My mouth dried as I swung around facing the door. “That’s okay, I can leave you to it.”
“Pretty sure this bad boy can fit both of us.”
11
amber
Seeingthe big soaker tub made me a bit bolder than I’d usually be. After the intense year I’d had where I’d had one singular focus—taking some time just for fun felt like a bold new adventure.
Nerves sung under the bubbles.
As varied as my relationships had been, I’d never been the one to push them forward. I’d always been the one who was pursued. And twice now, I’d leaped into the fray with this man. I just hoped I didn’t scare him away.
The hot water slowly rose, hiding me in the foamy bubbles.
Tate stood in the doorway, his hands fisted at his sides, the T-shirt dangling from his fingers.
The urge to babble and deflect rose inside me like the steam coming off the water. I used every trick in my personal arsenal to look unaffected as I gathered bubbles closer to tease around my breasts. The tight tips were still just above the water as excitement and wariness thrummed through me.
God, don’t turn me away.
He set the shirt on top of my pants on the tall hamper beside the sink, then turned back around. His sea glass eyes locked on me as he pulled his tight black T-shirt over his head.
Whoa.
I’d thought the tight costume from the parade was impressive, but it had nothing on what had been hiding beneath. It was rare to see a man without tattoos all over, but Tate was pure bronzed skin with a bloom of freckles across his shoulders. Muscles on muscles over a few more muscles flexed under the chest hair that dusted his pecs and endless abs.
The men I’d been with tended toward the esoteric brains with soft skin and even softer bodies.
This... My mouth dried.
There was nothing soft about Tate.
Music from the living room drifted in like a distant melody that had always hummed just under the surface for me. Yearning. The song matched everything I felt.
I’d been alone for what felt like forever. Even before Julian had demolished our relationship.
Finally, Tate moved closer. His fingertips dipped into the water near my feet. He made lazy little circles through the bubbles as he skimmed the roundness of my knee then trailed over to where my arms were under the water.
His eyes practically glowed in the low lights of the room. When he got to my breasts, he drifted around them making my breath back up into my lungs. He moved behind the tub. It filled one whole corner of the bathroom. “Is this what you want?”
“I wouldn’t have—” I broke off with a hiss as his hand sunk into the water to cup one breast possessively.
“Just making sure.”
First one, then the other, he learned the shape of me under the water until I was shifting in response. Then his touch wasgone and I craned my neck and got an eyeful of just how massive Tate Reynolds really was.
His jeans rode low on his hips, the top snap undone.
My mouth watered. Instead of coming closer, he reached into a cabinet and pulled out a few candles. He set them along the floor beside the tub then hit a remote and the room went golden. There were more of them on the ledge of the high window above us.
“Done this before?”
His low laugh made me shiver. “I like a bath. Working on this Wonderland project has been a lot of manual labor. Sometimes a hot shower isn’t enough. Pretty sure women don’t corner the market on relaxation.”
I dipped lower into the water until my chin touched the rapidly dissolving bubbles.
He walked around the tub again, a bottle in hand. The scent of eucalyptus and the forest made a lazy trail in the water and mixed with the steam in the air. He flicked the overhead lights off, leaving us in soft light.
