Page 19 of Honk if You Love Real Men (Tempting SEALs 1)

Chapter Five

There was a chest at her peephole. Estrella knew instantly that the chest belonged to Jesse. But when he stepped back in the hallway, giving her a view of the rest of him, the air went out of her lungs. Her fingers and toes and tongue—even, seemingly, every hair on her body—curled.

His face tilted toward the peephole. “Estrella?”

“Yes. Give me a moment.” All ten fingers were wound around the handle of a mop. She pried off five to unlock and open the door, looking over her shoulder at the apartment. She’d lapsed in her weekly chores and had spent the day catching up. Eve would expect the place to be perfect when she arrived home tomorrow.

Estrella absolutely could not invite Jesse inside.

She peered around the edge of the steel door. Clearly, he’d come straight from work. The orange vest was gone, but his blue T-shirt and jeans were ripe with the day’s sweat and dirt. A damp stain around the collar testified that he’d washed up as best he could.

“Jesse.” She widened the door. “Come in.”

He hesitated, looking through to the shining apartment, an ice palace with white marble floors, spans of glass and mirror, and walls so pale, it was nearly impossible to discern they were blue. “No, thanks. I’m a mess. I only dropped by to—” He pulled an arm out from behind his back. “—give you these.”

Flowers? Estrella’s eyes widened. A half-dozen sunflowers, big and gaudy as Mexican dinner plates, wrapped in green tissue.

“I chose wrong,” he said, frowning at the apartment.

“They’re beautiful. They’re perfect.” She put every emotion into her voice as she took the paper cone and it seemed to her that the vastly unoriginal and inadequate words rose out of her to bob in the air like helium balloons. “I love them. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” He smiled with one side of his mouth. The wry side. “I’m not really the kind of guy who brings flowers, but they seemed like ones you’d like.” His eyes went again to the apartment.

She shoved the mop aside. “You caught me playing Cinderella. Are you sure you won’t come in? I don’t mind that you’re di-dirty.” Her tongue stumbled. She colored, certain that he remembered how she’d told him she wanted to get dirty with him. “I, um, owe you an apology for . . . you know. And I’d rather do it inside.” Was that also suggestive? “I’d rather we sat down, I mean.”

She walked away from the door, juggling the flowers as she wiped her hands on the back of her jeans. “Take a seat. I want to pop these in a vase.”

The apartment was open concept, so she had no reprieve from his tracking gaze even in the kitchen area, which had been designed to disappear within the sleek modern decor. Estrella had never seen a less kitcheny kitchen. She’d taken days to learn the whereabouts of the few usable cabinets with their touch latches cleverly hidden in the seamless expanse of high-gloss surfaces.

While she filled a crystal vase at the tap, she smiled nervously at Jesse, perched uncomfortably on a low Barcelona chair made of bands of woven white leather and crisscrossed steel legs that looked like they might snap under his weight.

Why had he returned, and with flowers? The flowers were either a last shot at getting into her pants or a sign that he had actual feelings for her. Both options put her on guard.

She plunked the vase on the granite countertop. The sunflowers were glaringly out of place here, but they’d cheer her own drab place immensely once she got them home. Lavish arrangements of white lilies and roses were placed around Eve’s apartment. As she’d instructed, they’d been freshly delivered that morning to be at their peak for her arrival.

Jesse had noticed. He rubbed a finger behind his ear, staring at the bowl of white roses on the glass coffee table. “I really got it wrong.”

“No, you didn’t.” Estrella wondered if she should explain, but decided not to. Better to wait and see what he wanted.

She seated herself on the sofa, dread growing as she thought of the doorman downstairs. He was a friend, but she couldn’t expect him to cover for her. Bad enough that he’d stopped her that morning and wordlessly, amusedly, handed over a small envelope that turned out to contain her ripped panties. “How did you, ah, find me?”

“The doorman wasn’t too sure about letting me up,” Jesse admitted. “I look disreputable, huh? He even tried to deny you live here, but I pointed out the mailbox label for E. Romero on the sixteenth floor.”

Estrella blinked.

“That’s you, right? I guessed it had to be.”

“You found me.” She knitted her fingers in her lap. Okay, what now? Her eyes went to his arms. The wave tattoo was covered by a short sleeve, but on the other arm were two marks, not even remotely threatening in the light of day. “About the other night,” she started.

“Forget it. I understand. You changed your mind.”

“Not exactly. It wasn’t that I stopped wanting you.” Oh God. She flushed. His face drew her eyes and she had to force them back to the tattoos that hardly seemed to matter anymore. “To be honest, I still want you. Just looking at you makes me—” Sweat.

“Makes me remember. How it was.” She blew out a breath. “And then you bring flowers.” Her head bowed. “It was just . . . I had a moment of panic. Because of your tattoos.”

He nodded.

“Irrational, hm? But that was it.” She lifted her hands,

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