Men were such complicated creatures. Women were so much more straightforward.
He grabbed the back of his shirt and dragged it off over his head. The revelation of his hard body made her swoon. The bands of muscle and the way they flexed as he rolled his shoulders. He had a certain grace to him, an efficiency of movement. She could watch him for hours.
“You want to sleep?” she asked.
“Yeah.”
“Okay.”
She sat on a chair and removed her own brand new boots and comfy socks. Pulled her shirt off and dumped it on the small table. His gaze jumped to her, taking in the sensible cotton bra, but was hastily diverted. He scurried into the bathroom and she heard the sounds of him brushing his teeth. When he emerged he got straight into bed, climbing beneath the blankets. With eyes shut, he gave every appearance of settling in for the night.
So he missed the removal of the rest of her clothes.
“I guess you’re really tired,” she said, throwing back the blankets on her side of the bed. She climbed onto the mattress, clad in nothing but her own skin.
“A long day.”
“Yeah, it was,” she agreed.
His eyes shot open when her hand slid over his chest. The heat of his skin and hard flesh beneath felt sublime.
“I think I know what’s going on here,” she said.
“That so?”
“Male ni**les are so nice.” She rubbed the side of her thumb over one hard nub. “Useless, but nice.”
“I can think of a use for them.”
“Can you?” She leant forward and lapped at one, secured her lips around it and sucked. His sudden intake of breath and muttered ‘yes’ curled her toes. Her pu**y was swollen and slick. Ready. But she’d been ready for the better part of the day, damn him. She tightened her fingers in his chest hair and tugged, just a little. Giving him a small serving of her ire seemed more than justified.
Nick’s hand covered hers. “Ros.”
She moved onto his collarbone, tracing it with her tongue. “I think your delicate male pride was wounded when I chose the gun over you earlier today.”
He didn’t reply.
“See, this is a precarious situation we’re in, Nicky. Relationships don’t generally evolve from one party holding the other party hostage. Not healthy ones, at least.”
“You think we’re in a relationship?” he asked. His voice held no malice, but still.
Ros lifted her head. His forehead was furrowed and his fine lips were sealed tight. If only they’d stayed that way. He stared back at her, dark eyes unreadable.
“If mentioning that you abducted me and held me hostage upsets you, we’re not going to get very far.” Which was the absolute truth. She swung a leg over him, straddling his long body and seating herself atop his jean-covered hips. Actually, not a comfortable position. The zipper dug into her, raised as it was by his hard-on. She shuffled forward onto his bare, flat stomach. Much better. Nothing to chafe her there.
Nick licked his lips and his gaze slid down her warily as if her na**d state worried him. So it should. His hands held back, not touching her. Fine, she could do the touching for both of them. Her fingers stroked the soft skin of his face, the arch of his cheekbones and the dips of his temple. For a while the day before, when she’d been fighting off the infected, she’d thought she’d never see him again. Never get to be this close to him, ever again. It put things into perspective. He had issues, but then so did the rest of the world. Nothing was normal anymore. Man-wise, it seemed she’d been searching for perfection, but it didn’t exist. Unicorns were more likely. People, on the other hand, were infinitely fallible.
“I also think that us leaving the cabin has got you feeling a bit discombobulated,” she said. “All of your careful plans have fallen by the wayside. That can’t be pleasing to your inner control freak.”
“I’m feeling what?”
“Confused. Unsettled.”
“And that’s why you’re sitting on me bare-ass naked?”
“No,” she sighed. “I’m sitting on you bare-ass na**d because I want to have sex with you. I want to connect with you and feel close to you. Because you’re important to me beyond your ability to protect me.”
“Because you still think you can go out there and do okay on your own.”
She held back from rolling her eyes, just. “I’d manage.”
He snorted.
“But that’s not what we’re talking about,” she said.
“No? So what are we talking about? I’m confused, apparently.”
In answer she kissed his firm lips, trying to tempt him, to show him. Thank God, it worked. He opened his mouth to her on a groan and she slipped him her tongue. God, he kissed well. But then, he did all the physical stuff well. His hot, wet mouth hungrily kissed her back. It made her feel so much better. She squirmed against his hard stomach, rubbing herself on him oh so surreptitiously. As if he didn’t notice. Hands covered her thighs, fingers kneading her flesh. She kissed him until her head spun and she had to come up for air.
They both panted. But Nick took his hands off her and set them back on the bed at his sides. The look he gave her reeked of a challenge.
“Are you saying no to me?” she asked.
“No, I’m not saying no to you.”
“So I can do what I want?”
He cocked his brow. “Do you even know what you want?”
“I don’t think there’s a lot of doubt about that right now.” But she ground her wet pu**y against him in case there was. “Talk to me, Nicky. You’re giving me cause for concern here.”
He hesitated, staring over her shoulder. “I think we went about this the wrong way. I think … I rushed things between us.”
Her world turned topsy-turvy. It spun and bounced and careened off the walls and made absolutely no sense at all. “And now you’re trying to slow things down? Right now? After today?”
“I said I was sorry about the gun,” he answered softly. “I meant it.”
“Yeah, you did. I know.”
“And I’ve been thinking since then …”
She waited. He didn’t elaborate.
“You’ve been thinking?” she asked.
He nodded. “About where we go from here.”
The silence held for a long moment as she attempted to pull her thoughts together. Her heart beat somewhere between her legs and he wanted to discuss their future. Random didn’t begin to cover it, given their not even a week-long history. She looked down and, good God, she was leaking bodily fluids over the man’s six-pack. The trail of hair leading from his belly button beneath the waist of his jeans clung damp to his skin. The musky scent of her overeager sex surrounded them.