Total pages in book: 110
Estimated words: 106774 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 534(@200wpm)___ 427(@250wpm)___ 356(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 106774 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 534(@200wpm)___ 427(@250wpm)___ 356(@300wpm)
“Are you sure you’re okay?” I ask as she sits up.
“Yeah.” She glances down at the front of her shirt. It’s soaked from the water that was in her hand, and a dark smudge streaks down the right side of her chest. She groans again. “Oh, great. What is that? Mud?”
I shove my tongue in my cheek and decide if I should tell her that the streak isn’t from mud.
Astrid pulls the fabric away from her body, giving me a clear view of the tops of her round tits.
Heat creeps up my neck as I try to look away. Suddenly, she’s not a shrew, and she’s not the woman I work with. She’s a verifiable fox. I can’t stop myself from imagining my hands on her body, her nipples in my mouth, and the sound of her voice as she moans.
“What is that?” she asks with a shrillness to her tone that snaps me right out of my daydream.
“What’s what?”
She points. “That.”
I try my absolute hardest not to laugh. “That? That’s rabbit poop.”
She scoots back like it’s a pile of poison with the ability to reach out and bite her. The color in her face drains. Her fingers lose their grip on her shirt, and it falls against her again. She squeals, pulling it away from her skin.
It’s fucking adorable.
“Can I get rabies from this?” she asks.
“No, you cannot get rabies from this.” I twist my lips together, but the laughter comes anyway. “You’ll be fine.”
She hops up and backward, putting more distance between herself and the small pile of shit. “Seriously? I might throw up.”
“Hey, at least it’s not dysentery,” I joke.
“This isn’t funny, jackass.”
I clear my throat, trying to be serious. “You’re right. We’ll head back to the house, and you can get cleaned up.”
“I can’t wait that long. I have … poop on me.” She shivers. “What am I going to do?” she whines. “If I had a sports bra on, I’d just take my shirt off.”
“Not a bad idea.”
She cocks her head to the side and glares at me.
“Hey, leave it on and risk rabies,” I say, holding my hands at my chest. “It’s up to you.”
“Remember when I said I hated you less? I didn’t mean it.”
I grin smugly at her as I reach for the hem of my T-shirt. “I’m pretty sure you clarified that then.”
Her eyes drop to my waist. It feels like trails of lava are left on my skin as she drags her gaze up my body along with my shirt. Over my abs, up my torso, and across my shoulders. Her lips are parted when I ball it in my hands and smirk at her.
“Take your shirt off and you can wear mine,” I say, holding it out to her.
She swallows. “Then what are you going to wear?”
“Are you offended by me being shirtless?”
She rolls her eyes but takes my offering without touching me. “Turn around.”
Sure. Take the fun out of it. I twist on my heel. Taking the fun out of things really is her forte.
I watch the afternoon sun shine through the trees, casting shadows on the forest floor—and try to forget that Astrid is topless just feet behind me. I’m only a man, after all. One who just realized today that his assistant is fucking hot.
“Okay,” she says. “You can turn around.”
I do and find her shirt and bra hanging off her fingers. My tee is tied in a knot at her belly button, the fabric drawn to her middle, showcasing the natural shape of her tits. They’re rounded and hang in a sexy drop. Her nipples strain against the cotton.
Thank God I wore gray and not black today.
“Don’t make this weird,” she says, trudging by me to the side-by-side.
“There’s not a damn thing weird about this.”
“You’re making it weird.”
I bite my bottom lip to keep from smiling and climb into the seat beside her. She places a hand over her chest and lifts a brow at me.
“Try not to Indy 500 it back to the house, please,” she says. “As you’re well aware, I don’t have a bra on.”
“Who said I was aware of that?”
I look at her over my shoulder and find her fighting a grin, too.
“Thanks for telling me.” I shift the transmission into drive. “That’s good to know.”
“Gray!” she squeals, breaking into a fit of laughter as I stomp on the gas.
The sound of her laughter follows us all the way home. And despite thoroughly enjoying that Astrid can laugh at the situation, it also causes a knot to form in the bottom of my gut.
My assistant is not only a smoke show, but she’s also really fucking funny. Fuck me.
CHAPTER
TWENTY
Astrid
“I’ll learn to play euchre, but I want to be on your team,” I say to Hartley.
“Fine by me,” Gray says, sitting back in the kitchen chair. Still shirtless. “I don’t want to be your partner anyway. You can’t even walk and talk without falling into a pile of rabbit shit.”