42:Creative

August 20

Checking the clock on the microwave, Charlie found the time was six forty-five and there was nothing else to do besides wait. 

In preparation for dinner, pasta was lying on the counter and waiting to be boiled while the sauce was in the microwave ready be warmed and salads were chilling in the refrigerator.  Her own personal preparations included dressing for an evening in – jeans and a black jersey knit tee accompanied by her usual makeup and jewelry while her hair flowed loosely.  Neither the food nor her ensemble were impressive, but both were good enough for a man whose primary objective tonight was sex.

It was oddly unnerving to sit around waiting for his arrival, perhaps because their previous “encounters” had only required that she show up and get naked.  Everything else had been left to him and now, with the shoe on the other foot, Charlie was unsettled by his potential reaction to the home that was still partially under construction.

When trying to pinpoint the exact reason why it bothered her so much, she finally decided it was less about the construction and more about the parts of the house that were already finished.  In their furnishings and décor, those areas revealed genuine bits of who she was beyond the bitch lawyer – especially her murals – and imagining how cruel he could be with that knowledge troubled her.

Assigning him the task of bringing wine might not have been the best idea.  It may have been better for her to have done it and already drunk a glass by the time he arrived. 

If he did arrive.

In all honesty, she was just a little bit drunk when she sent that first text last night.  Finding herself completely alone in the house for the first time in an eternity had Charlie heading to the liquor cabinet for a martini to enjoy while she finished the kitchen mural.  One turned into two, which turned into three, which turned into a little horny and thinking about the man who could undoubtedly solve that problem. 

It all started innocently enough.  She was thinking of him because she was horny, and then remembered the Vancouver flight at the airport.  Wishing him well with his show there and proving that she could be a decent person seemed perfectly reasonable to her.  When he asked if she was lonely, the martinis had given her enough leeway to teasingly ask about keeping her company.  She sure as hell hadn’t expected him to take her up on the offer.

The ringing of the doorbell removed any doubt that he had, indeed, taken her up on the offer and Charlie inhaled deeply before trekking barefoot from the kitchen through the unfinished living room to the foyer and the door.  Determined to be non-bitchy, she fixed a smile in place and turned the knob.

Jesus, Mary and Joseph.

Her smile slipped into more of a slack-jawed stupor when presented with the man on her doorstep.  It had only been a week since she’d seen him.  How could he look so damn good? 

A silver necklace laden with charms sat in the center of his chest.  That chest was exquisitely covered by a black formfitting t-shirt that also showed off broad shoulders, defined biceps and narrow waist before ending in the midst of his button fly.  The jeans fit almost as well as the shirt and, when throwing a pair of rock star black sunglasses on top of that, with silver locks casually tousled… 

If her fallopian tubes weren’t already tied, they would’ve immediately knotted into a pretty bow that gifted him her female parts.

“Hey.”

His quiet greeting interrupted her flight of fancy and jogged Charlie into jacking her smile up at the corners.  “Hey,” she returned cheerfully while stepping back so that he could enter.  “Come in, and overlook the mess.  A few rooms are still under construction and the living room is one of them.”

He paused in passing to dust her cheek with a kiss.  As far as kisses went, it was about as intimate as one he might give his grandmother, but it was much less stilted than his parting one last week.  The gesture felt natural instead of forced and carried with it the little zap of electricity that had become synonymous with his touch.  She would gladly accept a grandma kiss under those circumstances. 

“Kitchen this way?”

“Yeah.  Straight through.  You can’t miss it.”

Following along behind him, she saw that the jeans so perfectly molding his thighs were equally appealing from the back.  Charlie was no stranger to his ass at this point, and while it looked better in the buff, this wasn’t a bad second choice.

Jon put the wine on the island and turned to ask with mild surprise, “You’re cooking?  Why did I think you don’t cook?”

“I don’t cook,” she confirmed, circling around to the cabinet on the other side of the island to fetch wine glasses and an opener.  “I’m boiling pasta and heating up sauce that Lilah sent me.  I figure if it’s your dad’s, you’ll eat it.”

His chuckle resonated with a warmth that she wasn’t used to from him and, when she turned back around to slide the glasses onto the island, Charlie leaned her palms against the edge to study him for a moment.  He was a little tense, but not the kind of tense that prefaced him jumping down her throat.  It was more intense than tense, as though he was anticipating the evening’s finale as highly as she was. 

“What?” The question was posed as he slipped off the sunglasses and slid them on the counter beside the wine that Charlie noted was the one she’d preferred out of the offerings at his house last week.    

“I’m not sure how this plays out,” she confessed as he took up a similar stance on his side of the island.  “We’re doing the pretend date thing before we screw each other’s brains out and you take off?  Is it as basic as that?”

“You telling me what you want or asking me what I want?”

Jon posed the question conversationally, without any heat – it was his eyes that held the heat.  They smoldered like molten blue lava, and Charlie would give any amount of money to know what thoughts had started that lava bubbling.

It shivers racing down the backs of her thighs. 

“Asking.”

“That’s easy.  I want you.”  One corner of his mouth slanted up with amusement even as he cocked his head in a modified shrug.  “If I didn’t, I wouldn’t be here.” 

Blunt and to the point, but such a turn-on.  Hearing him say he wanted her as though it was obvious and a foregone conclusion – without qualifying that he hated it…  Well, considering their “relationship”, it was a compliment in the highest form and she couldn’t bring herself to let it pass without a similar concession.

“I’m glad you are,” she acknowledged quietly and slid the wine opener to him.  “Now open that bottle so we can pretend this niceness is the wine talking.”

He scooped it up with a laugh to say, “There’s nothing nice about what I wanna do to you, Counselor.”

She was tempted to take that innuendo all the way to its dirty conclusion, but for some reason she got stuck on the nickname he usually delivered with such disdain.

“You ever forget for a minute that I’m a lawyer?” Charlie put it out there lightly, but she really wanted to know the answer.  In the not-too-distant future, that the title would no longer be appropriate.

The lava wasn’t bubbling anymore when he flicked tempered blue eyes from the cork to her for a split second.  “I doubt I ever forget, but I don’t dwell on it.  The bitch lawyer became just the bitch when you started fighting me in bed instead of court.  I should probably update my phone contact, come to think of it.”

“You have me in your phone as ‘bitch lawyer’?” she laughed incredulously. 

“Yep.”  The cork popped free, and he laid it to the side and stretched to bring the glasses close.  “I’d wager to say there aren’t any hearts next to my number in your phone, either.”

There weren’t any hearts, but she also hadn’t gone so far as to assign him a completely anonymous identity.  “Just ‘Jon’, but I might have to reconsider that.”

“Don’t feel bad.  I’m a little more creative than the average person.  Songwriter, yanno.”

Accepting her glass with a murmured thanks, Charlie folded one arm over her waist and turned a scornful eye on him.  “You think I lack creativity, huh?  Lawyers are all cold hard facts and would love to see the arts die?”

He lifted a helpless hand while he swallowed.  “I’m not criticizing, believe it or not.  Some people are just aren’t born with it.”

Charlie’s mouther puckered as she bit back a smile, and she tipped her head toward the dining room.  With the it being on the opposite end of the kitchen from the living room, they hadn’t passed by the six-foot section of wall that was behind him and to his right.  “You happen to see that wall when you came in?”

“No.”  Jon turned to glance at it now, and then turned back a second time.  Still not satisfied, he picked up his wineglass and went to stand directly in front of her kitchen mural so that he could inspect it more closely.  “Is that..?  That’s my fucking driveway.”

Not exactly.  The grass and stepping-stones were from the side yard because she thought they’d be prettier in her kitchen than a gravel drive.  The leaded windows and portico roofline peeking above white lilac trees, though?  Those were definitely his driveway.

“It’s a reasonable facsimile,” she modestly conceded.  “I just finished it last night.”

He swung around to give her the same intense scrutiny he’d given the wall.  “You?  You did this?”

“Mhm.  Not bad for somebody who wasn’t creative enough to put ‘dickhead rockstar’ in her phone contacts, huh?” 

“Not bad at all,” he granted without being the least bit condescending.  “I’ve always wanted a Jersey tribute in my studio.  Sinatra, landmarks, and all that nostalgic shit.  There's no single wall big enough, so it would probably have to go over multiple surfaces.  Or on the ceiling.  Think you could do it?”

Drawing down her eyebrows in concentration, she wasn’t quite sure what to make of this man.  He didn’t curse, belittle or despise her.  He was speaking to her like a “real” person who might interest him beyond boobs and the goodies between her legs.  Talk about unnerving.

“After looking at the space and getting more specifics, I probably could.”

“Would you?  I’d pay you, of course.”

Jon emanated an excitement like she’d never seen from him.  It lit his eyes from the inside, making them both as bright as a summer sky at the same time it and twinkling like a set of Christmas lights.   Sullen and brooding, he was a mouth wateringly sexy man, but glowing with delight?  He was exquisitely beautiful, and damn if it didn’t do something to Charlie’s insides knowing she had something to do with that. 

She liked the feeling. 

A lot.

Putting her glass on the counter, she circled around the island and walked directly up to him.  One hand was lightly placed in the center of his chest, and she tipped back her head to offer a soft smile along with the suggestion, “How about you kiss me instead?”