I stood there in stunned silence as he whipped his sweater over his head, leaving him standing there naked from the waist up.
I’d thought about Matteo a little too much if I were being perfectly honest. And things had gotten more and more explicit as the days passed and I got to spend more time with him.
And that one time I woke up when he came in after a shower wearing nothing but a towel? Forget about it. I mean, I’d only seen him from the back as he went into the closet for some clothes, but the man had a good-looking back.
I never thought I would be a woman who drooled over a man’s back. But here we are. And, I mean, no one would blame me if they got one look at Matteo.
However I felt about the man’s back, though, was nothing compared to his bare front. Because Matteo clearly found time to hit the gym more than every so often. The man was lean, but also managed to have a six-pack that tapered down to those delicious cuts of his Adonis belt.
“What are you doing?” I asked even though my mouth felt suddenly too dry to function properly.
“I have to get in with you since you can’t lean over,” he said, kicking out of his shoes and socks.
“But…” I started to object, not sure what I was about to say, but knowing I needed to object in some way.
“You’ll slip on a towel,” he told me, shrugging. That way, when your hair is done, you can just toss the towel out and take a shower if you want real quick. No big deal.”
Okay.
Maybe it wasn’t a big deal to him.
I mean I looked like a monster from a horror movie.
But he looked like some Roman god.
And he was taking off his pants.
I repeat… he was taking off his pants.
This was a Defcon One situation for my poor libido that was already hanging on by its weak fingertips.
In case anyone was wondering, Matteo Grassi was a boxer briefs kind of man. Which left almost nothing to the imagination.
I actually had to shut my eyes to keep from staring.
I listened as Matteo turned on the water, then went into the cabinet to grab the towel before he came back to me, grabbing me, and turning my back to him.
“Come on, babe,” he said, voice soft.
I couldn’t seem to make my hands lift, though. So Matteo took matters into his own hands, reaching around my body, snagging the zipper to my oversized hoodie that fit me like a dress, and slowly lowering it down.
I tried not to notice the way the back of his hand moved down my skin a second before it was exposed to the cool air.
Tried.
And clearly failed.
By the time he was letting his fingertips glide over the skin of my shoulders as he started to lower the shirt, my body was buzzing with need.
And when I felt the shirt fall and the warmth of Matteo’s dangerously close body against my back?
Oh, yeah.
I was aching for more.
It took a long moment of focus to remind myself that every part of my body hurt. And maybe even more importantly, I looked like I’d gone a couple rounds in a boxing ring.
It was not sexy.
Even if being almost naked with Matteo Grassi was absolutely sexy as all-get-out.
My slow, deep, steadying—I hoped—breath was cut short by the sensation of the bath towel brushing across my overly sensitive breasts. Bare because, well, who in their right mind wore a bra after getting kicked in the ribs? Only crazy people, that’s who.
It should not have felt sexy.
But the way the material moved across the desire-peaked tips of my breasts? Yeah, it was all I could do to keep a moan from escaping me.
“Arms up, baby,” Matteo demanded.
Was it just my overactive—and desperate—imagination, or did his voice sound a little rougher when he said that?
I raised my arms as high as I could without it sending a shooting sensation through my ribs, letting Matteo slide the towel around me, then tugging it gently until the ends were at the side of my body.
Then this man tried to kill me with unmet need when he tucked the damn thing right above the swell of my breast.
“Okay. Water is warm,” he said, stepping away, heading over toward the shower, and leaving me to follow numbly behind, keeping my gaze completely averted. “Turn for me,” he demanded when I stepped into the shower enclosure.
So I turned.
And then the warm water was cascading down my body, soaking me and, I imagined, Matteo as well.
I went ahead and let my eyelids drift closed, getting lost in the moment as he lathered up the shampoo, and started to scrub it into my scalp.
I usually found scalp massages relaxing. They could put me right to sleep. But right that moment, all I felt was the desire building through my system, reaching this borderline painful fever pitch in my core. It was an aching pressure on my lower stomach, a throbbing need between my thighs.