Page 31 of Tight Spot

He was far too large, far too masculine to have his large palm on anything, and yet touched it with a gentleness I wouldn’t have expected him capable of.

“What are you currently working on?”

I checked my watch and noticed it was well past closing. I’d spent almost an hour showing him my store, and he hadn’t once seemed rushed or annoyed I was taking so long.

“Let me lock up and I’ll show you.” I grabbed the keys out of my pocket.

“You need to go?”

Isaac was out of town, so I was planning on spending a few hours in the back, but I never used my workroom when I was alone in the store with doors unlocked. I might have been independent, but I wasn’t stupid.

For Dawson and whatever we needed to discuss or do, I’d put it off.

“I’m good.” He waited by the counter while I locked the front door and flipped the open sign to Closed. Then I dimmed the lights, to discourage anyone else who might not see my posted hours or the Closed sign. It was amazing how often it happened.

“Come on.”

I led him to the back, a narrow hallway I used for storage and a bathroom, and then unlocked the workroom door. Behind it was the door to the back parking lot, so it was always locked when I wasn’t in it. I stepped in and squirmed internally.

No one had ever shown so much interest. My friends, yes, and Meredith would often sit with me while I worked especially during Tuevo’s season, and he was on the road. But it hit me, I’d never had a man in this space. Certainly never Darrick. He’d never once given a shit about my passion or my business. He hadn’t even shown up when I had my grand opening celebration.

Red flags. Red flags had flown in my face so often I must have been color blind to not see them.

My throat closed as Dawson stepped in behind me and sucked in all the oxygen in the large but disorganized and messy and dirty wreck of a workroom.

“It’s kind of a mess,” I said and spun my keys around my thumb. “And it doesn’t look like much, but I guess, yeah…this is where I do most of the work.”

“It ventilated?”

He had tipped his chin to meet my eyes and then scanned the room.

“Um. Yeah?”

“You work with all those chemicals. That can’t be safe.”

Was he…worried about me?

I showed him the masks I used, the fans. “Bigger pieces I sometimes take out back to sand, but that’s just to make clean up easier, but the door opens and there’s the window. I’m good, Dawson.”

He shoved his hands to his hips. Frowned. “Good. That’s good.”

God, he was gorgeous. Aloof and growly, but so damn gorgeous. I stood by the door as he wandered around the room, not all of it, because it was half the size of my store, but I needed the space to hold everything I’d bought and was working on. He took in everything with an intensity I hadn’t expected, a natural curiosity.

“I gotta say, and you don’t need my approval or shit, but this is damn impressive. Really fucking cool what you do.”

A knot in my chest that I hadn’t realized was there loosened, making breathing easier.

I didn’t need his approval, but damn…it felt good to have it.

“Thanks.” I grinned then and froze as he headed my way. Our gazes met, his dark, almost black eyes and that glint of the nose ring. I licked my lips as he came closer. Couldn’t be helped.

He made my mouth water and my throat dry at the same time and my fingers itched, burned and pulsed to do exactly what Misty suggested and rub my hands all over him.

“So, what should we do then?” I asked, because there were ideas flashing in my mind at a rapid pace giving me so many suggestions.

“I’m not sure what we should do,” Dawson whispered, and his quiet voice was a rumble that shot a spike of arousal straight to my core. “But I know what I want to do.”

“What?” He was in front of me now. So large and broad-shouldered and sexy, and damn, I really wished his hair was down.

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