Page 45 of This Time Around
A sob ripped from my throat and I tossed them into the growing pile and turned back to the closet.
I grabbed armfuls of his clothes on hangers and turned, tossing them out.
And then I went after his shoes.
I threw them all out of the closet.One at a time.
Thunk.Thunk.Thunk.They hit my bedroom floor as I flung them over my shoulder.
Screw it.I squatted down and grabbed the last remaining bucket, picking it up to throw it out.
I turned to flip it out into the bedroom and screamed.
“What the hell!?”I shouted.
The bucket fell out of my arms and hit the floor.
Cooper stood just outside the doorway.His hands were held out in the air, and his gaze dipped from me to the floor at my feet, to the way too massive pile of clothing at his feet.
In my bedroom.
My bedroom.
“What are you doing here?”I wrapped the robe around my waist, tightened the knot.
Goddamn it!He wasn’t supposed to see this.
“Couldn’t sleep?”
That was what he asked.The urge to scream at him, to unleash holy terror for putting the idea into my head and making mefeel,clawed at my throat.“No.Why are you in my room?”
“Because I couldn’t sleep on the couch thinking of you and then I started hearing all this racket like the ceiling was going to cave in on my head and thought I should come check on you.”
My brain must have malfunctioned.I must have skipped some words, rearranged them in the wrong order.He didn’t say what it sounded like.
“What?”
He pinned me with a look.It stole the breath from my lungs.“You heard me.”
Shit.
“Yeah, shit.”
I slammed my mouth closed.If words were slipping out, when I didn’t mean them to, it was best to be quiet.
“Come out of the closet, Rebecca.”
He held out his hand.I ignored it.
I couldn’t breathe or move or focus.
He was standing outside my closet, and he was naked.
Notnaked,naked.Mostly naked.He’d taken off the pants and shirt I’d given him and all he had on was a pair of black boxer briefs.
Skin-tight boxer briefs.
That showedeveryoutline of him.And there was a lot of him to see.
