“What?” Mary scowled at the Viking-looking motherfucker kneeled in front of the older woman.
“I mean this with the most respect; you’re still a little pale, and it’s been a moment since you had some juice and a snack. Usually when this happens, you would have been okay by now.” Mary was about to argue, but he shook his head and gently took her hand in his. “Why don’t you let me take you to urgent care?”
“You?” She made a face. “Who is going to watch over the team if both of us are gone? Shit goes haywire at the drop of a dime here, and you know it,” she argued weakly.
“Marty can do it.” Stone shrugged. “And if anything comes up, Griff can pitch in,” he offered me up. I swallowed. I could feel Marty’s dark eyes on me, but I didn’t look at her. “Right, Griffin?” He was looking over his shoulder. I had no choice than to nod tersely.
No choice. Yeah, right.Eight hours of time guaranteed with Marty?That sounded fucking perfect to me. It would have been better if I could have had that time with her in one of the rooms upstairs.
But beggars couldn’t be choosers.
8MARTY
“You know I don’t need you to follow me around like some lost puppy, right?” My annoyance and frustration were clear in my tone. Something he didn’t call me out on, nor did he say much other than grunt at me as he looked around the dirty hotel room.
“People are slobs,” he said under his breath, the first actual words from him in the past two hours. I glanced at him and rolled my eyes before I got back to work wiping the floor-to-ceiling glass wall. I heard his big, booted feet shuffle through the space and the couch groan under his weight.
“You pissed at me?” he asked. The arm I’d been wiping the glass with froze mid-wipe.
“Why would I be pissed?” I continued with my cleaning.
Grunt.
Again.
I took a deep cleansing breath, but it did nothing to calm me down. Because under the lemony pine scent of the cleaners was Griffin and his leathery sage and eucalyptus scent. A scent I swore I’d been waking up to every freaking morning since that stupid night I’d idiotically asked him inside.
“You know why.”
“I don’t. And I’m not,” I said as I turned and pushed my cleaning cart toward the bathroom and got on cleaning up the huge soaker tub.
I admired the thing for a single moment before I reached for the cleaners. What would it feel like to soak in a tub like that? To not only have the tub itself but the time to luxuriate in not doing anything with hot, almost scalding water, filled with bubbles or great-smelling bath salts, the luxurious clean bathroom filled with candlelight?
And sexy, tatted-up Griffin settled behind me.
Naked. With his hands all over me. I bet Griffin’s touch can make a woman see stars.
I shook the thought away and ignored the blush on my face. What the hell was wrong with me? I’d never been that girl. The one who got googly eyes and mushy over a guy. I’d never been the boy-crazy, pick-me girl.
Until Griffin,a voice in my head whispered.
“Until Griffin,” I said under my breath.
“What about me?” His deep voice made me jump. My poor heart felt like it was about to leap out of my chest. I turned to look at him.
“What the hell are you doing?” I semi-shouted as he leaned against the doorway.
“I thought I heard you talking and wasn’t sure if you were talking to me. I didn’t want to be rude.”
“You? Rude? Right.” I shook my head and scrubbed the tub, ignoring the man and everything he made me feel. My skin tingled by the time I was finished, and he pushed the cart out of the doorway so I could get through.
“Thank you,” I said softly. I was tired, horny, and worried about Mary. It had been a couple of sleepless nights with tons of twisting and turning in bed until I had no choice but to reach into my nightstand and get my battery-operated boyfriend tohelp quelch the ache Griffin had brought to life.Or should I say Daddy?I shook the thought away.
“Stone texted. Said Mary’s okay. He’s taking her home and making her rest for a couple of days. He wanted me to ask if you were okay with taking her spot for these next couple of days.”
“Me?” I pointed at myself. I knew at least two people who would be better at helping Mary than I could.
“Yeah, you.”
