“Look,” I start. “I don’t do this. I don’t get involved with employees. Or with a mate’s sister. It’s a fucking disaster waiting to happen. But get this straight—I didn’t lose out last night. Watching you…” My jaw clenches. “Trust me, I got what I needed.”
She makes a small sound, but I don’t let her cut in. My thumb strokes her skin, keeping her still.
“There’s nothing sexier than—fuck.” I shake my head. “Than you exactly as you are. Not pretending, not performing. Just you.”
The words feel foreign in my mouth. I don’t talk like this. Don’tdothis. But Georgie’s too sweet and sincere for me to rip apart with carelessness. She doubts herself enough already. The last thing I’m going to do is feed it.
She needs to hear it straight. That what happened last night wasn’t me taking from her—it was me barely holding myself back.
“This thing?” I let out a rough breath. “It’s messy as hell. It shouldn’t be happening. But it is. So we either face it, or we don’t. Just don’t insult me by thinking I was doing you a bloody favor.”
Her throat bobs, lips parting. She’s ready to come back at me. I hush her with my thumb brushing over her mouth.
“Unfortunately for me,” I mutter, “you’re in my head now.”
She stares at me, breath caught, looking so lovely and overwhelmed I have to step back. “Ready for the ice bath?”
TWENTY-EIGHT
Mathematically satisfying dick ratios
Georgie
My head throbs witheach heartbeat, and my mouth tastes like a fish died in it, despite brushing my teeth until my gums protested. But honestly? The hangover’s nothing compared to the vertigo from what Patrick just said.
You’re in my head now.
I feel like I’ve accidentally wandered into someone else’s story. If this were a rom-com movie, I’d be the quirky sidekick, not the girl the brooding hero actually chooses. Any minute now, someone will burst through the door waving a script, yelling,“Sorry, mix-up! He’s supposed to fall for the confident blonde, not the girl who owns Periodic Table pajamas.”
Patrick hands me a fluffy towel, warm from the dryer. “Bathroom’s first door on the left.”
I scuttle off, heart pounding somewhere near my tonsils.
In the bathroom, I wriggle into Fee’s red bikini and stare at my reflection. I don’t recognize the girl in the mirror. Her eyes are brighter, even through the hangover fog. Her skin carries a constellation of faint marks—the gentle scrape of his stubble along my jaw. I trace one faint mark near my collarbone, and my whole body remembers the heat of his mouth.
I take a breath that does nothing to slow my racing pulse, then make a decision that would horrify sensible Georgie. The bikini comes back off.
If I’m doing this—if we’re doing whatever this is—I’m doing it properly. No hiding, no half measures.
Towel wrapped around me, I pad back out.
The cold air hits my legs, raising goosebumps, but it’s nothing compared to the heat curling low in my stomach as I watch Patrick. He tips his smoothie glass back and downs it in one long swallow, Adam’s apple bobbing, and I swear I’ve never seen anything more sexy in my life.
That white T-shirt clings to his chest, and those grey joggers… dear God. Whoever invented grey joggers deserves a Nobel Prize for services to women everywhere. There’s no mystery in those things. None.
I drag my eyes up just as he catches me staring.
He drags his hand across his mouth. “Ready?”
“Ready as I’ll ever be,” I say, lying through my hangover.
Out on the deck, I dip a finger into the tub. The cold is instant and violent. “Fucking hell!”
Patrick chuckles behind me, the sadist.
Screw it. Before I lose my nerve, I drop the towel.
Patrick goes completely still.
