With the door cracked open, Eva heard Derrick the minute he entered their suite. Her heart started into a sprint like a racehorse jumping forward at the crack of a gun. She hopped from the bed, where she’d been rereading the same page for the past half hour, and clicked the door shut. Pacing the floor, she decided to give him time to get settled before approaching him.
When she felt enough time had passed, she pulled on the lace-edged robe that matched her nightgown, knotted the band around her waist, and went to the connecting door and knocked. The absurdity of having to knock on her husband’s bedroom door infuriated her. No response came from his side, so she knocked again, louder this time. Still no answer. Couldn’t he hear her?
She twisted the doorknob and stormed in, but came to a halt in the middle of the room when she found it empty. As the door clicked close behind her, she took a look around. It was decorated in masculine tones, dark, heavy wood and varying hues of the colors brown and black. Without a single flower or soft color in sight, no one could mistake this for anything but the room of a driven, potent male.
Her eyes strayed to the huge, perfectly made bed with a wrought iron frame. It was custom-made and sat high off the floor. To get in, she’d have to climb up . . . Her thoughts screeched to a halt, and she tore her eyes away, noting the clothes tossed carelessly across one of the armchairs near the window. Where the hell was he?
In answer to her question, the bathroom door opened, and Derrick emerged in an unexpected way. He strolled out, naked as the day he was born, rubbing a towel across his wet skin.
It had been so long, she’d forgotten the type of sensual power the sight of his bare skin wielded. For a moment, she couldn’t remember why she’d gone there in the first place, reason vanishing as her eyes drank in every piece of sinewy flesh.
Breathing, normally an instinctive process, became a chore that needed a heightened level of coordination she became incapable of performing. A sheen of water remained layered over his golden skin. He paused at the sight of her, and she shamelessly focused on the muscles of his arms, his hair-sprinkled chest, and rock-hard abdomen.
Her thighs clenched as her gaze traveled further south to the thick shaft hanging between his muscular legs. A long time passed before she was able to tear her eyes away, and only because it made a show of rising halfway in a slow salute to her.
Eva’s gaze met Derrick’s, and a gradual smile transformed his face. Guilty heat blazed across her cheeks at his knowing look.
“Would you please cover yourself?” She cleared her throat to take the attention off her tremor-filled voice, but she knew he heard it.
He took his sweet time blotting his skin with the towel. “It’s not my fault you came into my room without asking and got an eyeful. Although I don’t see why you’re acting like such a prude. You’ve seen all of this before.”
What he said was true, but in the past, she’d also been able to touch him at will. Right now she couldn’t, and her greedy gaze lingered about his hips as he wrapped the towel around his narrow waist.
“I need to talk to you.” She curled her fingers around the loop of the knot in her belt in an attempt to fight back the ache pounding between her legs.
He walked by her, and she smelled the minty freshness of toothpaste or mouthwash and the clean scent of pine from his shower. She had to close her eyes for a moment to keep her bearings. Her body, jolted into sexual awareness, was acutely cognizant of his. Beneath the layers of satin, her nipples grew tight and strained against the fabric in appreciation of his hard physique.
Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea.
“What about?”
She turned around to look at him. He stood before the dresser and picked up a bottle of deodorant.
“I had an interesting conversation with Celeste today.”