“I did some petty larceny of my own,” he says, corner of his mouth quirking again.
I open his messenger bag and find two unopened toothbrushes, a half-empty tube of toothpaste, and two Old Spice deodorants in plastic shrink wrap. “I figured Paul and his family owedmethat much,” he says. “And they apparently stock the beach house from Costco—good news for us.”
I have never been so glad to see a toothbrush in my life.
Also, I have a plan for getting Rhys to sleep in the bed.
I take one of the toothbrushes and the toothpaste into the bathroom and brush my teeth. The bathroom is small and basic—a sink with a single vanity door, painted white, a stall shower—but like everything else, it’s clean, and I sigh with relief as I scrub my teeth and then use the small bar of soap and provided washcloth to wash my face.
Then I shuck my sweatpants, remove my underwear, pull my sweats back on, and rinse my thong carefully in the sink, wringing it out in a hand towel and hanging it on the bathroom’s least conspicuous hook. I cover it with the hand towel, hoping Rhys won’t move the towel and see it.
I come out, past where Rhys is sitting on the pullout peering at his laptop, and slide under the bedcovers. They’re cool and soft, and they smell clean, and for a moment, I question the sanity of my plan to give Rhys the bed.
But he drove me eight hours today without complaining. He fed me dinner.
He saved my business.
I mean, he didn’t do thattoday. But he did do it.
It means the score between us is even, which means that after he spent today taking care of me, the least I can do is let him get a good night’s sleep.
As soon as I’m settled, he gets up and goes to the bathroom, and I get out of the bed and hurry to the pullout.
In the bathroom, the shower turns on with a quiet groan of pipes and a rush of water.
Oh. He’s taking a shower.
Which means he’s stripping off his clothes in there. Unbuttoning the expensive dress shirt. Unbuckling his belt—probably supple Italian leather—and unfastening his pants. Letting his clothes fall to the floor… No. He’s probably carefully folding his clothes—not letting them touch the floor—and setting them on the edge of the sink, after first checking to make sure the counter isn’t damp.
Hopefully he’s not peeking under the hand towel I hung over my thong.
I hear the cadence of the water change as he steps under it, and my palms get hot.
I will not picture him soaping himself in the shower.
I will not picture him soaping himself in the shower.
What iswrongwith me? This morning—I guess technically yesterday morning, since it’s God Knows What O’Clock—I was engaged to marry Paul Graves. By noon I’d been jilted, and now, a little over twelve hours later, I’m fantasizing about another man.
Ornotfantasizing about him. But still.
The events of the day have destroyed my sanity. That’s all.
The water shuts off.
There’s a pause—him toweling himself off?—and I hear the water running in the sink. Brushing his teeth. The door opens, and he steps back in.
His eyes find me on the pullout. “No.”
I look over at him. He’s wearing a plain white T-shirt and boxer shorts, and I have to immediately look away because it feels way too intimate to see him like that. And because his legs are tree-trunk thick, with the perfect amount of dark curly hair.
He strides across the room, scoops me off the pullout like I weigh nothing, and carries me to the bed. His body is a wall of muscle, and he smells—God, he smells good. His T-shirt is soft and still scented with laundry soap but also musky with today’s efforts, and under that, I can smell hotel soap and Old Spice, the clean scent of his skin, and I turn my head to get closer?—
He deposits me unceremoniously, and I try not to want it back: his warmth and scent and strength.
I’m just feeling needy because I was dumpedthis morning.
He glares at me, then crosses back to the pullout and plops himself down.
