When the door opens, we step into the elevator. The doors close with the maid and the rest of the lobby staff watching us with smiles.
On the long ride up, neither of us says anything, though I can’t help sneaking sly glances at him, while he looks straight ahead. I’m acutely aware of the cold fabric sticking to my wet skin, the hot, constricted air of the enclosed space, and just how many fiery love scenes start, and sometimes end, in an elevator.
Don’t jump him, don’t jump him, I scold myself.
All too soon, the elevator door opens to his floor and the spell breaks.
Once back in the suite, he clears his throat, avoiding my eyes.
Suddenly, it’s awkward. Maybe the breathless anticipation, me dying for him to kiss me again, was all one-sided. Maybe he was just being polite. It isn’t his fault that every girl, including me, falls at his feet from just his smile.
“Fuck, I shouldn’t have done that.” His words confirm my fears.
“What? Why?” Is he talking about the dare? Or the kiss?
“I got caught up in the moment. It felt like we were alone out there in the rain, and the lobby was deserted when we left, but anyone could have gotten a photo. Fuck.”
“I-I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make things harder for you.”
“I’m not worried about me. I’m worried about you. Don’t you understand how it could affect you if this got out, if we got out?”
“We’re a we?”
He doesn’t answer, just stares at me with a mix of frustration and something more. Something tense and heated. The same something I thought I’d seen in his eyes before he gave me that fleeting kiss in the middle of the storm.
Finally, he looks away. “You should take a shower to warm up. I don’t want you to get sick.” He runs his hand through his hair, making the wet strands even wilder.
“I have no dry clothes.”
He swallows hard. “The bathroom should have a robe. And if you want, you can borrow something of mine until your clothes are dry. I can send them out to housekeeping. Now, go,” he says softly. “Your lips, tempting as they are, are turning blue.”
He thinks my lips are tempting! I want to say something, a witty retort, an avowal of love, an entreaty to ravish me until the rain stops falling—hell, until the world stops spinning—but my brain and mouth aren’t working at the moment.
I float my way to the bathroom. The shower soothes me, clearing my mind. The water jetting down from the fancy showerhead reminds me of the rain outside, only it’s blissfully warm, and the fresh, woodsy smell of the shampoo reminds me of Chase. When I finish, I dry myself in another cloudlike towel and look around for the robe Chase said was here. But it’s nowhere to be found.
Damn.
I wrap the towel as tight as it will go, trying to stretch the insufficient fabric. For a luxury hotel, their towels sure are on the small side. I quietly open the door and peek around the corner.
“Chase,” I hiss. He doesn’t answer. The door to the bedroom is closed, and I hear music coming from it.
“Chase!” I call louder.
Still nothing.
I swear silently and pull the towel tighter, feeling like a sausage in a too-small casing.
I walk to his room and clutch the towel with one hand and lift up my other arm to knock on the door. But as my hand is about to hit the door, it opens. The surprise of it knocks me off-balance, and I fall into a very tall, very large, very muscular body. Both my hands reach out to steady myself.
A shocked Chase drops the stack of clothes he’s holding, presumably for me, and reaches out to keep me upright.
I realize too late that with my hands otherwise occupied on Chase’s chest, there is nothing holding my towel up. In slow motion, it slips, then slips some more.
“Eeeep!” I squeak, trying to catch the falling fabric.
I catch it halfway down my body. My full breasts are out there—hanging wild and free and unencumbered, like two party girls.
I make a noise that’s somewhere between a squeak and a squeal and jerk my towel back up.
He swallows audibly.
“Th-there was no robe,” I stutter.
“Sorry.” He pulls his gaze from my chest. “I was just coming to bring you this.” He leans down and picks up the fallen clothes, which brings his head dangerously close to my almost bare bottom half. When he straightens, his breathing seems accelerated. He clears his throat. “A T-shirt and some shorts,” he holds them out to me. “They’ll probably be too big, but it’s the best I can do.”