And then he spun around.
It happened so fast that as their eyes met, both of them recoiled.
Even though she had been caught and then some, she shambled back against the pillows, and resumed her former position, restraightening the blankets he had been so careful with. With her face aflame, she wanted to hide—
A sharp squeak echoed through the room, and she glanced up. He had burst forth from the bathroom, the shower left open and running, soap still clinging to his abdominals and dripping from off . . .
His sex was a magnificent shock. Standing out from his body, the rod of him was hard and thick and proud.
“You . . .”
He said something further, but she was too captivated to care, too enthralled to notice. Deep within her, a wellspring was released, her sex swelling and preparing itself to accept him.
“Payne,” he demanded, covering himself with his hands.
Instantly, she was ashamed and put her palms to her hot cheeks. “Verily, I am sorry I spied upon you.”
Her human gripped the edge of the doorway. “Not that . . .” He shook his head as if to clear it. “Are you aware of what you were doing?”
She had to laugh. “Yes. Believe in this, my healer—I was totally aware of what I was regarding so thoroughly.”
“You were sitting up, Payne. You were up on your knees at the end of the bed.”
Her heart stopped. Surely she could not have heard him right.
Surely.
As Payne frowned, Manny lurched forward—and then realized he was really fucking naked. Which was a condition that occurred when a guy didn’t just have his ass in the breeze, but was totally and completely, ball-numbingly erect as he pulled a birthday suit. Reaching into the bathroom, he snagged a towel, wrapped it around his hips, and then went over to the bed.
“I . . . no, you must be wrong,” Payne said. “I couldn’t have—”
“You did—”
“I had merely stretched upon—”
“How did you get to the end of the bed, then. And how did you get back where you are?”
Her eyes went to the short footboard, confusion drawing her brows in tight. “I do not know. I was . . . watching you and you were all I knew.”
The man in him was astounded and . . . strangely transformed. To be wanted that much by someone like her?
But then the physician in him took over. “Here, let me see what’s doing, okay?”
He untucked the sheets and blanket from the end of the bed and rolled them up to the tops of her thighs. Using his finger, he ran it across the sole of her pretty foot.
He expected it to twitch. It didn’t.
“Anything?” he said.
When she shook her head, he repeated on the other side. Then he moved higher, wrapping his palms around her slender ankles. “Anything?”
Her eyes were tragic as they met his. “I feel nothing. And I do not understand what you think you saw.”
He moved higher, to her calves. “You were on your knees. I swear to it.”
Higher still, to her taut thighs.
Nothing.