Page 34 of Written By a Woman

Because I was hopeless for this man.

Ever since Mary had sent me that picture of him shirtless and poolside, I couldn’t get the image out of my head. It was like my brain had this override feature where whenever Zaid walked by my desk and gave me a shy smile in passing, my inner ho would screamremember what his happy trail looked like? And I’d become immediately flustered.

It was a problem, for a multitude of reasons.

Mostly because he didn’t exactly consent to Mary sending me a shirtless picture of himself. Also, he didn’t exactly consent to me writing about a guy who was the spitting image of him in my open-door romance novel.

I was disturbingly good at secretly crossing over some obvious boundaries when it came to Zaid Ansara.

In the couple of weeks after the horror that was my first livestream, I was still getting the occasional message or comment from readers asking who Zaid was, and if he was the real-life version of Zayne. It had been relatively easy to delete those comments from my posts without response, or to respond to direct messages with some sort of bull like, “Zayne is a fictional character who was made up in my big fat brain.”

Unfortunately, I had a feeling that I needed to make a more formal approach to get my readers to drop it, especially if my plan really was to continue with my publishing plans. I didn’t want to keep having a jump scare every time someone DM’d me about the CTO, and readers needed to not feel so comfortable prying into my—and also Zaid’s—personal lives.

Maybe doing another livestream (in the safety of my apartment, and nowhere else) to talk about where I am in the publishing process would help move their attention elsewhere.

“Don’t worry about it,” I waved him off with my handful of damp towels, “It’s my fault for not paying attention.” Zaid frowned a little, his brows scrunching behind the black frame of his glasses as he met my gaze.

…Were his ears pink? Was heblushing?

Oh, dear lord, maybe hewasstaring at more than the coffee stain before catching himself.

“Do you have anything else you can wear today?” Zaid asked, rubbing the side of his neck nervously before handing me more paper towels. I tossed the soiled ones before reaching for his, my fingers brushing against his hand accidentally, but also not so accidentally, if you get my drift.

His dark eyes met mine in the briefest of glances before he cleared his throat and looked over at our co-workers watching us fumble through this social interaction.

“I don’t, I guess I’ll just smell like coffee today.” I glanced behind me at Mary and Jamie, and I realized I was truly stuck with this. I was curvy, one of the larger women in the office. Even if the women in the room did have extra clothes, I wouldn’t fit in them.

“I have gym clothes if you need them,” Zaid shrugged.

Mary and Jamie weren’t moving, but all three of us froze for a moment at our CTO’s all-too-casual offer. He held a hand out after his question, his eyes flicking down to my chest before I handed him the newly soiled paper towels that he tossed in the bin for me.

“Gym clothes?” I asked, unsure if I heard or understood him correctly.

“Yeah,” his eyes widened as they met mine, “They’re not used or smelly. They’re freshly washed. I was going to go to the gym after work.” He shrugged a little, before rubbing his neck again, “I really am sorry about your dress.”

“Oh, um,” I shook my head once, “It’s fine. I appreciate the offer, and your gym clothes probably are comfier, but I think I’ll be okay.”

“No,” Zaid shook his head once, standing a little taller before he took a step towards the doorway, “I’ll go grab them for you. You shouldn’t have to wear wet clothes in the office all day.” And then Zaid turned on his heel and was gone without another word.

The three of us stood in silence before I slowly turned around to face my friends with an expression of disbelief on my face.

“Are you really going to wear Zaid’s clothes all day today?” Mary asked with a raised eyebrow and a casual sip of her coffee mug. Jamie’s mouth curved in a small smile at her question before taking a sip of her own.

“I think so?” I asked, blinking, “Am I allowed to do that?”

“Why wouldn’t you be?” Mary asked with confusion in her expression.

“I don’t know. Is that normal? What is the office etiquette for this situation?”

“Probably not to spill your coffee down the front of your dress in the first place, if I had to guess,” Mary shrugged, “Nice bra by the way.”

My jaw dropped before glancing down and yup, my white bra with red polka dots covering the cups was now officially visible, my dress now see-through even with the darker coffee stain wetting the material.

Oh,thisis why Zaid insisted on me changing, and probably why his eyes kept dropping to my chest earlier.

“Oh god!” I wheezed, immediately cupping my breasts in shock.

That was also the moment Zaid decided to walk back into the break room with a stack of folded clothing, freezing the moment his eyes landed on where my hands were eagerly grabbing the ladies.Jesus fucking Christ,did he have some weird sixth sense about Sun Steer employees behaving inappropriately in the break room, that made the man comerunning?

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