Authors: J. Rose Allister
“So?” The way her body was pulsing, she wouldn’t stop him if he did. Her reply was a shuddered whisper, barely audible over the flow of water. “The shower was your idea, remember?”
He growled. “Not to take advantage of a freezin’ woman. You stayed in that cold bathwater too long.”
“I only drifted off for a few minutes.”
“Darlin’, I heard you runnin’ this bath two hours ago. Had no idea you’d still be in it when I knocked to see if you were okay.”
His body was so warm, so comforting. She tried to register what he was saying, but keeping upright was getting harder.
“I’m sorry,” he went on. “I should have busted in here sooner. I just figured you wanted privacy after everythin’ that happened. If I’d have known you were practically drowning…shit. This is all my fault.”
She pushed away from him and nearly stumbled, but held up a hand when he made a move to save her. “No, it’s not.”
Shaking her head to clear it did little good, but with her standing away from him while water fell over his torso, she was aware of his eyes moving all over her. She automatically shielded her breasts with one arm and her mound with the other hand, and waves of self-consciousness washed over her at the scrutiny of his gaze. She saw all the notable places his eyes lingered, and none of them were the sleek, seductive curves a man should be drawn to while looking at a woman’s body. Instead, his attention was drawn to the relief map detailing the car accident that had stolen part of her life.
He paused at her hip, where the surgical scar traced a puckered trail. Another pause at her thigh, and the jagged, thick line that slashed down and spoiled the front of it. Next, he toured down to her opposite knee, which was dimpled and pockmarked with puncture scars. Finally, his seeking eyes skimmed right up past the ripe swells of her breasts to the perfectly round, ridged circle of scar tissue in the hollow of her throat. She normally hid it behind scarves and turtlenecks.
Her thoughts began to muddy again, whirling around until she had to work to grab onto the right words to think in a complete sentence. Damn. Maybe she should have shoved him against the shower wall and let him fuck her senseless when she’d had the chance. Now, he’d seen too much.
She couldn’t help but check him out, too, to see for herself that her scars would turn him off. Best to get that pain over with fast, like tearing off a bandage. Her gaze dropped straight between his legs, fully aware that his erection would be extinguished now that he’d seen how ugly she was. She blinked in shock when she saw he was as long and stiff as ever. When her gaze bounced back up to his eyes, they were golden and clouded with passion. How could he still be turned on?
Then again, Nash hadn’t lost his stiffy when Connor was beating him with a belt. Hell, if anything, it seemed to arouse him even more. Was that it? Did Connor get off on pain, too? Maybe it was the thought of her suffering, not her body, which held his dick at attention right now.
Her eyes narrowed.
“You were hurt,” Connor said.
Was he digging for gory details so he could feed his sick pain fantasies?
She pursed her lips and sagged against the shower wall. “It happens.”
“What happens?” He reached out to slick back a strand of her hair that was plastered along the front of her face. She flinched back. “What happened to you, Terra?”
The tenderness of his gesture and words almost made her believe that his concern was genuine. “Nothing.”
“Those scars ain’t nothin’.”
“I don’t want to talk about that.” The exact words she’d said to her parents once she’d been able to speak again.
Shit. Her parents.
“I have to go,” she said, grabbing the sole towel left in the bathroom and trying to step out of the tub.
Connor was beside her in a flash, taking the towel from her and wrapping it around her. “What’s your hurry?”
The room began to spin, and his words sounded more like “wuzyerhurree.” She shook her head and grabbed him to steady herself.
“I never meant to be gone this long.” Her words were slurred, too. “I have to drive home.”
That was the last thing she remembered before she collapsed in his arms.
Chapter Six
The next time Terra’s eyes fluttered open, she was lying on her side, she could hear the shower running in the other room, and her view of pretty much everything was blocked by a wide, muscular back that stretched out just inches from her face.
She stifled a gasp and raised her head to glance around in panic. Daylight filtered through the edges of the dark motel room curtains. Jesus, it was morning? Her fingers felt beneath the blanket she was under and discovered with no small alarm that she was as naked as the man she was in bed with. And which man was it?
A wary feeling slowed the trip her gaze took upward, and the tousled brown hair she saw confirmed her fears. What the hell was she doing in bed with Nash? Her pulse spiked while she fought wildly to try to remember. She’d been in the shower with Connor. Had she passed out again?
“You’re awake,” came a sleepy voice.
She jerked away and all but flew off the bed, realizing too late that this exposed her naked flesh. Her eyes scoured the room for something to cover herself with. “Stay the hell away from me.”
Nash unfolded from the bed, still turned completely around, and he stretched as though he was waking up after a week-long sleep. Her eyes were fastened of their own accord to his taut, shapely ass, which flexed enticingly while he stretched. “We need to talk, Terra.”
She snorted. “Forget it.”
Her heart pounded while she darted into the open bathroom, slammed the door shut, and snapped up a towel to wrap herself in. Then she started scouring the floor for her missing clothes.
Connor yanked open the shower curtain and gave her a heart-stopping smile that she couldn’t return. “Good mornin’,” he said. “How are you feeling?”
“Pissed off and freaked out.”
He frowned and disappeared behind the curtain, where she heard him shut off the water. He emerged with water gliding erotically down every inch of him. She held out another towel while averting her gaze, and he took it.
“What’s the matter?” he asked.
“Besides waking up beside Nash?”
“Sorry about that. You passed clean out again and you were still shiverin’.”
“Whatever. I just have to get out of here,” she said while she grabbed her underwear off the floor. “My folks will be completely losing it by now.”
“Why the rush? Just call them now and explain what happened.”
Terra turned her underwear right-side out and gave an indignant snort. “Oh, sure. And just what am I going to explain? ‘Gee, sorry I spent the night in a motel room with two guys, watching them fuck each other and turn into rabid werewolves’?”
His face remained blank, but she saw a muscle tense in his jaw while he finished toweling off. She bent over to put on the pink silk panties, but she stopped with a frown. Damn, she really didn’t want to put those back on. Or the bra she’d sweated in yesterday, for that matter.
With a sigh, she dropped them and grabbed her jeans, tugging them on commando-style. This was easier said than done, considering her skin was getting damp from the shower steam.
“I reckon you should leave out the werewolf part,” Connor said.
She glared at him, but Connor’s expression glinted with humor while he watched her towel-clad breasts bounce while she jumped up and down to get her snug pants up over her bare, damp bottom. “I have to leave out
all
the parts. And stop looking at me like I’m a tasty morsel.”
The return of his lazy grin speared longing right through her groin. “I can’t help it, what with your parts bouncin’ all around while you wiggle into those tight jeans. Didn’t you forget your panties?”
“I’m not putting those back on. They’re not clean.”
He gave her a decidedly heated look. “They smell like sex. You were so wet when you were wearin’ ’em.”
She made a face. “That’s gross and exactly why I’m not wearing them now.”
“Oh, no, darlin’. Your scent ain’t gross. It’s sexy as hell. Makes me ache, I’m so hard thinkin’ about it, and watchin’ your tits bounce ain’t helpin’.”
Her stomach twisted. “Then stop watching. And don’t try to act all sexy. That’s what got me into this mess in the first place.” She reached inside the towel still wrapped around her to zip up her fly, praying she wouldn’t get pubic hair caught in the zipper teeth.
She did her best to ignore the smolder in his gaze while she grabbed her sweater. “So, you think I’m sexy, do you?” he asked.
“Don’t read too much into that comment. I’m sure there isn’t a woman alive who doesn’t.”
Something shadowy crossed his face. “I know of at least one.”
“Yeah, well, she isn’t standing in this bathroom right now, but that doesn’t change anything.” She turned around and pulled it over her head before yanking the towel off. “I have to get out of here and think up some kind of convincing story, pronto.”
“I take it hangin’ out at a motel with a couple displaced cowpokes won’t cut it with your folks.”
“I’d be better off with the werewolf part. Or alien abduction, maybe. Yeah. Shit.”
“I’m sorry I got you into all this.”
She turned back around. “You weren’t the idiot who ran out of her own party and then picked up a hitchhiker.”
“No, I’m the idiot who should have made sure you didn’t stay around to get involved with Nash.”
“Me, involved with Nash? Of the two people standing in this room, I’d say you’re the one who fits that description.”
Terra found her scarf and plucked it up, frowning down at it. If she put it on, her wet hair would leave water marks on the silk. She sighed. Seemed like there was less clothing she could put back on than what she would have to leave off.
“Does that bother you?” Connor asked.
She shot him a puzzled look. “My scarf?”
“My
involvement
with Nash.”
“Why should it?”
“Didn’t ask whether it should. I asked if it does.”
Terra pressed her lips into a thin line. Why did he care? She spotted her socks lying in a corner behind the tub. These weren’t clean, either, of course. The idea of sticking her feet into her sneakers without them didn’t sound all that appealing, though. Oh, well.
She bent down behind the tub, and with gritted teeth she stuffed her bare toes inside her shoes. “I don’t see how it should matter what your sexual orientation is, or what you do with Nash.”
“What did he do to me?”
Terra’s head snapped around to see Nash leaning against the door she hadn’t heard him open. She’d been too busy trying to get dressed and argue at the same time.
Nash was a man transformed, and not in the I’m-a-werewolf-now sense. Unlike Connor, Nash had thankfully put his pants on, though they were still stained with dirt and rusty spatters. The rest of the previous night’s blood and bruises were gone. He had left his shirt off, and his feet were bare. He sported a dotted shadow of beard that looked damn sexy, and his hair was tousled attractively from sleep. How did he manage that? Terra’s hair was a fright when she woke up. And why the hell did he have to be such a showstopper with his heavy-lidded, greenish-gold gaze and blinding white smile?
Good heavens, she had slept up against all that, not to mention Connor as well.