“You really don’t have to do all this,” I say as I stand up, making sure not to put too much weight on my injured foot. “I mean, I really appreciate it—of course I do—but I’m sure you have better things to do than take care of me.”
He just shoots me another annoyed look and continues with what he’s doing. Or at least he starts to, but then it must register that I’m standing on my own two feet because he all but leaps across the room at me. “Seriously?” he demands, pulling me up and against him until my breasts are pressed against his chest and my injured foot isn’t even touching the ground. Then again, neither is my uninjured one. “You couldn’t wait two minutes for me to come get you? Do you want to open that cut back up again?”
“I didn’t want you to have to wait on me. I—”
“I think you’re mistaking basic human decency for servitude,” he answers in obvious exasperation. He looks for all the world like he wants to give me a piece of his mind?
?or a good shake.
I know I should pretend to look apologetic—it’s the least I can do after everything he’s done for me—but suddenly I’m all too aware of the fact that his body is pressed to mine. That my body is pressed to his. That our bodies are pressed together.
I should be freaking out right now—after the morning I’ve had, this is the last thing I need. But it’s hard to get upset when being held against Miles feels this good. This natural.
It’s completely ridiculous, but suddenly I’m having a hard time catching my breath. My lungs ache, the air stuttering in my throat every time I try to inhale.
Desperate to look normal, to be normal, I force myself to take a deep, shuddering breath. But that only makes things worse, because now I can smell him. Oranges and bergamot and warm, dark honey flood my system, make my nipples peak and my mouth water. For him. For Miles fucking Girard.
—
For Chloe’s brother, I remind myself a little frantically. This is Chloe’s brother I’m having such a strong reaction to.
Chloe’s brother who is sending shivers across my skin with every slow rise and fall of his chest against mine.
Chloe’s brother who has me wondering, for the first time, ever, what he would feel like, sound like, taste like, if I leaned forward just a little more and ran my lips up the strong column of his throat.
The thought settles around me like a dark cloud, wrapping me up in the scent, the feel, of Miles. Suddenly I want nothing more than to tilt my head back, to loop my hands around his neck, to pull his mouth down to mine.
But this is Miles! The little voice at the back of my head is screaming at me now, telling me to back up. To step away. To put some serious distance between us before I do something really, really stupid.
But then it’s too late. He’s scooping me up in his arms again. Holding me against his rock-hard chest as he carries me over to the bed. I’ve seen him in a bathing suit a bunch of times in the last year, but seeing him without a shirt on is very different from feeling his well-muscled pecs and flat abs pressed so intimately against me. Especially when those ice-blue eyes of his are looking down at me with the same combination of annoyance and arousal that I’m currently feeling.
When we get to the bed, he takes his time sliding me down his body to the mattress. Once he lets me go, I expect it to get easier to think—to breathe. But then his fingers—long and elegant and just a little rough—are on the bare skin of my knee, my calf, as he arranges my leg on the pillow.
“Comfortable?” he asks, after a minute, and his voice is husky, jagged. Just a little off.
“Yeah. Thanks.”
“Good.” He backs up a couple of steps, nods toward the door. “I’m going to go get some sleep. I was up all night and I’m about to drop.”
“Oh right. Thanks again. For everything.”
“No problem. You can hide out here for a couple of days, until the press dies down and you’re ready to go back to your real life.”
This is it, the opening I’ve been looking for. This is my chance to tell him that I can’t go back, that my father has completely cut me off from the only life I’ve ever known. But even as I open my mouth to explain everything, I can’t get the words past my too-tight throat. Miles made it very clear in the kitchen that I’m already a fuckup in his mind. The last thing I want to do is make it worse.
It shouldn’t matter what he thinks of me, and God knows I don’t want it to matter. But for some reason it does. Which is why I just nod when I should speak, just look at him when I should be explaining everything.
“Do you need anything before I go to sleep?” he asks after a second. “Maybe something to drink?”
“No.” I finally force the word out. “I’m good. Besides, I’m not an invalid. If I get thirsty, I can get it myself.”
“You should stay off that foot as much as possible. At least for today. Give the butterfly bandages a chance to work.” He nods at the nightstand table, where the remote control for the TV is resting. “Watch some television or something. But no gossip shows. You don’t need that.”
I groan because of course Alexander and I will have made E! and God only knows what else. “I definitely won’t be channel surfing.”
Miles must believe me, because he doesn’t say anything else. Just gives me a wry smile and a little wave before ducking out the door.
And then I’m alone, with nothing to keep me company but the million and one recriminations currently ripping through my brain.