"You promise?"

"Yes, I promise," he said, resisting the urge to roll his eyes. No doubt he was going to have to hunt down a small spider outside and throw it into a glass jar to convince her that he found it otherwise she'd probably be screaming for help all night over "spiders."

"O-okay," she said, shifting on the bed.

Trevor bit back a smile as he paused near the bed, knowing she'd probably kill him later, but simply couldn't resist. "There's just one thing. I need a towel."

Zoe yanked her eyes away from the bathroom to frown down at him in confusion. "Your closet is full of towels."

"Uh huh, but I need a pink towel," he explained as he reached out and ripped her towel away from her. He was already halfway down the stairs when he heard her gasp of surprise and heading out her door when she started threatening the poor confused appendage in his pants that hadn't been able to go down since he spotted Zoe cowering in the bathtub.

Chapter 13

"Zoe?" Trevor called out as he walked up the stairs. "Are you still here quivering in fear?" he asked, chuckling when he remembered the expression on her face when he ripped the towel away.

Too bad he hadn't been able to stick around and steal a peek at what he'd uncovered, he thought with a heavy sigh. It was just as well that he didn't know what lay beneath all her baggy clothes.

He walked into the bedroom to find Toby cuddled on the bed with the ratty old teddy bear that Zoe seemed to love so much. The playful pup raised his head, wagging his tail and panting happily as he watched Trevor approach the bed.

"Hey, buddy, you want to help me slay the monster?" he asked, giving the dog a playful scratch behind the ears that earned a groan of delight. After a minute Toby rolled over onto his back in silent demand that Trevor gave into with a little sigh. Damn demanding dog, Trevor thought with a smile.

If he wasn't afraid that Zoe would think he was a pushover he'd be tempted to forget his rule and let her keep the dog. Hell, he was half thinking of stealing the dog for himself. He always loved having dogs as a kid and promised himself that he'd get another one when he was older, but he never seemed to have the time for one.

He gave the dog one last rub, careful not to get any dog hair on his navy blue dress shirt or black slacks. Normally if he was going to work on something in one of his tenant's apartments he'd don his work clothes, but this was only a small spider in Zoe's freakishly neat home so he wasn't too worried about getting dirty. He started to head towards the bathroom only to come to an abrupt halt when something caught his eye.

For the first time since he walked into the room he noticed a large pile of department store shopping bags near the wall. The amount of bags kind of surprised him since he'd never thought of Zoe as much of a spender. She actually came across as pretty frugal, never spending much money on herself and getting by with the basics. He often wondered about that, thinking that maybe she grew up in an extremely thrifty family.

He was just about to get the little spider hunt over with when a familiar pink logo on a group of bags buried towards the back of the pile caught his eye. After a minute of trying to ignore temptation he shrugged and walked over to the bags. If Zoe came back and caught him he'd just tell her he that he was checking for spiders, he decided with a mental pat on the back, knowing damn well that she'd thank him too.

With one last look over his shoulder he opened the bag closest to him wider and felt his eyebrows arch clear to the hairline. The bag was filled with lace and silk of every color. Rubbing his suddenly sweaty hands on his slacks he reached into the bag and picked up the lacey baby pick item on top and nearly groaned when he realized they were panties, a little larger than he was used to seeing and in no way a thong, but still sexy as hell.

He exhaled slowly as he ran a shaky hand through his hair as he imagined that beautiful bottom of Zoe's covered in this material. Christ, he really didn't need to know what she was wearing to cover her curves and he should walk away, but curiosity was a bitch and had him quickly going through the rest of the pink bags.

Five minutes later he was sitting on the edge of Zoe's bed with his elbows propped up on his knees and his head in his hands, trying to wrap his mind around the amount of panties, bras, and teddies Zoe purchased. He still couldn't believe how sexy some of those items were and that unnerved him a bit, because when he thought about Zoe he never thought sexy. Yeah she turned him on for some weird reason, but never intentionally.

But damn if he wasn't turned on now, he thought with a grimace as he sat up and tried to adjust himself in his now too tight pants. When that didn't work he stood up and began to pace the spacious room.

Who the hell was she seeing? he wondered. It had to be someone serious for her to go nuts shopping like that and buying intimate apparel. In his experience women only did that if they were in the start of a relationship, but Zoe hadn't said anything to him about seeing some guy. There was too damn much she wasn't telling him and that really pissed him off.

Every morning and for a few minutes every night they talked about work, the book they were reading, television and all the stupid shit in between and not once did she mention a boyfriend. He knew he mostly viewed her as a tenant and employee, but he hadn't known that she only saw him as a boss and landlord, one apparently that she made small talk with to be polite. That knowledge pissed him off in the worst possible way and it didn't take a genius to figure out why.

Somewhere along the line he actually started to think of Zoe as a friend.

Whatever.

Fuck her.

If she wanted to keep this relationship strictly professional then that was more than fine with him, he thought opening the sink cabinet with a little more force than necessary. He didn't give a rat's ass if they weren't friends. Why the hell would he? It's not like he went out of his way at work to talk to her, which proved that he didn't care.

Or proved that he was an asshole, he thought shaking his head ruefully. Then again she didn't exactly go out of her way to talk to him at work either, which only proved his point or that he was turning into a fucking woman overanalyzing every little thing, he thought, sighing as he shoved things around as he looked for this "huge" spider.

There was no need for all this drama. So Zoe didn't tell him about her date? So what? It didn't mean anything and besides tonight was not the night to stress over this shit. Tonight was about getting laid and clearing his head of Zoe, he reminded himself as his hand landed on the condom box. As he picked it up to toss it to the side a condom fell out, making him frown.

He could have sworn it wasn't open earlier. After a minute of feeling like an ass for caring at all he dumped the rest of the condoms out of the box and counted. Six left out of a twelve pack. Looks like Zoe wasn't the only one planning on getting laid tonight, he thought darkly as he tossed the box back into the cabinet.

This was fucking unbelievable.

He was fucking jealous.

The knowledge both sickened and shocked him. He never got jealous. Not once. Well, when he was kid he'd been jealous of Jason, but that was completely different. He never become jealous over a woman, but here he was crouching down on his frumpy tenant's bathroom floor, wondering who the hell she needed six condoms for and wanting to kick his own ass for caring so damn much.

It was past time he worked her out of her system, he decided, moving to stand up when Toby started growling. He followed the dog's glare and couldn't help but roll his eyes when he spotted the tiny little black spider racing across one of the rolls of toilet paper.