Total pages in book: 27
Estimated words: 25182 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 126(@200wpm)___ 101(@250wpm)___ 84(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 25182 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 126(@200wpm)___ 101(@250wpm)___ 84(@300wpm)
He smirks. “That’s a damn shame.”
The soft, unmistakable sound of a dog whimpering comes from a nearby room. I haven’t even met Hunter’s dogs yet, and I’m already pretty sure I’m going to adore them.
“You should go down the hall and take a warm shower. I’ll get started on that pizza,” he says.
I nod, accepting that I’ve been dismissed for now. Not that I mind. A warm shower sounds amazing after the day I’ve had.
I follow his directions through a massive bedroom with a king-size sleigh bed. The blankets are rumpled like he’s a restless sleeper. I have an overwhelming desire to test the mattress and see if the bed is as soft and plushy as I imagine.
The idea of being tangled up under those blankets with Hunter pops into my brain, and I push the image away. I can’t be thinking like that right now. I have a life to get back to after this.
Shaking my head, I pad into the ensuite bathroom with the huge glass shower stall. I start the water, turning it to extra hot before I peel my wet clothes from my body.
There are no girly shampoos or soaps in the shower stall. The scant few products scattered in the shower and on the bathroom counter all have masculine packaging and woodsy smells.
I take my time in the shower, letting the hot water loosen my tense muscles and warm me up from the outside in. When I’ve finally regained feeling everywhere, I wrap a thick, fluffy towel around myself. As I do, I can’t help but wonder what Hunter would look like in just a towel and nothing else.
I shouldn’t do what I do next, but I can’t help myself. I go through his bathroom cabinets looking for evidence of a woman. There are no pink razors or tampons. There’s no extra toothbrush or even a different brand of toothpaste.
Relieved that he’s single for reasons I don’t want to think too deeply about, I pad to his walk-in closet. I grab a faded, flannel shirt that’s almost long enough to be a dress on me.
I wrap it around my body, noticing the way the buttons pull tight across the chest. I like the feeling of wearing his clothes and the way that I smell like him now that I’ve used his shampoo and soap.
Delicious scents of garlic and Parmesan cheese waft through the air ducts. My stomach growls, but since he’s still cooking, I take my time examining his bedroom too.
Dog-eared books are stacked on his bedside table. On the top of the stack is a photo of him with two other men that look just like him. His brothers, if I had to guess. There’s loose change on the top of his dresser and a bottle of beard oil left out. All of these little touches make me smile.
I’m used to being on picture-perfect sets that are carefully curated to appeal to the target demographic. The sets never feel lived in. Even my apartment is like that. I spend most of my time filming. There doesn’t seem to be a reason to decorate it or make it my own.
But this space feels real. It feels lived in, and the coziness wraps around me like a cocoon. No wonder he wants to spend all his time away from civilization up here in these mountains. I’d want the same thing if I had a cabin like this.
I follow my nose into the kitchen to find Hunter kneading dough on the kitchen island. I watch his biceps move wondering what it would be like to have his strong hands massaging my body.
When he finally looks up from the dough he’s been working on, he has a streak of flour on his cheek.
“You didn’t have to go to all this effort. Frozen pizza would have been fine,” I say, touched that he cared this much. Bobby never would have done anything like this for me. He wouldn’t have taken an hour out of his busy schedule to handmake me a pizza.
At this point, I’d be impressed if Bobby even knew my favorite type of pizza. It’s almost like Hunter is reading my mind when he says, “You should be with a man who delights in satisfying you in every way.”
I know he’s talking about more than pizza and part of me wonders what it would be like if he did satisfy me. But that’s not a road I can go down right now. So, I clear my throat and change the subject. “Who taught you how to make pizza?”
“My foster mother, Emma May,” he says, his voice softening when he says her name. “Christmas was hard for me the year I came to her. She asked what I wanted to eat for the holiday dinner, and I told her all I wanted was a pepperoni pizza.”