Just Roommates

Chapter 10

Frightened, I shriek, dropping his boxers back into the washer and slamming the lid back in place. "Jesus! You scared me."

He chuckles, pushing his sweat-dampened hair back off his forehead. He looks a lot more relaxed than when he left, and for a very brief moment, I'm glad.

Then I remember his new pink laundry.

"Nope, not Jesus. Just me . . ." He places his hand flat on his chest. "Ian." I laugh, but it's forced, and he can tell. "I, uh, just came to check my laundry." He peers around me, one of his eyebrows arched high. "What are you doing?"

"Nothing," I answer a little too quickly, even going as far as to hop up onto the washer to keep him from getting to it. Yes, I realize how stupid that is.

"I'm going to need to get in there."

I shake my head vehemently. "No you don't."

"Steph?" He's advancing slowly toward me, and I begin to panic, my heart racing.

I give him my best puppy dog eyes; my parents used to fall for it all the time when I was younger, so I feel confident it'll work now. "Please, don't."

He smiles, his green eyes sparkling with nothing but mischief as he takes another step toward me. I'm still shaking my head, making myself somewhat dizzy, as he continues forward. I push myself back farther onto the washer, trying to make my body heavy and hanging onto the sides as he reaches out for me.

"Nonononono," I keep repeating over and over again. Of course, the minute the tips of his fingers touch the exposed sliver of skin between my tank top and shorts, I think about changing it to yesyesyesyesyes!

I'm no match for his football-player strength; he moves me with ease, even against my struggles to remain between him and the massacre beneath me. He sets me on the top of the dryer, my face in my hands but peeking at him through my fingers.

"You weren't trying to poach my laundry, were you?" he teases before opening the lid and seeing the problem. "Oh."

My hands fall from my eyes to cover my mouth as he slowly pulls out pink piece after pink piece of clothing. "I'm so sorry," I say, my voice muffled by my fingers. "I guess I was in such a rush to get my stuff out of there so you could use it that I missed a sock." He remains silent, and this scares me. "A-are you mad?"

He drops his hands immediately, his shirt collar still held tightly between his fingers, and looks at me. The minute his lips turn up into a smile, I let my hands fall to my lap, feeling slightly relieved. But only slightly. "They're just clothes, Steph."

"Yeah," I agree. "But they're pink."

"True. But no one needs to know that."

I drop my eyes to my fidgeting fingers. "Yeah, but I'll know."

Ian snickers. "You planning to start thinking about what color my underwear might be?" I inhale sharply, and he's quick to correct himself. "Sorry. That was . . . out of line."

"Uh, no, it's fine." Truthfully, if what he said was out of line, everything I've thought about him since the day we met has been so far over the line that I can't even see it anymore.

And I am most definitely wondering about the color of the underwear he's wearing right at this moment.

Ian starts pulling his clothes out of the washer, and I pull my legs up and crisscross them in front of me so he can load them into the dryer. He looks amused as he removes each piece of pink clothing. Some things are worse-off than others, being completely pink in color, while others look somewhat tie-dyed.