‘You assume right.’
‘Me neither. I’m going to give you my jumper because once the fire goes out, the temperature will dip and you’ve got to be warm to sleep.’ Jamie wasted no time in pulling his sweater out of his bag and handing it to Alicia. ‘Here.’
Alicia took it, the wool thick, chunky and a little scratchy between her fingers. ‘But, what about you?’ she asked. ‘How will you keep warm? How will you sleep?’
‘Don’t worry about me. I can sleep standing up and, as I said before, I don’t feel the cold.’
Alicia doubted very much that Jamie could sleep standing up, although she supposed that a lot of people could sleep in chairs so it was conceivable that he was one of them. But when she watched him pull over the same rickety wooden chair he’d been sitting on earlier, she got the distinct feeling he was lying to assuage her guilt.
‘And you’ve got the curtain on the bed for privacy,’ he added. ‘But I’ll look the other way, whenever you need me to. Or wait outside.’
If Alicia could have been warmed by Jamie’s thoughtfulness, there would be no need for the fire or an extra sweater. It was like he had considered everyone of her worries and was doing his best to put her at ease. Maybe she had overreacted earlier.
She hunkered inside the box bed, musty smelling drapes drawn and slid Jamie’s sweater over her head. Of course, it smelled of him. That manly, tangy bergamot scent would be around her neck and on her hands all night long. It made her want to peel it off and hold it to her chest. As she lay back on the makeshift pillow fashioned out of a shirt, also pulled from the magician’s hat that was Jamie’s backpack, she realised that it, too, smelled far too sexy. My God, the man may as well be in here with her.
What was he doing? Alicia listened but the stillness of the bothy gave away none of its secrets. Then peeking out the drapes, she was immediately reminded that privacy went both ways. Jamie was standing in the dimly candlelit room removing his jeans.Fuck.She was so out of order. He had granted her every bit of dignity and here she was spying on him. Well, not spying, as such, but accidentally watching him undressing.
You don’t have to watch.
But it didn’t feel like a choice. Here was this rock of a man standing in the middle of a bothy in only a pair of long johns and a flannel shirt. It shouldn’t have been sexy, but Jamie Butler managed to make thermal clothing hotter than a forest fire. The thickness of his thighs filling the fabric and, oh, the bulge. Holy moly! Her mouth turned to cotton. She sucked in a breath to steady herself. But it was louder than expected. Jamie flicked his head towards the box bed.Shit.Alicia fell back on the pillow, feeling like a cross between a naughty child and a pervert. She had never felt like a pervert before, but she had been covertly gawping at Jamie’s penis. That would make a man a pervert, so how was she any better?
‘You okay, Alicia?’ Jamie’s low tones filtered through the drapes. ‘Got everything you need?’
‘Mmm, yes, thanks.’He knows. He knows.He may as well have asked if I wanted a photo.Alicia slapped her forehead, the sound muffled by the beanie she was still wearing. ‘I hope you sleep well.’
‘Aye, you too. If you need anything in the night, let me know.’
She shook her head and mouthed the word ‘no’ to herself.No, no, no. Do not tell him you need him next to you.
‘Thank you, Jamie. I should be fine. Goodnight.’
And that should have been it, but as Alicia lay in the darkness of her box bed, cocooned in the warmth of Jamie’s sweater, his rich scent hugging her, in no way could she sleep. By rights, exhaustion should have her dead to the world but for what could have been hours, thoughts of Jamie roamed through her mind like a trespasser tramping onto unguarded land. The arousing scent of his cologne. His smile. His bulk. That bulge.Imagine that inside you. She couldn’t shift it from her mind. A rogue fluttering shimmied in her underwear. Maybe she should…
Jeez! No, you can’t. Not even quietly.
Okay, she wouldn’t touch herself. That would be wrong with Jamie on the other side of the drapes But then a sound made her eyes fly open, even though it was pitch dark and there was nothing to see. The sound of a man’s breath. Sharp and urgent. Panting.Oh, no, please say he isn’t. Please.
But on it went. Puff, huh, puff, huh, puff, huh. Alicia was torn between covering her ears and looking out the drapes. Nervous of what she might see, but unable to restrain herself, she shimmied herself up in bed, as quietlyas possible, and edged back an inch of the fabric. The sight she beheld almost made her gasp.
Jamie, still in his Christmas-gift-revealing long johns and a tight white t-shirt that moulded perfectly around his muscular upper arms, was doing push ups by candlelight on the floor of the bothy.
Oh, thank God. But at the same time, wow! Those arms. Beefcake is the only word.
He could lift her and carry her home any day of the week.
‘Hey,’ she whispered.
Jamie stopped mid push up and turned to look at her whilst resting on one throbbing yet distinctly capable arm.
Fuck me.
‘Oh, hey.’ He lowered himself to the ground before rising to his full towering height, like an old-fashioned gentleman standing when a lady enters the room. Chad would have continued doing push ups as if it were some emblem of his manliness. ‘Sorry. Did I wake you?’
‘Er, no. You can’t sleep either?’ Was it bad to admit that when she’d been given the bed?
‘Ach, turns out that chair doesn’t convert to a sofa bed after all. Was trying to tire myself out to see if I could get sparko on the floor.’
‘The floor?!’ Alicia couldn’t let Jamie sleep on the floor of the bothy. It was freezing and probably had remnants of cowpat and sheep-dropping encrusted boots all over it, and who knew what else?’
