On the Steamy Side Read Online Free PDF Page B

wrinkling her nose. “And don’t think I didn’t notice; you didn’t deny the gallery thing. I pegged you right! I know it.”

    Enjoying himself immensely, Devon sketched a courtly bow. “What can I say? Give the lady a cigar.”

    “I have a knack for sizing people up,” she said. “When you’ve conducted as many auditions as I have, it’s a necessary skill.”

    “You’re in theater,” Devon said.

    “Used to be,” she said. “Until very recently.”

    “You said you conducted the auditions. I take it you’re not an actress, then.”

    “Gracious, no. I directed and taught.”

    “What kinds of plays?” Devon was mildly amazed at himself, making light conversation with this incredibly enticing woman in the intimate, sexually charged atmosphere of his personal bathroom. But he was actually kind of digging it. And it was more than the novelty of conversing with someone who wasn’t after anything from him.

    It was her.

    “Shakespeare is the obvious one,” she said. “But he’s only obvious because he wears so well. Many of his plays are shockingly relevant to our modern world. I’ve also done Brecht, Ibsen, Chekhov . . . we mostly stuck to the classics.”

    “Reinterpretations of the classics can be transcendent,” Devon replied, thinking of the signature dish on the menu at his flagship restaurant, Appetite. It was steak frites, the quintessential bistro dish, re-imagined as a layered torte of sliced, seared filet, parsley butter and seasonal vegetables fried in duck fat. It was one of the dishes mentioned in the New York Times review that got him his four stars; it was on the menu to stay.

    Realizing he’d been standing there silently for a moment too long, Devon said, “Well, I’ll let you get to it, then. I’m going to go find something clean for you to change into.” She hesitated as if she had something to say, but then smiled and thanked him again.

    Devon left the bathroom quickly, before images of her stripping down and getting wet made it impossible.

CHAPTER FOUR
    He waited as long as he could, but it had been a few years since Devon had been forced to wait for anything he truly wanted, and he was out of practice.

    So when he tapped on the bathroom door and she called “Come in,” Devon wasn’t surprised to be sucked into a humid fog. The shower was still running, everything in the bathroom steamed up and misted over. He knew he was probably supposed to turn his head away or squeeze his eyes shut or something, but he’d never been very good at doing what he was supposed to do. He zeroed in on the glass shower door as if his eyes were high-beam xenon headlights that could penetrate steam.

    No such luck.

    “I’ve got a shirt here you can put on,” Devon said. “When you’re done.”

    “I’ll never be done,” she moaned. “Seriously. You’re going to have to cook my meals and serve them to me in here, because I am never leaving this shower.”

    Devon laughed despite the frisson of nerves accompanying her blithe demand that he cook. “Can’t blame you. That shower is one of my favorite places in the entire world. And I’ve been all over.”

    “I’ve never been anywhere but Spotswood County, Virginia, and New York City,” she said. “But I don’t need to travel the world to know there’s not much out there that could compare with this.” It was almost unbearable to stand in the moist heat of the bathroom knowing she was barely five feet away from him, completely bare and wet as a seal. The tension was terrible. Devon savored it for another minute, then said, “Okay, I’ll be in the living room when you’re done.”

    “Wait,” she said when his hand was on the slippery doorknob. “I can think of one thing that would make this shower even better.”

    From the tremor in her voice, Devon thought he could guess what that one thing was, but he wanted her to say it. “What’s that?”

    He could almost hear her swallow. His pulse jumped.

    “If you