Perfect Strangers

8

It turnsout to be convenient that I didn’t lock the apartment door on the way out, because it means I don’t have to stop kissing James to dig through my handbag for keys on the way in.

I simply turn the knob and we go right back at it.

We fall through the door, kissing madly. I drop my handbag on the floor. James kicks the door shut behind us, then pushes me against the wall and pins me there, his chest flush with mine. He clasps both my wrists in one of his big hands and holds my arms behind my back as he kisses me hard in the unlit entryway, his free hand firmly gripping my face.

It’s hot. It’s insanely hot, dominant, and passionate, just this side of rough.

When we stop to gasp for air, I start laughing.

“Oh my God, this is just like in the movies!”

“Only better,” he says in a husky tone, blue eyes glowing with lust. “Because it’s real.”

“It can’t possibly get better than this,” I say, panting. “Maybe we should stop at kissing, because this is absolutely epic—”

I yelp in shock when he swiftly bends and throws me over his shoulder.

The man throws me over his shoulder! Wait until I tell Kelly aboutthis!

“We’re not stopping,” he growls, striding into the living room as I swing from his shoulder like something he caught in a trap in the forest and is bringing home to eat.

Laughter threatens to break from my mouth again, so I bite my lip to stop it. I feel crazed, possessed by the weirdest mix of glee and terror, like the feeling you get when you’re at the tippy top of a high, dangerous roller coaster, just about to crest over the edge and go zooming recklessly down.

James tosses me onto my back on the living room sofa. I bounce, once, then stare up at him wide-eyed as my heart threatens to burst inside my chest.

I’ve had panic attacks less severe than this.

He gazes at me with unwavering intensity as his fingers fly over the buttons of his shirt. “You look scared.”

“Shitless,” I admit, shaking. “You better hurry up and take off your clothes before I suffer some kind of serious health crisis and you have to call an ambulance.”

His shirt parts under his fingers. He shrugs out of it and lets it drop to the floor.

And I simply stare up at him with my mouth open.

Maybe God doesn’t hate me so much after all, because if he, she, or it did, I’d never have been given something as incredible as this.

He’s.

Fucking.

Perfect.

Chiseled, sculpted, carved, hewn…you name it, he’s all the adjectives there are for hard, masculine beauty. His chest is a masterpiece. His abs could make angels weep. This guy makes Michelangelo’s David look like something a first-semester art student at a community college glued together out of old newspapers and cat turds.

It’s only a nanosecond after that thought hits that it’s followed by another, far worse: I have to get naked in front of this walking piece of art.

My sudden terror isn’t lost on James. “All the blood just drained from your face.”

I say, “Oh, don’t mind me, I’m just down here dealing with some major body image issues brought out in full force by how ridiculously ripped you are. Please tell me that eight pack is cleverly contoured makeup.”

He kneels over me, plants his hands on the cushion on either side of my head, and smiles. “You know it isn’t.”

Is my gulp audible? I bet it’s audible. I bet he can even hear all my cells screaming at the top of their petrified little lungs. “Spoiler alert: my body doesn’t look like that.”