He nodded.
‘Have you any other tattoos?’ she asked.
‘Besides the Cass one, nope, I’m not really a tattoo person.’
Carli quirked a brow. ‘Says the man with two tattoos.’
‘I’m more of a you person.’
‘Oh.’Holy fuck!Was this conversation actually happening? Was a man saying these things to her? And was that man Niall Butler, standing here in soaked underpants with his rock-hard body, all wet and taunting, with ink on it dedicated to her? Carli’s gaze dropped to his crotch again. ‘You…might want to leave something to a lady’s imagination,’ she said before looking up to catch him tilting his head and smiling softly at her. He was glad she was back and that he’d helped bring her back. She could tell.
‘Sorry,’ he said, evidently trying to hold back the same amount of stupid happiness she was.
‘No, you’re not.’
He stepped towards her, wet underwear dangerously close, took her chin in his fingers, tilted it up towards him and spoke with crushing sincerity. ‘You know I am, Cass.’
And then he was gone. For a shower. My God. Why did he keep doing this to her? Leaving her hanging while hewent off to be naked somewhere else that wasn’t in her presence.
Carli did some deep breaths to steady herself and tried to ignore how aroused he made her. Logic said she couldn’t fall into things with Niall so soon. The revelation was too raw.
Except it wasn’t. It truly wasn’t. The only thing that was raw was how much she wanted him.
He’s staying in Scotland for goodness’ sake.
Minor detail.
When Carli had seen Niall this morning, standing there cooking her breakfast, in his rough, sleepy morning haze, that adorable expression of concentration on his face, she held nothing but affection for him. Niall had owned his mistakes, he’d said he was sorry countless times, and today he’d shown himself to be a good man. The person she knew he was. He was the person who’d hurt her, but he’d also been the person who’d helped her heal, and he had a good, good heart.
And he had two tattoos on his achingly beautiful body dedicated to her.
As for the chemistry. It was off the charts and getting desperately difficult to ignore.
Chapter 20
Niall
Niall lay in his tent and imagined Carli in hers. They’d had a perfect day together and things had mended a little. There had even been some flirting by the edge of the loch when he’d shown her the tattoo. He was glad he’d come here to keep her safe. Having her camping in the pitch dark on her own was not something he would have been at all comfortable with. But even though Carli was in the next tent, she was too far away. Too far away to protect her if someone did turn up and sneak into her tent, the chances of that happening, thankfully, being slim. And too far away. Too far away from him.
Niall shuffled onto his side in his sleeping bag. Fortunately, the exhaustion from jet lag meant he would easily be out for the count. He closed his eyes.
The next thing he was aware of was the sound of rain on the tent. It wouldn’t normally have been enough to wake him, but the lack of fly sheet meant that not only could he hear the rain, he felt it too.
Fucking Scottish weather. You try to assume the best and it slaps you in the face to remind you who’s in charge.
No baby raindrops either. Big heavy belters like steel pebbles were seeping through the tent and onto his sleeping bag. Bloody Sean and his chaos. Niall sat up, shuffled out of his sleeping bag and reached in his jeans for the car keys. He unzipped the tent, pulled on his jeans, t-shirt and boots, scooped up as much stuff as he could whilst guiding his way to the car using his phone’s torch. He then returned to get everything else before it was ruined by the rain.
‘Niall?’ Carli’s voice came from inside her tent. Shit, she might think there was an intruder in the campsite.
‘Aye, it’s me. Don’t worry. Go back to sleep.’
‘What’re you doing?’
‘Och, nothing. There’s a wee bit of rain.’
Niall heard the zip on Carli’s tent and then her voice. ‘It’s bucketing down. What are you doing?’
‘I’m away to sleep in the car ’cause my tent doesn’t have a fly sheet. Go back to sleep.’
