“It was Floyd today,” I tell her, then give her the safe-for-work version of the story—the one about Floyd’s client conquests, not his comments about banging assistants. There’s no need to have that hanging out there in the air between us. Can’t plant that forbidden idea in her head.

That risky, dangerous, dirty, filthy, completely fucking alluring idea. My eyes roam the office briefly, and I catalogue all the places that are calling out to be christened. Her desk, her chair, the floor . . .

Just like that, my head is a wild rumpus of inappropriate ideas. Exactly what it shouldn’t be. It’s like horny aliens have invaded my mind.

But I’m not Floyd. I can do better, so I picture a vise, jam the images into it, and crush them out of my mind. The dirty images and the horny aliens, too.

“And then I escorted him out of Lila’s home and said see ya later,” I tell her, finishing the story, as I drag a hand through my dark brown hair. “Like, in another lifetime later.”

“Hmm . . .” she says.

“Hmm, that’s great, or hmm, why did I give one of our suppliers the heave-ho?”

“Hmm, as in your story gives me a good idea. Something I’ve wanted to do for a long time.”

“What’s that?”

Her eyes sparkle. Hers are a lighter shade than my dark blue. “Want me to find a new hinge supplier?”

The idea is beyond perfect. I smack my palm against the edge of her desk enthusiastically. “Yes. And for the record, you’re brilliant and beauti—” I cut the last word off so it sounds like a low bass note. Note to self: Don’t call her beautiful when you’re berating other men for hitting on her at work.

She’s watching me, waiting for me to finish my sentence, and somehow I twist the words into a new compliment, as I say, “Brilliant, and . . . bountiful.”

Bountiful? Seriously? What the hell was that? Maybe she won’t notice.

No such luck.

“Bountiful?” she asks, skepticism thick in her tone. As it fucking should be. “I’m bountiful?”

I nod, going with it, owning it. “Your brain. It’s like a cornucopia of ideas. It’s a Thanksgiving bounty. It’s bountiful,” I say, because I’ve got to sell this cover-up.

She squares her shoulders. “If you say so, Hammer. And this bountiful brain was two steps ahead today. I already found a new supplier. I called around, talked to some of our colleagues, and got some great recommendations. I already have a new hinge guy lined up.”

My smile spreads quickly. “Damn. You are three steps ahead of me.”

“A good assistant should be.”

“And you’re a great one. What do you say we go celebrate six months of you making WH Carpentry & Construction a much better business than it was before?”

WH stands for my name, Wyatt Hammer.

But WH also might stand for something else. You’ll see. Don’t worry. The whole Oreo, remember? I’ll give it to you.

2

She chooses the vegetarian bibimbap, supernova spicy style, at a Korean restaurant off Ninth Avenue, not far from the office.

“Bibimbap,” she says, like she’s weighing the word. “It’s challenging to pronounce and usually comes out like ‘bippity-bop,’ something a fairy godmother from a Disney movie says. But in fact, bibimbap tastes nothing like a Disney movie.”

“Or like a fairy godmother,” I add, stretching my neck to the side to work out the kinks in it from today’s job. Eight hours on my feet, screwing, pounding and drilling. Nothing like a hard day’s work, but man, I could go for a massage.

She shoots me a look. “And you know how a fairy godmother tastes?”

I realize how my comment came out, but I go with it. “Like all your dreams come true.”

“You’re telling me you’ve dated fairy godmothers?”

“Maybe I have.”

“I’ve dated genies, then,” she says, playing at one-upmanship as our waitress arrives. Natalie tells her what she wants, and I order the beef bibimbap for myself, so spicy it singes your hair off, then add in an appetizer and some beers.

We’re here because Natalie loves spicy food. The hotter the better. In fact, she’s challenged me to a few food dares over the last six months. Fortunately, I was born with fireproof taste buds and a competitive will of iron, so I usually beat her, but I’ve got to hand it to the woman. She can down a habanero pepper like no one I’ve ever seen.

Not gonna lie. It was a massive turn-on watching her eat a couple of those bad boys on a burger one night a few weeks ago when we got some grub after work. There’s just something about a woman who can handle her spice.

That is, it would have been a turn-on if I’d been thinking of her that way. And I hadn’t, so I wasn’t turned on.

Case closed.

A minute later, the waitress returns with two beers, and I raise a glass to toast Natalie. “To six months of your magic. You’re better than a fairy godmother.”

“To six months of solid employment, at last,” she jokes. Natalie was bouncing around at various odd jobs before I hired her. She’d needed work, and she was blunt about it. In fact, the night she approached me in her job hunt perfectly underscores my point about dudes saying women are hot for us.

Because we have no clue if they actually are. We’re all fumbling and bumbling around, blind to what women really want. Women are basically the most complicated creatures ever invented, and approximately twenty thousand times more complex than the world’s smartest computer. At my friend Spencer’s wedding last fall to Natalie’s sister Charlotte, Natalie made her way over to me with a determined look in her eyes, and I’d joked to my twin brother Nick, “She wants me.”