Stitches

Her gaze drops to my chest pointedly, but I can see from the rise and fall of her chest, she’s breathing a little less evenly than usual. She adopts what I think she intends to be a stern look, but Moira’s like a kindergarten teacher who can’t even control the little people in her classroom. Sternness is not her thing. She can’t pull it off. She’s gentle and sweet. Still, since I’m her husband’s best friend, she tries for stern. She stares at the button hole as she undoes the top buttons of my shirt.

“I’m thinking that I feel sorry for your liver right now. You haven’t treated it very well tonight.”

God, she’s so close. I could reach out and touch her right now if I wanted to. Instead, I watch her fingers move down my chest, pushing little plastic buttons through the neatly sewn holes. I’m a head taller than she is, so looking down at her like this, I can see right down her top. I can see the tops of her high, rounded, perfect fucking breasts, not even restrained by a bra. I force my eyes away, but then I’m just thinking about the curve of her ass, her long, strong legs. She’s a runner, I think. I know she used to be, not sure if she still is. It certainly looks like she still is.

I want to touch her ass. I want to grab it and yank her against me right here in the guest room. I envision it, imagine her gasp as she falls against me, her hands moving to my chest to instinctively push me away. Maybe she would hesitate. Maybe I would see just a split second of longing in her pretty blue eyes before she did the decent thing and pushed me away.

I keep my hands to myself and my fantasies in my head, but fuck, I don’t want to.

Is it cheating if Ashley cheated first? Wait, no, Ashley isn’t the problem. Seb is. That bastard has never cheated, and he probably wouldn’t take too kindly to my pinning his wife against this wall and kissing the fuck out of her, my hands roaming down to squeeze that incredible ass.

Nope, he wouldn’t like that at all. I’m pretty fucking sure of it.

She probably wouldn’t, either. Unlike Ashley, Moira is actually happy with her marriage.

That brings me back down. Fucking reality is a real asshole.

What a shitty fucking day. I woke up this morning with at least a little enthusiasm for Palm Springs, now here I am, drunk and lost while Moira undresses me—and not because she wants to fuck me, but because I’m too fucking drunk to do it myself.

Suddenly I push her hands off my chest and scowl. I can unbutton my own damn dress shirt. She takes an uncertain step back, but waits for me to peel my shirt off and drop it on the floor.

Sighing, she bends down to pick it up.

I look down the front of her nightie again.

Dammit, Griff, quit that shit.

She drags her ass out of bed in the middle of the night to come pick you up; you stop acting like an asshole and pay her a little respect.

I have the best of intentions until she pops back up, tossing my shirt on the chair, and gets distracted by the sight of my bare chest. She looks vaguely surprised, and I’m not sure whether to feel insulted or flattered. She clearly likes what she sees—and why wouldn’t she? I log the gym time and I was born with a good arrangement of muscles to begin with—but still, that she sees Seb naked every day and still pauses at the sight of me makes me feel kinda good about myself. Seb and I look absolutely nothing alike. His appearance is more refined—dark hair, deep blue eyes, a touch of elegance to cover up all his rough edges. If Hollywood approached him tomorrow and asked him to be the new Bond, exactly zero people would be surprised.

Me, I could never pull that off. No one expects me to pull up in an Aston Martin with a Bond girl in the passenger seat and a tumbler full of expensive liquor in my hand, ready to take care of business in time for us to make our dinner reservations.

I vaguely look like the questionable man in all black that you would meet at a dive bar and slide an envelope full of cash to kill your spouse so you can collect the insurance money. It’s always worked for us in business. Seb is slick, he’s got the charisma and he’s a good wheeler and dealer. I’m good at playing bad cop, coming down hard on people and making them wiggle when they’re positive there’s no wiggle room.

Just not good at keeping my wife from fucking around on me, apparently.

Fuck, my mind had to go back there.

Moira has recovered from ogling my muscular chest and now she nervously plucks pillows off the bed and pulls back the blanket. She has to lean over the bed to do it though, and I cannot help looking at her ass again.

I just want to move closer. I’m not going to touch her. That’s my intention, but I’m too fucking drunk and I bump into her, knocking her on the bed.

I hear Moira gasp as she catches herself on the soft surface beneath her.

“Aw, shit,” I mutter.

Moira looks back, startled, then she laughs when I trip and catch myself on the bed.

“Oh, my God, you are so—”

I’m fairly certain she’s about to tell me how drunk I am, like I don’t already know, but the words die on her tongue. Instead of letting her up, I shove her little ass to the center of the bed and lie down beside her.

When I initially

move so close to her scantily clad body, Moira looks understandably hesitant. I can only imagine what’s going through her mind as her eyes follow my every movement, then cautiously dart to my face. I settle in beside her, but I don’t make a move to touch her, so she tries to pretend this is a normal thing for me to do.

“You didn’t finish getting undressed,” she remarks, since apparently that’s all she can think to say.