Total pages in book: 133
Estimated words: 126589 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 633(@200wpm)___ 506(@250wpm)___ 422(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 126589 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 633(@200wpm)___ 506(@250wpm)___ 422(@300wpm)
The edge of the bed was a mile away. Trust Gideon to have a king-sized bed. It took forever to slide her legs over the side of it. The drapes were drawn and the room was gloomy. Added to that, she had no idea where the heck her glasses were, which meant she couldn’t see further than three feet in front of her, before everything became a dizzying blur.
Where were her clothes?
She tugged a pillow from the head of the bed, holding it up in front of her body in an attempt to cover her nudity until she found the dress that she’d worn to Cam’s birthday party last night. But she couldn’t spot the damned thing anywhere in the room.
Gideon’s bedroom was in a shambles and she flushed as she recalled how it had gotten that way.
Do not think about it.
Don’t!
Her eyes helplessly tracked to the huge easy chair in the corner and her flush deepened.
Gideon bent her over the back of the chair, his hands reaching down to possessively squeeze her butt.
“I love this arse. I’ve never told you that before, have I?” The already deep timbre of his voice had roughened into a sexy, gravelly rasp that caused her naughty bits to spasm helplessly.
He flipped her dress up over her butt and made a harsh, tortured sound of appreciation.
The flashback was both welcome and unwelcome. Unwelcome, since the recollection of how ridiculously turned on she’d been by his short, sharp—often crude—exhalations of appreciation was enough to make her cringe now. And welcome because she finally recalled where she’d lost both her panties and her dress.
She hastened to the corner and squeaked in fright when she nearly face-planted in the middle of the carpeted floor as she tripped over one of his large sneakers.
The violent lurch forward dislodged the pillow from her grip and sent it flying a few feet in front of her. She muttered bad temperedly beneath her breath as she caught her balance and hastened to retrieve the pillow. She was bending over to pick it up when she heard a long, deep groan coming from the bed.
“Fuuuuuuck, why is there a little dude with a hammer banging away at my frontal lobe?” Gideon’s grumpy morning voice was dipped in dark chocolate and sprinkled with crushed rocks. Beth loathed that she found the sound of it so damned sexy.
She froze on the spot and risked a peek at him over her shoulder. He was pushing himself up onto his elbow and blinking at her in confusion.
She winced when she saw the gradual recognition in his eyes and tried not to cringe when that recognition was immediately followed by a regretful and heartfelt, “Shit.”
Nice, just what every woman wanted to hear the morning after the worst mistake of her life.
“Lizzy?”
She hated it when he called her that. Which, of course, was why he persisted in calling her that.
“Aah Christ, Lizzy…”
She became aware, and self-conscious, of the fact that she was bent over with her naked butt sticking up for his viewing pleasure. Mercifully, he appeared too distracted to take a verbal potshot at her about it.
Self-conscious, she straightened to her full—annoyingly lacking—height of five-foot-one inch and turned around to face him. Pillow firmly in place over the bits that he’d had such an absolute blast exploring last night.
Very thoroughly exploring.
“G-Gideon.” She managed to inject some formality into her voice and pushed her wavy fall of brown hair out of her face. She took a deep breath, composing herself, and formed the words in her brain before allowing them to pass her lips. “I think we can both agree that last night was a mistake.”
She was proud of the steady assertiveness in her voice then nearly kicked herself when his lack of response prompted her to add a small, uncertain, “Right?”
He glowered at her for a long moment, before barking, “What the fuck happened?”
Wait, what?
“Don’t you? Uhm…” Crap! How drunk had he been? Had he even been capable of consenting to her clumsy advances? Had she been the one to make the first move? She didn’t think so, it had felt mutual. They’d been dancing and then sort of leaned in toward each other, and…
She was anxious at the possibility of having misread him last night. He hadn’t appeared that drunk. “Don’t you remember what happened?”
He pushed himself up into a sitting position, and groaned, one large hand going to his forehead. She tried not to drop her eyes to his ripped, naked chest.
Not appropriate, considering her current concerns.
“Yeah, ’course I remember, but I don’t know why we did what we did.”
“I d-didn’t force or coerce you to—”
He interrupted her with a sarcastic little chuckle.
“Don’t worry Lizzy-bit, I won’t be reporting you to the cops for assault or anything, I wanted to fuck you. I just don’t know why.”