“Miguel, take our guest’s luggage. She brought an entire closet’s worth of stuff, it looks like. Must be awfully heavy for one woman to carry,” Bruin remarked with just a hint of a smirk on his handsome face.
I blushed. I probably looked ridiculous, carrying all this stuff with me. I hated looking high-maintenance. I mean, I kind of was, but not by choice. It was important to my job, and my job was the most important thing to me. Well, besides Jeff.
Oh, God. Jeff.
Miguel stepped up and took my suitcase from me with a smile. “I’ll take that, ma’am.”
“Thanks, Miguel,” I replied, my cheeks still hot.
“Where will I take it, sir?” he asked Bruin.
Bruin waved his hand. “To my stateroom. Just put it in the closet.”
What? His room?
“Wait,” I interrupted before Miguel could walk away with my stuff in tow. “Why your room? Shouldn’t my stuff be in my room?”
Bruin grinned. “One and the same, Jillian. My room is your room.”
“That seems awfully unprofessional,” I said, crossing my arms over my chest. “Besides, Mirabella is massive. There are plenty of rooms to choose from without us having to bunk together, Bruin.”
He didn’t waver for even a second. He took my arm and began leading me to the stairs and down to the hall where his room was located. Miguel followed behind dutifully.
“Bruin, I’m serious,” I said firmly.
“Well, there are other rooms, but I think you’ll have to agree that mine is the best one. The largest, the most comfortable, the best view. And the services provided in my room are the best of the best,” he growled.
“S-Services?” I repeated, frowning in confusion.
He nodded slowly as he led me to the room. He stood back to let Miguel walk by and put my luggage away. I pulled away from him. “Bruin, I am not staying in your room. I’ll take the one next door. Final offer.”
He looked at me for a long moment, his face unreadable. Then he shrugged.
“Okay. Whatever you say,” he agreed with a radiant smile. “Here, let me show you your room, then. We’ll get reacquainted.”
“I think I can figure out how to use a bed on my own, thanks,” I said, a little sharply.
Bruin simply laughed. “Damn, you’ve really changed since I last saw you.”
“Well, yeah. I’m twenty-five now. I was a dumb kid back then.”
We walked into the smaller stateroom and he closed the door behind us, then said to me meaningfully, “Jillian, you may have been a kid, but you have never, ever been dumb.”
I blinked a few times, surprised at the compliment. I kept waiting for the punch line, but it never came. Instead he simply started showing me around the room. “Right. Here’s the en suite bathroom, the wardrobe, the linen closet with towels and extra sheets for the bed.”
“Thank you,” I said. Then, I opened my mouth to say something else and stopped myself. I didn’t know what to say. Bruin caught it, though. He caught everything.
He sauntered up to me wordlessly and cupped my face in his hands. I stared up at him, afraid to even breathe. His hands were huge and warm and I could feel my whole body tingling with desire. “You’re fucking beautiful, you know that?” he murmured.
“Bruin…” I trailed off.
He bent down to kiss me, softly at first, and then harder. Forceful. Passionate.
My plan to avoid all bodily contact evaporated. Suddenly, I couldn’t get enough of his touch. And he knew it. He picked me up, wrapping my legs around his waist, and he carried me to the bed. He pushed me down onto my back, spreading my legs apart with his hand roughly. I gazed up at him, breathing hard, afraid that he might stop before we even started.
But not this time.