ABOUT LAST NIGHT

by Stephanie Bond

  He shook his head. “I travel light and expect hotels to have those things.” Then he snapped his fingers. “But I do have shaving cream.”

  Janine smiled sheepishly and reached behind her to hand him the empty travel-size can of shaving cream. “You were almost out anyway,” she offered in her defense.

  He depressed the button to the sound of hissing emptiness. The side of his cheek bulged from his probing tongue. He rimmed the can into the trash, then pushed himself to his feet. “Maybe Steve will have something in his bag.”

  The bathroom seemed cavernous in his absence, and she wondered briefly how Steve would have handled this predicament. With much less good humor, she suspected, and the realization bothered her.

  Derek returned with Steve’s black bag, set it on the vanity and ransacked it for several minutes. “Nothing,” he said, defeated. “I’ll call the front desk and have something sent up.”

  The water had taken on a distinct chill, the last cloud of bubbles were fizzing away and her leg was beginning to throb. “Tell them to hurry,” she called.

  But a few minutes later, he was back in the doorway. “The line is still busy. I’ll have to go downstairs.”

  “I thought we weren’t supposed to leave our rooms.”

  He smirked and gestured toward her foot. “I’ll leave it up to you, but I’d say this constitutes an emergency.”

  “Don’t you have anything in your bag that would do? Hair gel? Lotion?”

  “Nope.”

  “Petroleum jelly? Body oil?” He shook his head.

  “What would happen if you turned on the faucet?”

  A tolerant smile curved one side of his mouth. “Believe me, you don’t want to do that. But I can let out the water if you’re cold.”

  “I think the water is helping to support my weight.”

  His gaze swept over her again. “What weight? I thought you southern women were supposed to have a little meat on your bones.”

  She scowled. “Do you mind? I thought you were going to help. Don’t you have anything that might work?”

  “I told you, I—” He stopped and his dark eyebrows drew together, then his mouth quirked.

  “What?”

  He shook his head, as if he’d dismissed the thought. “Never mind.”

  “No, what is it? Tell me!”

  “It wouldn’t work.”

  “For crissake, Derek, spit it out!”

  “Honey butter.”

  “What?”

  “I have a pint of honey butter.”

  Janine angled her head at him. “Are you feeling worse?”

  He rubbed his eyes with thumb and forefinger. “Yes.”

  “You really shouldn’t do that.”

  He stopped rubbing, gave her a silencing glance, then whirled and disappeared into the bedroom.

  She stretched her neck, but he’d moved out of her line of vision. Had he said honey butter? The man was incoherent, she decided, but her worry over his deteriorating symptoms was overridden by her immediate concern of being left alone to die a slow death in this bathtub. She laid her head back and stared at the skylight. At least the view would be nice.

  But Derek returned in a few seconds with a small container in his hand, reading the label. “This stuff has butter in it, so maybe it’ll work.”

  Janine eyed the container with surprise. “Where did you get it?”

  “I brought it with me.”

  Okay, maybe he wasn’t incoherent, just strange. “And do you always travel with a stash of condiments?”

  His smirk defined the laugh lines around his mouth. She guessed his age to be thirty-five or -six, a bit older than Steve. “It’s a long story. Let’s just hope this works.”

  He knelt again, and she was struck by the sheer maleness of him—the pleasing way the knobby muscle of his shoulder rose from the collar of the sweatshirt and melded into the cord of his neck, the sheen of his hair, close-cropped but as thick as a pelt, the large, well-formed features of his face. And his hands…

  Janine shivered again. Square and strong and capable. Mentally she compared them to Steve’s, which were slender and beautiful—a surgeon’s hands—and wondered what Derek did for a living. But in the next second, she was distracted because those hands were on the verge of smearing a gob of pale yellow goo on her toe. His concentration seemed so dogged, she was overcome by a sense of being taken care of. And it occurred to her that he still hadn’t questioned her about her surprise appearance last night. He probably thought she was some kind of sex-crazed kitten, when, in truth, she was a sex-starved kitten—er, woman.

  He made a disgusted sound in his throat. “People actually eat this stuff?”

  “Listen, Derek,” she murmured, then cleared her throat. “About last night … ahhhhhh.” She couldn’t help it—the combination of his hands on her foot, the slippery substance he smeared on her skin and the tingly numbness of her leg made her body twitch and surge.

  He seemed not to notice and continued to slather the area around her toe.

  “You’re probably wondering why I showed up here wearing that, um, costume.”

  Derek grunted and worked her toe back and forth.

  “You see, it was a little joke between me and Steve.” She manufactured a laugh, but dipped her chin and accidentally swallowed a mouthful of cool soapy water, then came up sputtering.

  He looked over his shoulder, then shook his head as if considering whether to hold her under until she stopped flopping. God, what about this man turned her into such a klutz? After shoving his sweatshirt sleeve up past his biceps, he plunged his hand into the water and she heard the dull thunk of the pulled plug before he returned to his greasy task.

  The water level began to lower, tickling her as it drained away, and making her feel even more exposed. The towel covered her from neck to knees, but just knowing that the only thing that stood between Derek and her birthday suit was a layer of wet terry cloth left a disturbance in her stomach. When the silence became unbearable, she picked up where she’d left off. “Like I was saying, Steve and I are always joshing each other.” She laughed. “Josh, josh, josh. You know how couples are,” she said, hoping she didn’t sound as inane as she felt.

  Derek’s arm moved back and forth as he worked to loosen her toe, then suddenly her foot jerked back, and she was free.

  “Oh, thank you,” she said, weak with both relief and immobility. “I was afraid we’d have to call the fire department.”

  Wiping his hands on a towel, he gave her a whisper of a smile. “Do you need a hand getting up?” She did, but she knew she’d never be able to keep herself covered in the process. He must have read her mind because he added, “Don’t worry, Pinky, I’ll close my eyes.”

  For some reason, she liked the ridiculous nickname. “Okay.” Janine raised her arms for him to clasp, then he closed his eyes and lifted her to her feet as easily as if she were a piece of fluff. Water sluiced from her hair, her body and the towel, which she tried to keep close to her with her elbows, to no avail. The towel fell to the bottom of the tub, and when she put her weight on her foot, it slipped out from under her. She shrieked and Derek responded by scooping an arm around her waist to steady her, jamming her up against his body. Desire bolted through her, although he kept his hands in innocent places. Concern rode over his features, but true to his word, his eyes remained closed.

  She clung to his arms—his sleeves really, which were the first handholds she’d been able to grab. Even with her toes dangling a couple of inches off the ground, the top of her head reached only to his collarbone. The soft cotton of his sweatshirt soaked up the water from her breasts pressed against him, and the skin below her navel stung from proximity to the metal button on his jeans. His fingers curved around her waist, hot and powerfully strong, and the male scent of his skin filled her nostrils. Janine’s lips parted, and in that instant, crazily, she wanted more than anything for this man to kiss her. Kiss her so she could be indignant, outraged, even insulted that he wo
uld think that she, on the verge of being married, would entertain being kissed by someone other than, um … she winced … oh, yeah—Steve.

  “Are you okay?” he asked, his eyes still closed.

  Other than waterlogged and adrenaline-shot? “I think so,” she managed to say. “Just let me down slowly.”

  Derek swallowed, wondering if she could feel and hear his heart thudding like a randy fifteen-year-old’s. Against screaming instincts, he kept his eyes closed. He’d been too long without a woman, he decided, if he could be so easily affected by the accident-prone wife-to-be of a friend. The same woman, he reminded himself, who was responsible for him being detained, sleep-deprived, inconvenienced and very, very wet.

  Doing as he was told, he set her down slowly, although it meant her nude body slid down the length of his straining one. The ends of her wet hair tickled his hands as he lowered her, and he held her waist until she had her footing.

  “I think I can stand on my own now,” she murmured, but he was reluctant to let go. His thumbs rested on the firm slick skin around her navel, and his fingers brushed the small of her back. She was willowy, and lush, like a long-stemmed flower, and it was all he could do not to steal a glance of her in full bloom as he turned to exit the bathroom. She’d come to the hotel in that crazy getup to surprise Steve, and now he couldn’t decide if his buddy was the luckiest man alive, or the most cursed.

  Derek closed the door behind him, and exhaled mightily to regain control of his libido. He simply could not be physically attracted to the loony case in the bathroom, not if they were going to be in close quarters for the next several hours—possibly days—and especially since she was about to marry a friend of his.

  Suddenly some of the words Janine had murmured last night when she thought he was Steve flooded back to him. I just can’t wait any longer. I need to know now if we’re good together. Thunderstruck, he repeated the words to himself. Was it possible that his buddy was about to marry a woman he hadn’t yet slept with? That she had come to the hotel with the intention of seducing her groom?

  Derek groaned and ran his hand through his hair. If so, that meant the hormones of the shapely woman in the next room were probably raging as high as his. And something else was bothering him. He distinctly remembered seeing Steve rummage in a gray toiletry bag yesterday before he left, but now the bag was nowhere to be found. Derek had a feeling his buddy hadn’t spent the night out partying with the other groomsmen.

  And while admittedly, Janine Murphy seemed like the kind of woman who attracted trouble, she also struck him as being a little naive, sweetly vulnerable and completely sincere. As a determined bachelor, he was the last man qualified to give advice about getting married, but the very least she deserved was honesty and faithfulness from her partner.

  Derek cursed as those protective feelings ballooned in his chest again. What kind of fool was he even to consider protecting Janine from the man she loved? Their relationship was none of his concern. And he had to admit that his newfound attraction to the woman, not to mention his medication, was probably coloring his judgment. So the only solution was to stay as far away from her as he could, while sharing a bedroom.

  The bathroom door cracked and Janine’s head appeared. “Derek?”

  He turned, and his gut clenched. After his best efforts to resist a glance at her while wrestling in the bathroom, her nakedness was revealed in its splendor in the mirror over the vanity, clearly visible from his vantage point. He realized she was completely oblivious to the peep show, and he saw no reason to embarrass her by voicing his admiration for the brown beauty mark on her right hip. His body hardened instantly.

  Her smile, conversely, resonated abject innocence. “I found only socks and gym shoes in Steve’s bag. Do you have some clothes I can borrow?”

  Derek swallowed hard and managed to nod. Janine beamed and closed the door, although he knew the imprint of her slender naked body wouldn’t soon be erased from his mind.

  Not generally a religious man, he nonetheless recognized his limits as a mortal and muttered a silent prayer for strength.

  *

  9

  « ^ »

  Janine adjusted her borrowed clothes. Derek’s gray sweatpants—the counterpart to his University of Kentucky sweatshirt, she assumed—swallowed her. Sans underwear, the cotton fleece nuzzled her skin, which was satiny smooth and warm from her prolonged bath. Rolled cuffs helped shorten the pants while a drawstring held the waistband just under her breasts. She was forced to go braless until Marie or her mother could drop off reinforcements. Derek’s plain black T-shirt fell to her knees, so she knotted it at her waist to take up the slack. She gazed at her reflection and nodded in satisfaction. The shapeless clothes were a far cry from the costume she’d shown up wearing last night, which was just the way she wanted it. After an evening of prancing around like a Frederick’s of Hollywood reject, and after a morning of wrangling naked in the bathroom, big and baggy was just the look she needed to keep her body under wraps and her urges under control. She sniffed a sleeve that fell past her elbow, then pursed her lips in appreciation at the mountain-fresh scent—the man used fabric softener, so he had a sensitive side.

  Either that or his mother still did his laundry.

  The bathroom was equipped with a blow-dryer, but she opted to detangle her wet hair with a small comb from Derek’s toiletry bag—which she rinsed and dried carefully before replacing—to allow the long strands to dry naturally. She stared at her hair for several minutes, perusing the arrow-straight center part and waist-length style, knowing her hair was hopelessly out of date, while acknowledging it suited her. The color wasn’t as blond as it used to be, but she felt no compulsion to lighten the honey-hued strands. And other than having to buy shampoo by the gallon, her long hair was low-maintenance, more often than not secured into a low ponytail with her favorite tortoise-shell clasp. For now, it would have to hang loose.

  She wriggled her liberated big toe. Other than some tenderness and a few scratches in the pink nail polish—a gift pedicure from Marie—her toe seemed to have escaped permanent damage from the bathtub incident.

  But her psyche, well, that was another story.

  Derek Stillman had shaken her. For proof of that revelation, she needed to look no farther than her cheeks. Even in the absence of makeup or lotion, they bore an uncommon blush that marched across her nose and tingled with a fiery intensity. So she was attracted to the man. Okay, make that wildly attracted to the man. She had a simple explanation: Didn’t it make sense that the sexual feelings she’d brought with her for Steve, she might now be projecting onto Derek?

  No, came the resounding answer. It didn’t make sense at all.

  The body might be a fickle instrument, not caring who or what stimulated it, but the mind should be able to tell the difference between right and wrong. Carrying enough guilt on her shoulders to fill a cathedral ten minutes before Mass, she opened the bathroom door, hoping against hope that Derek would announce the quarantine had just been lifted. Or perhaps discover that her eyes had played tricks on her—her best man wasn’t a great-looking, incredibly built specimen with whom she had to share four walls, but a homely, broken-down gnome who would take up residence under the bed if they had to spend another night together.

  But Derek glanced up from his seat on the end of the bed and dispelled her hopes in one fell swoop with the concerned frown pulling at his appallingly handsome face.

  “We’re making headlines,” he said, gesturing toward the television. Resisting the urge to sit next to him, she hovered a few steps away, riveted to the screen. The tag line on the bottom of the picture read: Quarantine Crisis, Green Stations Resort, Lake Lanier, Georgia. A grim-faced reporter wearing a yellow windbreaker, with a surgical mask dangling around his neck, stared into the camera as he delivered his report.

  “A spokesperson for the Centers for Disease Control reports some form of Legionnaires’ disease may have broken out among the guests at a resort near Lake Lani
er, north of Atlanta, where a quarantine is in effect. An infirmary has been set up in the hotel workout facility to monitor and care for those who have fallen too ill to remain in their rooms, and other measures are being enacted to protect the many, many guests who were taken completely by surprise.” The general manager appeared on-screen, holding a microphone with a gloved hand. The interview had been shot through a window.

  “The resort enjoys a brisk business this time of the year,” Mr. Oliver said. “So not surprisingly, we were booked solid. Including employees, we have around six hundred people inside the grounds, and we’re going to do our best to make sure everyone is as comfortable as possible during the confinement period.”

  Dr. Pedro came on next, his setting similar to Mr. Oliver’s. “As of about 5:00 a.m. this morning, approximately four dozen guests were exhibiting symptoms, with three of those cases serious enough to require hospitalization—” The clip of the doctor was cut short, obviously edited, and the reporter’s dour face appeared once again.

  “The resort has been inundated with calls and deliveries from relatives and well-wishers, but officials asked the media to inform the public that no objects, such as clothing, food or flowers, will be allowed inside the resort. Meals are being prepared in another facility and delivered under the supervision of the CDC.” The man lowered his chin for dramatic effect. “Except for CDC personnel, no one is allowed to leave or enter the resort, unless, of course, a body needs to be moved to the hospital … or to the morgue.” The reporter lifted the surgical mask to cover his mouth. “Reporting live from Lake Lanier. Now back to you in the studio.”

  Janine rolled her eyes and Derek scoffed, using the remote to turn down the volume. “According to that guy, we should be making out our wills.”

  She nodded. “I would’ve liked to hear what the doctor had to say that didn’t make it into the news segment. Did he insinuate to you this morning that the situation is worse?”

  “Just what you heard on TV. Three people in the hospital, although he said he didn’t think their lives were at risk.”