“Yeah?” Cole asked, keeping his voice casual. “What’d you say?”

“I said maybe,” she said, chewing her lip as they both looked over to where Adam was expertly posing for the cameras as though he’d done it a million times. Because he had.

“I thought you said he was a pig.”

She lifted a shoulder. “I’m not going to marry the guy. And you’re the one who said I should let myself be wooed.”

“Not by him!” Cole said.

His voice was louder than he’d intended, and several people turned to stare.

He forced a smile before lowering his voice. “You know what? I think you should go on a date with him.”

“It’s not a date, just a drink,” she said.

Cole shook his head.

Clueless. So adorably clueless.

“It’s a date,” he said.

“It’s not,” she said emphatically. “In fact…you should come!”

Yeah. Because that’s just how he wanted to spend a Thursday night. Watching a playboy pro athlete put the moves on the one woman who’d rejected him.

“Can’t,” he said.

“Plans?” she asked.

It was the distracted, uninterested note in her voice, as though she didn’t care one way or another, that brought the lie to the tip of his tongue. “Yup. Got a date of my own.”

That got her attention.

She snapped her head around, and he didn’t think he imagined the slight delay in her usual smile.

“Oh! Well, have fun,” she said.

“I will. And you have fun with Adam.” He wiggled his eyebrows just to mess with her and she narrowed her eyes.

“I told you, it’s not a date. I have absolutely zero intention of becoming one of Adam Bailey’s women.”

“Uh-huh.”

He walked away then, not wanting her to pick up on his bad mood, and Penelope’s voice followed him.

“Hey, where are you going? The shoot’s not over yet.”

He turned around and walked backward as he answered. “Gotta go call my date. Confirm where we’re meeting.”

Once outside the studio where the shoot was taking place, Cole pulled out his phone.

Only not to call a woman.

Lincoln picked up on the first ring. “Yo.”

“Need help.”

“Name it.”

“I need a last-minute date.”

Lincoln paused. “And you’re telling me this because…”

Cole rolled his eyes. “Come on. I know you’ve got like a dozen rejects you can set me up with.”

“I may have plenty of women on speed dial,” Lincoln said slowly. “But I don’t want you messing with them.”

There it was again—that implication that Cole was a callow user of women.

“This from the guy who’s never had a relationship in…ever?” Cole shot back.

Lincoln was quiet for several moments. “When you say last-minute, how last-minute we talking about?”

“Tonight. Come on, Mathis, I’m not looking for my soulmate, just a woman who wouldn’t mind grabbing drinks with a good-looking guy.”

“I refuse to vouch for the good-looking part,” his friend said. “But I know a few girls who don’t mind letting a guy buy them a drink. No expectations of hearts and flowers and the like.”

The mention of hearts and flowers reminded him of his conversation with Penelope, and it was on the tip of his tongue to ask if Lincoln knew of any women who preferred onion rings to chocolate.

Shit. This had to stop.

Penelope Pope was…hell, he didn’t want her. Didn’t want to date her.

Which was good. Because she didn’t want him either. She could not have been more clear about that. I don’t want this, Cole. I don’t want you, not like this.

“Sure, call one of them,” Cole told Lincoln. “Or text me a number and I’ll make the call.”

“You got it,” Lincoln said. “But dude, you sound weird. What’s going on?”

Cole hung up the phone without responding.

No point in responding to a question you didn’t have the answer to.

Chapter 13

Penelope and Cole had been co-editors for nearly two months now, and Penelope thought she’d done a darn good job not thinking about that kiss in the snow.

She’d done a good job not reading too much into the fact that Cole brought her onion rings just because he knew that she liked them. She’d done a good job of not reading into it when he asked her out to Friday happy hour most weeks.

It was self-preservation, really. Penelope had made the mistake once of reading too much into a man’s friendliness, and she was determined not to make the same mistake with Cole.

They worked well together—no surprise there, but more than that, they respected each other. Were comfortable with each other.

Liked each other.

And if every so often Penelope found herself wishing she could go back in time and do things just a little bit differently the night of that kiss, she reminded herself that the way they were now was better.

Safer.

And then…

And then she walked in on Cole and another woman.

“Oh!” Penelope skidded to a halt in the doorway of his office. “Oh!”

Cole had a curvy blonde pinned against his desk, one hand on either side of the woman’s ample hips as they kissed.

Penelope flashed back to the time Evan had told her he was seeing someone.

It hurt. It shouldn’t. But it did.

Cole acknowledged the interruption before his lady friend did, and he lazily pulled his mouth away from the blonde’s before his eyes met Penelope’s across the office.

“Hey, Tiny.”

The man didn’t look the least bit embarrassed, but Penelope was mortified.

“I’m so sorry,” she said, her voice coming out all croaky and awkward. “The door was shut, and I should have knocked, it’s just…”

It’s just that they never knocked.

He came into her office whenever he damn well felt like it, and vice versa.

A policy she’d be remedying stat.

The blonde had turned around to see the interruption for herself, and Penelope was unsurprised to see that the other woman was pretty—very pretty.

Of course she was.

“Sorry,” Penelope mouthed, even as she was closing the door.

“Hold up,” Cole said, pushing back from his desk. “What did you want to see me about?”

Penelope forced a smile and held up the paper in her hands. “First proofs came in for the Adam Bailey article. I’m thinking we want to revisit which shots we picked. They looked fine on their own, but on the page—you know? Never mind. It can wait.”

Wait until you’re done playing tonsil hockey.

“I was just leaving,” the blonde said, smoothing a hand over her silky pink dress. “I’m Meredith, by the way.”

“Penelope,” she said, feeling horribly out of place.

Penelope snuck a glance at Cole to make sure he wasn’t bothered by the interruption, but he seemed completely indifferent to her presence as he swiped a thumb over his mouth, probably to remove Meredith’s lipstick.

“See you, baby,” Meredith said, leaning forward to brush her lips against Cole’s cheek.

Penelope noted with no small amount of envy that the woman didn’t have to go up on her toes to reach Cole’s face. The combination of her height and heels put cheek—and mouth—within easy kissing distance.

Everything about the other woman made Penelope feel like a child. The height. The curves. The clothes. The confidence.

Meredith grabbed her purse by the door and Penelope all but scampered out of the way as the woman gave her a friendly smile and sailed out of the office in a whoosh of some spicy, exotic perfume.

Penelope started to follow her, but Cole’s voice stopped her. “Yo. Pope. Get in here. Show me what you’ve got.”

She swallowed and approached the desk as he sat in his chair.

So he wanted to play it cool? Fine. She could do that.

“New girlfriend?” she asked, proud that her voice didn’t betray her embarrassment. Or jealousy.