"Which way to his bedroom?" She jerked a thumb in Ty's direction. Jack looked at Ty, then looked at Julie, and quickly figured out who the boss was. "Last door down the hall to the left.
"Thanks." Julie headed through his house as if she owned it.
"Dude, you have all the luck," his friend said.
"Don't I know it," Ty said, grinning. And he was going to get even luckier.
"You should really charge a fee," she said when he caught up to her in the hallway, then stopped at the threshold of his bedroom so suddenly, he nearly plowed into her. The decorating was a little over the top, but what did he care? The master suite was for shut-eye and sex. Besides, the women he brought back seemed to expect every stop to be pulled out: 8oo-threadcount sheets, a roaring fireplace, views, a deck, a bathtub big enough for half his team, a shower with ten jets.
The best part of all was that he'd bought the house with cash.
Which meant no one could take it away from him.
Julie was holding on to the door frame so tightly, her knuckles had gone white. Somehow he had a feeling she wasn't bowled over by the opulence. She'd grown up in a fancy house. She must be freaking out over the bed, probably having dirty thoughts about what she wanted to do to him between the sheets.
If he wanted to move into her good graces, and thus her bed, he needed to stop messing with her. But he'd been acting like a smart-ass for way too long to stop himself now. Putting his hand on the small of her back, he gently pushed her into the room. He walked over to the bed, which his housekeeper hadn't made yet. Tucking a pillow back up against the antique wroughtiron headboard, he looked up at her.
"I could use a little help here."
She blinked, her eyes faintly wild. "With what?"
"The bed."
She took a step back and he gave her a knowing look.
"Has anyone ever told you that you have a dirty mind?"
In an instant she became the prim Little Miss Perfect he remembered from high school. "Of course not," she snapped.
"All I'm asking you to do is help me make the bed."
He watched her war with herself and realize that she couldn't refuse his request. It would only make her seem like she really did have a dirty mind.
She walked over to the other side of the bed and shoved his sheets into place with ill grace. She threw the duvet cover onto her half of the bed, then spun around and made a beeline for his walk-in closet.
"No, no, no, and most definitely no," she said as she shoved hangers around, taking her anger out on his clothes. "Do you even own anything appropriate?"
"If you mean boring, then no."
She waved dismissively at all of his clothes. "You can't wear any of this. Not if we ever expect you to be taken seriously."
He was surprised that she was turning her nose up at his designer clothes; she knew quality when she saw it. So what was her problem?
"Don't worry about what Bobby said," he teased. "You'll still look better than me, no matter what I'm wearing."
She looked up toward the ceiling as if praying for guidance. "It's my job to make sure that you don't look like you should have a pop starlet hanging off your arm who's been buying your clothes off a runway."
Not the most flattering picture, but it drove the point home.
"Have you been to a funeral recently?" she asked.
One corner of his mouth curved up. "Is that a hint?"
She furrowed her brow before realization dawned in her blue eyes. "Maybe," she said, "but only if you give me any trouble."
He liked it when she teased him back. He crooked a finger at her to follow him.
"This way."
He took her into a small closet in a room across the hall, one where they both barely fit. He liked the vibe in here, the two of them so very close. She smelled flowery, yet sultry. He wanted to pull her close, breathe in her hair, push it to the side, taste her neck, find out all over again where her most sensitive spots were. He wanted to push back one of those boring suits she was going to go nuts over and take her hard and fast against the wall. He could already picture her legs wrapped around his waist, her head thrown back, how damn good it would feel when he slid into her.
"Thank God," she said as she pulled out a basic navy pinstriped suit. "I was worried you didn't have any clothes that didn't scream pimp."
That snapped him out of his extremely pleasant fantasy. Though maybe she did have a point. He'd never been all that comfortable in the designer clothes that his stylist picked out for him. He hadn't even wanted a stylist in the first place, but his agent had insisted.
Clearly, having Julie around wasn't all bad. Especially if she could do some dirty work for him.
"My stylist isn't going to be too happy with you."
She handed him several conservative suits. "She's fired."
He held back a grin. Who else did he need to get rid of? The guy who cut his hair was kind of annoying too.
"Bring these out, then grab anything else you need," she said. "I'll be waiting in your living room." He hadn't realized until now how sick he was of everyone doing his bidding without question. It also kind of got his motor running to be bossed around by her. Still, keeping her on her toes was an important part of the dance she probably didn't even realize they were doing.
"I've got some bathing suits that you might fit into if you want to hang out by the pool." The disgusted look on her face was so cute, he nearly grabbed her and kissed it off.
"First of all, I wouldn't wear one of the thong bikinis from one of your 'girlfriends' "—she put the word in quotes—"if everything else I owned went up in flames."
He nodded. "That's cool. I get it. Girls with dirty minds like you always want to skinny-dip." She ignored his dig. "You have fifteen minutes to get your stuff together, then we're out of here."
"Just one problem with that," he said.
She sighed a big, chest-heaving sigh that did magnificent things to her br**sts. "Why am I not surprised that there's a problem? What is it this time?"
"Bobby's impromptu meeting cut into my workout, and working out is part of my job description."
"How long will that take?"
"A hundred laps usually takes forty-five minutes. I could sprint some of them if you're in a rush to get somewhere."
"No," she said, "We've got all the time in the world." Wrong. Two weeks wasn't nearly enough time to convince her to give in to what she really wanted. Him.
In her bed.