Page 7 of Late Nights

“I scheduled a tour to see the San Francisco Institute of Esthetics and Cosmetology Wednesday afternoon. I’m hoping to enroll there and get started as soon as possible,” I said, the excitement bubbling out of me. “Although, I’ll need to get a loan because I don’t have any money. Which reminds me that I need to find a job…” My voice trailed off.

Chewing on my bottom lip, I worried how I would find a job when I had no work experience.

“Let’s worry about one thing at a time.” He stood up from the bed and eyed my suitcase, still full of shoes. “First, finish unpacking. Then you can start thinking about what comes next.”

I nodded. “That’s probably smart.”

He gave me his full smile, and my heart skipped a beat. “I’ll leave you alone now. Welcome to the apartment.”

I stared at him as he turned to leave, not able to form words after getting the full Cannon James smile.

For a second there, I’d thought that living with Cannon wasn’t going to be as difficult as I had earlier believed. But with that smile of his, he was as enticing as ever. And I worried that he would only become more so the more time we spent together.

3

Demi

As I sat on the couch watching some new romance movie on Netflix, I wasn’t thinking about Cannon.

Okay, fine, I was totally thinking about him.

It had been two days since I’d seen him for more than a quick hello in passing. It almost felt like he was avoiding me, but I didn’t have any reasons to support that theory. Why would he want to avoid me? If anyone needed to avoid someone, it was me. I was the one who had a stupid crush on him with all his handsomeness and kindness. It was probably brotherly kindness. Blech.

I had told West I thought of Cannon like a brother, but that was a complete lie. It was such a huge lie that I had been worried they had all seen it on my face and been seconds from calling my bluff, but they’d all seemed to believe me.

But what if Cannon hadn’t? What if Cannon knew I had a crush on him?

Oh, my gosh! What if that was why he was avoiding me like the plague?

I buried my head in my hands at the thought, embarrassment prickling my skin. I had tried not to stare at him too much or blush when he flashed his sigh-inducing smile, but I was only human. It would help if he were a jerk, but he’s not. He’s always been so kind to me. Never once treated me like an annoying younger sister.

Granted, over the years we hadn’t spent that much time together. It had only been in the last couple years that we’d had conversations without West present. And those conversations had been short.

Come to think of it, despite having known Cannon for ten years, I didn’t really know him that well.

And here I was crushing on him, mainly because of his looks. How shallow was I? Ugh. I was twenty-six years old. I shouldn’t put so much stock in looks.

Cannon was hard not to look at, though. I’d heard from more than one woman that he was Henry Cavill’s doppelgänger, and I had to agree. The dark hair, the blue eyes, the chiseled body. I’d challenge any woman to be in the same room as a guy who looked like Henry and not have your heart rate spike and your skin feel feverish.

Cannon was hot. There was no denying I was attracted to him, shallow though I may have been.

Maybe my crush wasn’t a crush after all—it was just attraction. That’s all this was. I could deal with that. I wasn’t a horrible person for being attracted to someone. I could move past it. I could get used to living with a gorgeous man. I could focus on other things, like starting hair school and finding a job. And not on the sexy man who slept just a few feet away.

Plus, I wasn’t sure how West would feel about me obsessing over his best friend. Yes, Cannon was West’s best friend. And yes, he truly did think of him as his brother. But Cannon’s reputation with women wasn’t what some would call great. In all the time I’d known him, he’d never had a long-term girlfriend. Never brought a girl to our monthly family dinners. From what I’d been able to pick up on through conversations I’d overheard between the two of them or comments made by West, Cannon never dated the same girl more than two or three times.

Between focusing on my new path and knowing that my brother might not be thrilled about my not-so-sibling feelings toward Cannon, that should be plenty to keep me busy and away from my hot roommate.

Feeling confident in my new resolve, I lifted my head out of my hands and relaxed back into the couch.

The movie wasn’t interesting enough to pull me into the story. I kept getting distracted, wondering what time it was and why Cannon wasn’t home yet. No matter how many times I repeated to myself that I had no claim to know his whereabouts or his schedule, I couldn’t stop thinking about it.

Was he out with some girl? Probably. When you looked like him, you could have any girl you wanted.

If he wasn’t out with a girl, who else would he be hanging out with? I knew for a fact that West was already asleep upstairs in Halle’s room. And don’t ask me how I knew that. Their activity before sleeping was unfortunately not as quiet as I’m sure they intended. Those vents really must have been very poorly done. I remembered West telling me that before he and Halle had gotten together, they had been able to have full on conversations through the vents.

Now I got to experience the joy of those vents firsthand. I had to eventually run out of the room with my hands over my ears, yelling la-la-la-la before hurrying to put the TV on to cover up any possible noises making their way through the vents.

I picked up my phone and tapped on the screen, checking the time again.

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