STRIPTEASED (Roommate Reverse Harem Romance)

I hopped off the rock. “Why’d you do that?”

He looked at the image on his screen. “I liked the way your hair was blowing around your face.”

“You’ve got to delete that. I’m not even wearing any makeup.”

“Don’t need it,” he grunted, still looking at his camera.

“Let me see that.” I grabbed his huge forearm, trying to see. It felt like grabbing on to an iron beam.

“I’ll send it to you.”

That seemed like a couple of needless extra steps for something I was going to delete anyway, but this was his show. He fiddled with his camera, then pulled out his phone and asked for my number. A few moments later, my phone chimed and I opened his text.

Wow. The woman staring up from the screen didn’t look like me at all. Her eyes looked light and seemed to stare right through me. Her—my—hair was wild around my face, yet somehow framed it perfectly. The picture was unlike any I’d seen of me, but I no longer wanted to delete it.

“Wow. Um, you’re a good photographer. I guess you can make anyone look good.”

He tilted his head to the side as he stared down at me but didn’t comment. It felt like he’d managed to capture not just my image, but somehow, a hint of my spirit. I didn’t know how he’d done it, but some people seemed to have a certain kind of magic with a camera, and clearly Knox did.

Spontaneously, I stretched up on my toes and reached my arms around Knox’s thick neck. After a moment, his arms went around me, and I felt warm, safe, and secure. I inhaled deeply, my nose buried in his shirt, and he smelled good. He’d obviously showered this morning, and he had a clean, fresh scent in addition to deeper masculine notes behind it. Knox patted me somewhat awkwardly on the back and ran a tentative hand through my hair. When I stepped back, he met my eye for a moment before gesturing down the path. He was right, it was time to go back.

We walked along in a comfortable silence until we were almost back to his car. Then he stopped and turned to me. “I don’t usually do that.”

A number of different interpretations flashed through my head. “Take pictures of people?”

“No,” he said, then shook his head. “Well, that too. But hug people. I don’t often do that.”

“I don’t either.”

One of Knox’s dark, bushy eyebrows rose. “Really?”

“Really.” I studied the terrain as if the trees and bushes around me held the words I was looking for. “I told you I was raised by my grandmother, right?”

He nodded, looking as tall and as strong as the trees behind him.

“She was a very practical sort of woman. When I was little, if I fell and banged my knee, she’d patch it up, but wouldn’t kiss it or offer any words of sympathy. She didn’t ever seem to feel the need to hug me or pat my arm or anything like that. It just didn’t mean anything to her, if that makes any sense.”

“What about your ex?”

I ran my hand through my hair, pushing it away from my face. “He hugged me—if he wanted something.”

“Wanted something?” Knox echoed.

“Let’s just say that it was part of his very limited range of foreplay.” I was pretty sure I was blushing.

“Oh.” His tone held no judgment, and my embarrassment faded.

“Did your parents hug you?”

“Foster parents,” he corrected. “And no, most of them didn’t.”

“How many did you have?”

“A lot. Maybe when I was young some did, but the bigger I got, the more they kept their distance.”

“That’s awful. I’m sorry you went through that.”

He shrugged. “I learned to keep my distance, too. It seemed easier. Not many foster parents liked having to look up at a kid.”

Impulsively, I stepped forward and took his hand. “I wish they’d been able to see your heart instead of your size.” As much as the story of his past made me sad, I was also glad that he was opening up to me and that we were finally carrying on an actual conversation.

Knox stared down at our joined hands as if arrested by the sight. “Why aren’t you scared of me?”

I looked up into his blue eyes. “Should I be?”

“No. Unless you’re causing trouble at the club. But most people are afraid, anyway.”

That was sad, but I suddenly realized it wasn’t entirely true. “The guys aren’t. Tonio and the twins. They’re your friends.”

“They’re my coworkers.”

“They wouldn’t have invited you to live with them if they didn’t like you.”

He cocked his head to the side. “How do you know they invited me to live with them? Maybe it’s my house and I let them stay there.”

Oops. “I just assumed, because Tonio said the three of them had been friends since high school.”