Page 43 of Interpreter

“That I want to have sex with him on this desk.”

A throat clears and I swear my heart stops beating until Gretchen kicks my chair, jolting it back to life.

“Tim, is it?” Her phone-sex voice is on level ten, but I don’t bother to tell her that Tim won’t be impressed. In fact, when I finally manage a peek at him, he’s not even looking at her. He’s staring me down with a smirk on his face.

“Tim Lambros,” he gruffs out after a moment, taking Gretchen’s hand in an awkward handshake that she makes weird.

“Milah was just telling me all about her new routine with you.”

Tim cocks his head to the side, sending me a look that asks,what the fuck is she talking about?

“We’re getting the hang of it,” he mutters, trying to sidestep her and failing. You know, I’ve never really just sat back and admired how well Tim lip-reads. It seems almost effortless and I know it can’t be. Lipreading is fucking hard. I’ve tried to do it a couple of times when I was watching Pe and Marcus argue in the bar. It was not easy at all. I ended up thinking Pe was straight and Marcus wanted to join the circus and train dolphins for a living. And, yes, I know dolphins aren’t in the circus. I asked Felipe about it later—about the dolphins—and he basically cried in my face laughing so hard. Apparently, Marcus called some guy “doll face” and that’s why Pe looked all murderous. Anyway, I’m just saying, it’s hard. So the fact that Tim can follow even a third of what Gretchen is prattling on about is pretty dang impressive.

“So, yeah, if you need anything, I’m right down the hall.” She folds his hand closed and gives it a squeeze. See? This is why you can’t tell Gretchen shit.

And, yes, I guess I am a little freaking jealous. Which is exactly what she’s trying to make me feel. She wants me to get jealous and grab her ass again to prove she’s right.

Does she wonder why he’s my co-teacher in the first place? Or why he lives at the McCallister-Jameson Foundation? Okay, so I’m sure she doesn’t, and, yes, it’s me who wonders about all these things. Especially about the foundation. I’ve heard things. Mostly about Anniston, whom they call “Commander.” Apparently, she only takes in homeless veterans or the ones that need help integrating back into the real world.

I have to know which one Tim was…. I’ve only been around him for a few days, and sure, the first day was a little rough, but he seems to function rather normally. So, was he homeless?

“It was nice to meet you too. Thanks again for the offer,” rumbles a sexy voice.

Wait. What offer? What the hell did Gretchen just offer him?

My eyes dart to the two just inside the door when Gretchen wiggles her fingers in a sneaky little wave. What the fuck did she offer him? Straightening, I watch the smug look take over my co-teacher’s face. Gah, I hope he was too far away and didn’t read my lips about banging him on this desk, but something tells me there’s a little too much pep in his step to not have seen anything. He caught something. Maybe not all of the words, but he caught some of them. Which ones is the question. A question I don’t think I want an answer to.

“Good morning, Ms. Iglesias.”

Yeah, he’s smug. His sexy rasp says it all. He saw me.

Time to do damage control. “I know you probably saw what I said.” Instinctually, I trail a finger over my lips, indicating that he read them, but instead of maintaining that smugness, his expression falls serious and his jaw clenches.

“Aww, look. You have a wrinkle when you frown too.”

The bastard winks at me, his cockiness instantly back in full effect.Please buckle your seat belt, Mr. Lambros is one crazy ride.“It’s a crease, not wrinkle,” he corrects.

It’s a fucking wrinkle to me. No woman in their twenties should have a wrinkle. I blame the Costa Rican sun.

“It’s a wrinkle,” I argue one last time before I let the shit go.

“So….” He trails off, eyeing my desk, moving closer. “You cleaned your desk off, I see.”

My head drops back and I sigh a long, drawn-out sound before sucking it up and facing him. I see how he’s going to be. “I know you read my lips.” I eye him hard. “Which is really astounding that you managed to do it from the door but let me clear it up for you.” I try to ignore him crossing those huge arms in front of his chest casually as if we’re talking about the lunch menu. “I don’t want to have sex with you….” I cringe and look at the desk he takes a seat on. He’s right, I did clean it off, but it wasn’t because I planned on doing him on it. “On the desk.”

The man who smiles so little folds over and barks out this deep, throaty laugh that legit sends tingles to the end of my fingers. It takes him a minute to get it together, but when he does, he faces me, a faint blush across his cheeks. “Does that mean you want to have sex with me somewhere else? Is that what you mean?”

The annoying man doesn’t give me time to respond as he pushes off the desk and gets right in my face. Our breaths meet in between us and, for some reason, words freaking escape me. “What about the piano? Would that be more your style?”

And… we’ve crossed a line.

A big, fat, Costa Rican line.

But do I stop it?

Hell to the no, I don’t.

Instead, I feel his chest rise against mine, his warm breath fanning along my throat, holy—“Milah? Everything okay?”

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