Hard to Handle (Love in the Balance 2)

“You’re bossy, do you know that?”

“Take your shirt off, Aiden.”

What he wouldn’t give for her to be purring that into his ear instead of barking it at him like a drill sergeant. No, actually, that worked, too. He hid his smile as he tugged the neck of his shirt and pulled it over his head.

Sadie dabbed at the cut, her ministrations gentle. “I had it,” she said, her voice soft. “You just scared me.”

“You did not,” Aiden said, winding his shirt in his hands. She swiped again and he sucked air through his teeth, frowning over his shoulder at her.

She gave him a tight smile. “Sorry.”

Aiden turned back around. “Next time you need something back here, ask for my help.”

She switched from a wet paper towel to dry. “You were busy,” she bit out.

Aiden kept his head down so she couldn’t see the curve of his lips. So he hadn’t imagined her reaction. Her overreaction. How interesting.

He heard the tear of paper, saw the movement out of the corner of his eye, and waited for her to lay the bandage over his cut and give it a pound with one fist. Instead, she laid it on his shoulder and used gentle pressure to secure it at the edges.

He turned his head slightly, weighing his next words. “Sonya’s married. That was her husband’s phone number she gave me so I could call him about a special order.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said.

“Sadie…” But her fingers moving away from the bandage to draw a long, slow line down his back made him forget what he was going to say. She was following the trail of his scar, he guessed. Most of it was numb from the nerve damage, but then, she knew that already.

She’d touched him like this before, the morning he’d woken next to her. The morning he left to pick up breakfast to keep himself from begging her to make love to him. He didn’t think he’d ever wanted someone as badly as he wanted Sadie.

He still wanted her.

Her fingertips veered to his side, probably tracing one of the thorny branches of the tattoo wrapping around to his back.

“When did you get this?” she asked quietly.

“A couple of months ago.”

Her fingers continued down his ribs. “Can I see it?” She sounded pained to ask.

“Sure.”

He stood and lifted his arm, giving her a view of the ink running the length of his flank. After Mom died, the subject of his first tat was a no-brainer. A red rose bursting from a tangle of thorny vines. The thorns signified hardship, the red rose his mother.

Sadie traced the flower, and Aiden swallowed hard. He missed her touch. His fist closed around the shirt in his hand as he gritted his teeth.

She stroked his skin, having no idea she was turning him inside out. “Your mom’s roses.”

God, how this woman got him. “Yeah,” he said, swallowing around a lump in his throat. “A heart with the word MOM in it seemed a little cliché.”

He heard her blow air from her nose, an attempt at a laugh that didn’t quite make it.

She laid her palm flat over the rose and the warmth expanded from his belly to chest where it wrapped around his heart. He lowered his arm, trapping her hand against him. The expression on her face, a mixture of sorrow and longing, nearly dropped him like a sack of grain.

He closed the distance between them, bringing up a hand to cup her chin as he thumbed her bottom lip. He had so many things to say. Like how sorry he was, how he’d do anything to take back the day he’d lost her for good. How he wanted her with an intensity time and space hadn’t been able to lessen.

And God knew how he’d tried to stop.

“You should put on a clean shirt,” she whispered, not speaking the words he read so easily in her eyes.

“You should kiss me,” he murmured.

Her eyes sank closed as her hand gripped him tighter. Aiden kept hold of her face, lowering his head to her glossed lips. The sweet scent of strawberry rolled off her mouth, and he wondered if her waiting tongue tasted as sweet…

“Everything okay back here?” a voice bellowed through the warehouse.

Sadie’s eyes snapped open.

Aiden stood over her, debating whether or not to kiss her even though Axle’s head would appear in the doorway in a second.

She pulled away from him before he could and busied herself by cleaning up the paper towels and washing her hands.

Axle poked his head in, his face an Easter Island statue. He took in Sadie’s flushed cheeks and Aiden’s state of undress and his eyes widened a fraction. “Lose your shirt?”