Relentless(9)
“Oh, shit. Sorry. I didn’t know that.” He looks over his shoulder to see if it’s safe to flip a U-turn out of the parking lot. “Where do you want to go?”
“I’m only kidding, but I had Buddy’s a couple of days ago. Can we go somewhere else?”
He pulls back out onto Lumina and shakes his head. “Oh, you think that’s funny, making me think I’m about to kill you for the second time.” I shrug as he turns the truck around and heads back toward our apartment. “All right, jokester, I’ve got one for you. Why are E.T.’s eyes so big?”
“Duh. Because he saw the phone bill. Please, I’ve heard that one a billion times.”
“Okay, what did the pony say when he had a sore throat?” He pauses for a moment then says, “I apologize. I’m a little horse.”
“Are you ten years old?”
He laughs and I can’t help but smile as I shake my head. “I’ve got some better jokes, but I like to start with the clean ones.”
“Thanks. I appreciate that.”
I want to ask him what he does for a living, but I’m afraid that will lead into what he went to school for. Then that will lead back to why I dropped out. I try to think of a nonstandard date question, but my head feels all cloudy just from being near him and I’m having a hard time focusing.
He pulls into our apartment complex a few minutes later and parks his car. “You’ve probably been to all the restaurants around here a million times. I’m going to make you some lunch.”
“Wow. You don’t waste any time, do you?”
He throws open his door and glances over his shoulder at me. “I said I wanted to be your friend, Claire. I have no intention of trying to sleep with you.”
I’m not sure I totally buy that, but I’ll go along with it. I’m starving.
“If this is just a friendly thing, can I invite Cora?” I ask as we cross the driveway.
“You’re going to make her walk up all those stairs?”
“Oh, right.”
Well, there goes my big plan to use Cora as a buffer. My stomach tightens more with each step and I begin to shiver the moment I see the stairs. He climbs a few steps and turns around when he doesn’t hear me behind him.
“Are you coming? I promise to be good.” He winks as he says this and I can’t believe the nerve of this guy.
What’s worse is that I feel drawn to him. I want to follow him into his apartment.
“You’re not going to poison me, are you?”
“I’m going to poison you with my charm, but only if you keep stalling. Come on.”
I take the first step and Chris’s voice echoes inside my head.
“I guess I’ll let you sleep and maybe when you wake up you’ll chill the fuck out and realize that just because someone’s nice to you it doesn’t mean they want to fuck you. Or you can come downstairs and hang out and maybe I’ll play you a song.”
I should have gone to sleep that day and I’m beginning to think I should have stayed asleep today.
Chapter Five
Relentless Questions
MY JAW DROPS THE MOMENT we step inside his apartment. The living room looks like the cover of a beach home magazine. One day after moving in and he already has everything in its place, save for a few empty broken down cardboard boxes in the corner next to a sleek drafting table. His apartment makes our apartment downstairs look like it was designed by six-year-olds.
“Holy shit,” I whisper as he makes his way toward the kitchen. “This is amazing.”
He smiles as he glances over his shoulder and the dimple on his right cheek quirks up. “I plan on staying here a while.”
I follow him into the kitchen and I’m surprised at what he’s been able to do with the limited space. He has a fancy stainless steel refrigerator and his countertops are completely free of clutter. The only items on his counter are a coffee machine and a cordless phone. He pulls something out of a cupboard over the sink and I laugh when I see the box of macaroni and cheese in his hand.
“Is that what you’re planning to make?”
“Hey, I never said I could cook. I just said I’d make you lunch. You can’t expect me to be good at everything or this will never work.”
I take a seat on a barstool at the breakfast bar as he begins to prepare our gourmet lunch. “So what else are you good at?”
This is probably a bad question to ask while trapped inside his apartment, but it’s safer than asking him what he does for a living.
“Oh, I’m sure you’ll figure that out soon enough.”
“You know, you don’t have to answer every question with a sexual innuendo. I get it.”