by Sophia Gray
I stepped back from him. “Um, sorry, it’s just…” I broke off and tried again, gesturing back towards the fireplace. “That’s what happened to me. My clothes got soaked because of the snow, so I took them off so they could dry and…” I stopped again and forced myself to look up into his eyes.
He was staring at me with a knowing smirk, but I was surprised when his hands went to the jeans at his waist and undid the button there. My eyes went wide and I couldn’t help but sputter.
“Um, I mean, I can go in the other room so you can…” Can what? I demanded silently. Sure it was all well and good for me. This sweater was huge and came down mid-thigh on me—it was still mostly dry, though the hem of it was wet I noticed, and I realized I’d have to change out of this, too. It covered all the private bits on me. But what about him? No way were the sweaters I’d found going to be long enough to cover his…well, his crotch.
The thought and the movements of his hands had my eyes riveted there. Was it just me, or was there a slight bulge straining at his zipper?
Stop thinking about that!
I jerked my gaze away, turning to put my back to him. My cheeks were burning furiously. “I’ll, uh, find you something to wear.” Before he could say anything more, I dipped out of the living room and into the kitchen. I shut the door behind me, resting my back against it, and released a whoosh of air. Oh hell, I thought. I thought I heard something that might have been laughter—or maybe my own imagination.
Oh God, he’s laughing at me. I’m so stupid.
Shoving myself away from the door, I went to the hallway to see if I could find anything. I hadn’t before and didn’t think I would this time, but I could check those drawers and things, too. I searched the closet and still didn’t find anything that would cover his…privates. Moving on, I checked the drawers to the desk, too, but there was nothing there but socks. Literally, two pairs of mismatched socks. And they probably weren’t even his size.
At least not for his feet.
The thought went through my head before I could stop it and suddenly I was picturing him standing there naked with a sock over his—
“What is wrong with me?” I muttered, sitting heavily on the bed. My weight made the springs groan a little and I heard what sounded like scraping. I frowned. Scraping? I bounced a little on the bed and the scraping sound happened again.
Getting off the bed, I knelt down and found that there were a couple of boxes beneath it. I pulled them out and lo and behold, clothes! None were my size, of course, but there were some sweats in there and they would definitely cover his crotch and hopefully save whatever little remained of my dignity.
I pulled out several articles of clothing and rushed back to the living room. I pushed open the door and said, “I found some sweats. They might be a little small on you, but they should work just fine for now.”
I froze as soon as I entered the room. Standing there in his full glory, back to me, was a fully naked Ciaran. A shudder went through me. He was standing in front to the fire, making his body just a little more than a silhouette and emphasizing that his body was built perfectly. Those tight muscles of his shoulders. That narrow waist. That firm, squeezable ass.
But as soon as I had spoken, he started to turn towards the sound. And he didn’t just turn his head. No, he moved his full body until I got a good, full view of his front side, too. His body was cut from granite and damn if my own body didn’t react to it.
I held out the sweats, but couldn’t say anything.
He grinned at me. “I didn’t think you’d find anything.” He sounded slightly disappointed. “Are you going to give me the sweats or what?” He was smirking at me now, no doubt enjoying the fact that I was still staring–no, gaping–at him.
Shaking myself free of the spell his perfect body had cast on me, I chucked the sweats at him. He caught them easily, laughing a little as I made a point of turning around so he could slip them on. A moment later, he said, “I’m decent, baby. You can look now.”
I shuddered a little at the word baby, though I shouldn’t have. I didn’t need some guy I didn’t know giving me pet names! Though if they all said them in that low, gravelly tone, I’d probably let a lot more of them slide.
Doing my best to keep my blushing down to a minimum, I turned around and found the sweats didn’t help a lot with my sudden and intense attraction to him. They were low slung, barely hanging on his hips, and let me see a small trail of soft, feathery light brown hair tinged with red trailing down beneath the waistband of his sweats. His torso was still exposed, his muscles just as strong and cut as before and I had to work hard not to let my eyes linger on them for too long.
Clearing my throat, I headed over to the fireplace. I made a point of keeping some distance between us, but I was cold and I needed to dry off a little bit.
“Didn’t find anything for yourself, I see,” he commented.
I ignored it, though I caught his green eyes raking over my legs once again. Instead, I changed the subject. “Okay, now you’ve checked the car and nearly made yourself pass out again. Can we leave it?”
He didn’t say anything, making me look over at him. His expression didn’t look happy, his full lips tugging down into a frown. I waited for so long for him to answer that I finally just figured he wasn’t going to. Then he opened his mouth and said, “We can’t stay here forever.”
It was my turn to frown. “Not forever. Which is why I say we should check the front office. They’ll probably have a phone or something.”
“One that works?” he asked skeptically.
I hesitated. There was actually a really good chance that no, it didn’t have one that worked. But what else were we supposed to do? The snow was too deep to drive out of here even if we could miraculously get my car uncovered and running again. So I said, “Probably. I think this place is like a resort or something, so I’ll bet they have a main phone to use in the office.”
He didn’t look convinced, but he didn’t flat out argue with me either.
“Okay,” he told me. “Fine. Then we’ll warm up a little bit and try again.”
“Once our clothes are dry,” I reminded him. “And when you say we, you mean me, because you’re still not one hundred percent yet.” He opened his mouth to argue, but I shook my head. “I’ll check the office later. You’ll stay here and get warm.”
He didn’t look pleased at the order and I doubted for a moment that he would listen, but then he just offered me a half smile and said, “Alright, then. Deal made.”
Chapter 6
Ciaran
I found her to be as adorable as she had been in my dream. There was a sweet innocence to her that I found refreshing—and a bit frustrating. She seemed to worry and fuss over me, a complete stranger, and while part of me reveled in her attentions, the rest of me just wanted her to leave me the hell alone. I’d dig out her damn car if I wanted to.
Even though that hadn’t gone so well.
Still, the whole taking off of my clothes to get me warm again thing…that had been fun. I hadn’t been embarrassed by her sudden and frenzied need to take off my clothes, but she certainly had been. I’d been half hoping that she’d drop my pants too and say hello to my manhood, but she’d caught herself just in time. And worse still, she’d managed to find some Goddamned pants, too. They were sweats at least and I was grateful for their warmth, but I was enjoying making her uncomfortable with my nakedness.
At least my shirt was still off and that was apparently enough to make her a little uncomfortable and flushed. And she looked damn good flushed.
My dream had revved me up to begin with and I had to remind myself that she hadn’t experienced that same dream. It hadn’t been real, which meant she hadn’t swallowed my cock like a pro until I shot my load down her throat. Which was unfortunate on some levels, but would probably make everything a little less complicated in the long run.
Besides, I didn’t need to be worrying about her any more than I already was. Which was quit
e a bit to start with.
I was worried because whoever beat me over the head with that tire iron the night before was still out there. If it were Shane as I suspected, that posed a slew of different problems for me. If it were just some random mugger, I would at least have the duration of the storm before I had to worry about any trouble from him. No one was going to find my body out there in the snow and he would know that, so he wouldn’t notice that they hadn’t found it until the storm began to clear.
It was a miracle that Elle had found me in the first place, I thought, examining her once again as we sat in front of the fire. Her long, bare legs were pulled up beneath her as she held her hands out towards the flames. I was sitting off to the side, my shoulder pressed against the wall so I didn’t have to sit up, but still got most of the warmth. She was a damn pretty little thing with her dark hair and blue eyes and those long, long legs.
Doing my best to focus on the problems at hand, I reminded myself that staying in the cabin, as Elle seemed content to do, was foolish. Because if it were Shane, there was a good chance he knew I wasn’t dead. He probably left me to freeze the night before and now was out there digging around for me. And even if he weren’t, he was back home telling my boys I was dead. Which meant the Lucky Skulls were without a leader.
And that really was dangerous.
Shane could try to take over. He could persuade some of my boys to switch sides, and those who stayed would face his wrath. The Irish Hounds were already a thorn in our side and plenty dangerous. If they picked now to start a war or try for a hostile takeover, a lot of my boys were going to die. And it was my job to prevent that.
I couldn’t do that from this damn cabin.
That being said, I needed some way to get the hell out of here—or to get ahold of my boys and let them know what was going down. But there was a little hiccup in my plans and what needed to be done, and it had nothing to do with the storm.
It had to do with Elle.
I was beginning to realize I only had a few options with her. I could dig out her car and steal it, leaving her behind and effectively making sure no one knew of the connection between us. That would make sure she stayed safe and that Shane didn’t decide to come after her for saving my life. The other option was to dig out the car and have her drop me off where she’d found me the night before. My bike was still there, hopefully, and that would mostly keep the two of us from being linked.
Unless someone’s out there looking for me.
Unfortunately, both of those plans hinged on one thing: Elle’s car. If I couldn’t dig it out, it didn’t matter. If it didn’t start, it didn’t matter. If I couldn’t plow it through the snow-covered roads, it didn’t matter. And, unfortunately, I wasn’t one hundred percent sure I could manage any of those things.
I decided I’d try the car again in the morning when I was feeling a little better and hopefully while she was still asleep. That way she couldn’t get angry for my deliberately ignoring her earlier insistence. This afternoon, I would let her try for the damn office, but I already had a pretty good guess that she wasn’t going to find a working phone. If there wasn’t one here—I noted a landline here in the living room—then whatever phone she found there probably wasn’t working either. But I’d let her try to keep her complacent.
She seemed like a worrying little thing.
“What were you doing out there on the road?” Elle asked me. She had canted her head sideways and was staring at me curiously now. Her eyes flickered to my chest, but didn’t linger.
I hesitated. I wasn’t about to tell her that I was having difficulties with a rival motorcycle club and had likely suffered an attempted murder before she found me. I doubted that would make her feel too good about saving me in the first place. Instead, I tried for a mixture of white lies and partial truths. “I was supposed to be meeting a friend,” I told her cautiously. “An old buddy of mine. But we got into a bit of a spat and we both left angry.”
She frowned. “Did he do that to you?” She gestured towards the bruising on my face and chest.
I shook my head. “No. I mean, I didn’t see who did it, but a friend wouldn’t do that, right?” I offered her a smile, because I was avoiding my suspicions of the truth and trying to put her at ease. Because no, technically, I hadn’t seen who had hit me, and technically, a friend wouldn’t do that. But Shane hadn’t really been my friend in a long time and I wouldn’t put it past him to pull some chickenshit stunt like this.
Something in my words must have struck her as true, because her shoulders relaxed a little and her face didn’t look quite so worried. “So you were on your way home when you were attacked?” she pushed.
I hesitated, trying to think through something plausible. “Yeah, basically. I’m lucky you found me.”
She blushed a little bit. “I didn’t see your car anywhere. Was it stolen?”
I shook my head and decided to answer this one honestly. “No, I was driving a motorcycle. It was parked there in the trees.”
Her eyebrows shot up in surprise. “A little cold for that, especially in a t-shirt!”
I laughed. “Well, I did have a jacket. Bastard must have taken it when he knocked me out.”
She bit her lower lip, something that reminded me of the raunchy dream I’d had of her. I told myself I just hadn’t been laid in a long time. Add that in with being a little loopy and messed up from being sick and injured and of course I’d dreamt of her doing dirty things with me. She was a beautiful woman. I knew her breasts were perky and firm; I knew her legs went on for miles. And I knew I wanted to see if her hips made as good of handholds as I thought they would.
“Do you think your bike’s still out there?”
I paused to think about it. In all honesty, I hadn’t thought much of my bike. Granted, I’d only been awake for a couple of hours maybe and I’d been delirious all of last night, so I really hadn’t had the time to devote to my bike. But now that I was thinking about it, I wondered if it was still there. Damnit, it’s not good to leave it out in the cold like that, I thought, pissed off.
“Probably,” I told her, still annoyed, though not at her. “Probably looks just like your car out there.” I jerked my thumb towards her buried piece of shit that she called a car. If it was anything like I recalled from my feverish night, it had been a real junker. Worn tires, broken window, half-assed heater. Yeah, a real fucking winner. Sure, it had saved my life and I appreciated that fact, but I doubted it would start now after it had been sitting out in the cold like that. Hell, it was a miracle it started when it was warm outside.
“I’m sorry,” she told me sincerely. “Maybe we can go find it?” She flushed and her eyes widened slightly. Quickly, she added, “I mean, once we get out of here, and you probably would want to do that yourself, but if I could give you a ride, not that I would have a ride anyway and—”
She was rambling again, a mile a minute, something she seemed to do when she was nervous. It was kind of annoying, kind of cute. I couldn’t decide which for sure, but I knew I didn’t want to just let her go off on a tangent for the next hour, so I changed the subject.
“Speaking of,” I interrupted. “Where were you heading out so late and in the middle of a damn blizzard?”
She shrugged her shoulders. “I was heading to visit my parents for the holidays. They live in Iowa.”
It was my turn to raise my eyebrows. Iowa? Seriously? “And you were taking that piece of crap out there to Iowa?”
She flushed a little, but pulled her shoulders up defensively. “Yeah, well, it’s better than nothing. And the bus was all full.”
I rolled my eyes. “Okay, fine. I get it. Sometimes you do what you gotta do, but in the middle of a damn blizzard? Wouldn’t your parents rather you just call them, be safe, and promise to visit another time? Like in the fucking summer?”
Elle winced a little at that, then said reluctantly, “Well, the car doesn’t really have air conditioning.”
“Jeez, does that thing do a
nything well?”
She folded her arms across her chest, which I instantly decided was a good thing. It plumped up her breasts, shoving them together, and confirmed my earlier suspicions that they were full and perky. “It saved your ass!”
For a moment, we were both silent. Then I burst out laughing. “Okay, okay, there is that.” Still smiling, I said, “But saving me or not, you probably shouldn’t have driven that thing out in a blizzard.”
She shrugged her shoulders. “I know. I was supposed to leave, like, three days ago to beat the weather, but then I got a gig and it’s so hard to get one that I had to stay for it!”
