Total pages in book: 138
Estimated words: 128260 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 641(@200wpm)___ 513(@250wpm)___ 428(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 128260 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 641(@200wpm)___ 513(@250wpm)___ 428(@300wpm)
“Oh, okay,” I said, confused. Wasn’t the point of this to take our clothes off? God, what the hell am I doing? I swallowed hard and considered bolting. Maybe I haven’t really thought this through.
It had sounded like a decent idea in my room—exciting even, thrilling!—but now the reality of it had me feeling jittery and brittle.
Carson suddenly emerged from the bathroom wearing a pair of worn jeans and a Boston Red Sox T-shirt. Boston? Oh, right! “Your granny’s team?” I asked, gesturing to his shirt.
He looked surprised. “Yeah. You remembered.”
“You told me your granny was from Massachusetts an hour ago, Carson.”
He chuckled as he started pulling on his socks. “Has it only been an hour?”
Not even an hour. But I knew what he meant. Time felt funny all of a sudden—passing in bursts of rapid heartbeats, and then stretching strangely, like nerves being pulled tight. We were both silent as he pulled on his shoes.
“So how’d you get my room number anyway?” he asked.
I scratched my neck. “Well, I went back down to the front desk and spun a tale of romantic elevator love for Mr. Savard. I told him that I had lost you in the mix and needed to tell you that I couldn’t live without you. Turns out, he’s a romantic who was willing to bend the rules.”
He grinned. “I’ll be forever in Mr. Savard’s debt.” He stood up. “Ready?” he asked, holding out his hand to me.
“Where are we going?”
“We’re stopping by your hotel room so you can change and then I’m taking you to dinner.”
Dinner. “Oh. Um, okay.”
“You are hungry, right?”
I thought about it. No, I feel like I’m going to throw up. “Yes, I’m hungry.”
“Okay, then, let’s go.”
I took his hand and stood up, and then followed him out of his room on legs that still felt rubbery.
We stepped on the elevator and as it began its descent, we both looked at each other and laughed. “It would be like getting struck by lightning, right?” I asked, not able to hide the slight tremble in my voice.
He smiled again as the elevator came to a stop at my floor. “Absolutely. And no one gets struck by lightning twice.”
We stepped into the hallway, and when we got to my room, I took out my key card. Carson was suddenly right behind me and he put his hands on the door next to each side of my head. I stilled, the key card still inches from the key slot. My breath hitched in my throat as his smell surrounded me—clean soap and Carson, that delicious, unidentifiable scent that had me wanting to rub against him like a cat in heat again. I closed my eyes, my heart leaping, as I felt his breath against my ear. He nuzzled me with his nose and his lips for long moments, my nerves catching fire before he whispered, “I’m glad you said yes.”
Oh. God, I was so turned on I was shaking, a steady throb beginning in my core and spreading down my limbs. I nodded jerkily and barely made the key card into the slot. I needed a cold shower if I was going to make it through dinner. I’d been attracted to men before, but I’d easily ignored it in order to fully focus on my studies. But this? This I couldn’t ignore. I had never felt this level of lust, ever, and I didn’t know whether I liked it or not. It made me feel out of control, cloudy, desperate. The feeling was scary, unfamiliar. I wasn’t going to be able to push it aside. At least not easily.
I grabbed some clothes and glanced back at Carson as I went into the bathroom, and he looked cool, calm, and collected. He had fallen back on the bed and was flipping through the channels on the television. Meanwhile, I was about to go up in flames from a few whispered words and some PG nuzzling. Oh, God. Should I stop this before it got worse for me? I spun around and came back out of the bathroom. Carson looked up at me questioningly. I cleared my throat, my mind racing, that angel and that devil going at it from opposite shoulders. I opened my mouth and then closed it again. “Be out in a few minutes,” I finally said.
The corners of his mouth shook. He was obviously holding back a smile. “Take your time.”
I closed the door behind me. It was already eight thirty and when I took a few minutes to suck in deep, calming breaths, I realized I was actually hungry. So I showered quickly and started blowing my hair dry. I remembered Carson asking me to take it down in the elevator and so instead of putting it up like I usually did, I put some mousse in it and blew it partially dry so that it fell down my back in long waves.