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He jumped, and she thought she heard a little gasp. But he didn’t stop her as she stripped him of the offending garment. She was so taken with what lay beneath, she let the jacket slip from her fingers.
Oh, he did work out. Yes indeedy. Those broad shoulders needed no help from padding. Her fingers itched to keep on going. To take off the purple tie, un-button the oxford shirt. Touch the heat of his flesh. But since she didn’t want him to run screaming to the police, she did the next best thing. She looked down at his butt.
Slim hips. Nice, nice, nice. And what an ass. She knew. She was something of a connoisseur when it came to that part of the anatomy, and if his wasn’t worthy of a ten-minute standing ovation, then nothing was.
God, what an incredible hypocrite she was. She hated it when men were only interested in her body, either pro or con. Thought it was shallow and despicable. And here she was drooling over this virtual stranger. It was awful. Horrible. She’d have a serious talk with herself after she got in bed tonight. Eventually.
He turned, surprised to find his jacket puddled on the hardwood floor. “Is it dead?”
She grinned. “Not yet. Just wounded.”
“I promise, next time I’ll try harder to fit in.”
“No. You’re perfect.”
He blushed. She couldn’t believe how bad she was being. She was obviously channeling Samantha from Sex and the City. Cool.
After clearing his throat, he shook his head a little, and gave her a real hard look, squinching his eyes and everything. “I don’t know how to talk to you.”
“Most people don’t.”
“Does it get easier?”
She sighed. “Oh, yeah. Well, for the most part. I can be pretty strange.”
“You sure make a mean pizza.”
She grabbed his upper arms. Both of them. “Pizza.”
“What?”
“Come with me.”
He looked briefly to his left, to the door, then back at her. “Uh, now?”
“Yes, now.” She let his shoulders go, but grabbed his hand, just in case he wanted to make a break for it. They walked past the big couch, the one she’d recovered in a dreamy cream suede, where Corrie, Anya and Rocco were laughing, past the hutch she’d gotten from her mother, into the kitchen.
The dough was on the counter. “You ever make a pizza?”
“I’ve ordered plenty.”
She nodded. “Good enough.” She handed him the rolling pin. “Roll it out.”
He took to his task with the kind of concentration usually reserved for neurosurgeons. Eyebrows together, straight front teeth chewing on the lower lip. He attacked the round ball of dough, first pressing too hard, then easing up so much he didn’t make a dent. But he learned quickly. Soon, he had the right pressure, he even had turned the dough and smoothed it out to a really even oval.
“You were kidding me, right?” she asked. “You studied pizza making for years.”
He smiled and the effect it had on his face was nothing less then stellar. Holy Chihuahua! Before she could stop herself, she reached up and slipped his glasses off his face. His eyes widened with surprise. They were blue. Cerulean blue, which she’d seen on paint samples, but never on a living human. A person could swim in those eyes. Even his eyelashes made her swoon. Thick, dark, long.
“I need those,” he said.
“Why?”
“To see.”
“No. Why not contacts?”
“I tried them once. They were annoying.”
“A little like me, huh?”
“You’re not annoying.”
“Ha.” She got out the tomato sauce and the pepperoni. “Another, please,” she said, nodding at the dough.
Daniel immediately went to work, this time very much at ease. “You’re not. You’re just different.”
“From?”
“Other people I know.”
“Ah.”
He paused, took his glasses from where she’d left them on the counter and put them back on. “So you’re a food stylist?”
“Yep.”
“Which is what, exactly?”
“I make food look yummy. For magazines and television and at parties.”
“I’ve heard they use mashed potatoes instead of ice cream on TV.”
“Sometimes. Mashed potatoes don’t melt under the lights.”
He worked some more on the dough, this time making a perfect round. “How’d you get into food styling?”
She spread the sauce on the first pizza. “My parents owned a grocery store. Brooklyn’s answer to Zabar’s.”
“Gourmet stuff?”
“Mostly cheeses and specialty items. But my mother used to like to give samples to the customers, and I liked to make the displays pretty.”
“So it was a natural progression to doing the same thing professionally.”
“Exactamundo.”
He grinned. “Is there a lot of competition?”
“Lots. But I’m really, really good at it.”
“I imagine you are.”
Corrie walked into the kitchen. “Anya says her dinner is going to die an unnatural death if we don’t go up to her place in five.”
Margot frowned. “Okay. You guys go. Daniel and I will finish up the pizzas and bring them in ten.”
Corrie nodded, but her gaze stayed on Daniel. “So what do you think?”
“About what?”
“Us. This. Margot.”
“It’s interesting. Not at all like Greenwich.”
“That’s a pretty big jump,” Margot said as she spread pepperoni. “Why Chelsea?”
“I was ready for a change. Something big.”
“Why?”
He shook his head. “You don’t give up, do you?”
Margot stopped. Looked him right in the eyes. “Not until I get what I want.”
Daniel’s Adam’s apple bobbed. “I see.”
She smiled. She still didn’t know why he’d moved to Chelsea, but she did know for certain why he’d moved to this building. To meet her, that’s why. To become an adventure. A challenge. He might have been ready for something big, but she had the feeling he had no idea just how big the change was going to be.
“Well, I’ll just see you two upstairs,” Corrie said. She touched Daniel on the upper arm. “Don’t be scared,” she said, her voice gentle and calming. “She won’t hurt you.”
Daniel put down the rolling pin. “I’m not so sure.”
Corrie laughed as she headed for the others.
Margot added the toppings to the first pizza, then stepped back. “Get creative, Daniel. Make this the best pizza you’ve ever had.”
He looked at her in that way of his, as if he was trying to see underneath