Page 17 of The Perfect Distraction

Is he smiling because of my nipples? Ha! Don’t be ridiculous! Since he’d been nice enough to check on her, she decided she owed him an explanation. “I was having a nightmare, but I didn’t realize I was shouting.”

Leaning back against the kitchen counter, Colton seemed in no hurry to leave.

“You were, but I couldn’t make out the words.”

Thank God! “Well, as you can see, I’m perfectly fine, so you can go back to bed now.”

“I wasn’t really sleeping anyway,” he said.

“Oh. Are you a night owl?”

“Never used to be, but I don’t sleep as well these days.”

“Ah,” she said, thinking it probably had something to do with the divorce.

“I’m still not used to sleeping alone.”

And there it was, the full admission, although why did it give her a twinge in her southern hemisphere?

“Me neither,” she said and then averted her eyes. Damn! It had just slipped out. She couldn’t be held responsible for anything she said or did after midnight. She wasn’t herself then.

“I never thought to ask. Were you married before too?”

“Me? No. Not at all,” she said, throwing her arms out wide and temporarily forgetting about her nipples.

Colton laughed. “Not at all, huh? So, not even a tiny bit?”

Later, she would blame it on the late hour and the fact that he seemed genuinely concerned about her. Whatever the reason, she found herself opening up to him—a little.

“I had a fiancé once. Does that count?”

Colton didn’t flinch. “What happened?”

“Things didn’t work out,” she said, reluctant to say more. She barely knew this man, after all, even though she was talking to him in her pajamas. With that thought, she covered her chest again.

Pushing off the counter, he said, “You know what? It’s really none of my business, and it’s late. I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

She nodded, wondering why she wasn’t ready for him to leave yet. He’d just taken a step toward the door when she said, “Since you’re here, we might as well discuss Joey’s next tutoring session.”

“Okay. What does the rest of your week look like?”

Besides the usual, reading, eating, lounging, and more reading, she didn’t have anything planned. Some might call it laziness. She called it summer vacation. “I’m pretty much wide open,” she said and then instantly regretted it. He must have thought that she had no life whatsoever outside of teaching.

Suddenly, Colton’s eyes lit up, and he rasped his hand over the stubble on his chin. She’d been trying not to look at him too closely, but the move drew her eyes right to his full lips. Stop it!

“I’ve got an idea. On Thursday evenings, Joey and I usually go into town for Music in the Streets.”

“What’s that?”

“It’s where local musicians play on the sidewalks and people just stroll around and listen.”

Is he asking me out? Is it because it’s after midnight? Does he feel like he knows me better now that he’s seen me in my pajamas? “Not sure how this pertains to Joey’s tutoring,” she said, arching her brows.

Colton chuckled for the second time that night. “Sorry. I was thinking that maybe you could tutor him in the afternoon and then we could meet up for dinner and go to the music festival.”

“Oh.”

“Unless you’d rather not.”