“What?” He lifted the brow that wasn’t caked with blood. “Why?” He looked at her askance. The twinkle in his green eyes said he thought maybe she was up for joining the Mile High Club.
Which, okay, she totally was. When it came to Dan, she was up for just about anything. But no matter how she racked her brain, calculating angles and gymnast-worthy positions, she just couldn’t see how they could make it work in the confines of the tiny lavatory.
Another instance of “more’s the pity.”
“I need to clean up that wound.” She motioned toward his forehead.
“It’s nothing,” he assured her in that guy way that said, I’m a badass and wouldn’t complain even if I were missing a limb.
She tried not to roll her eyes. “Even so, it’ll make me feel better if we get it bandaged.”
“Sure, okay.” He shrugged his shoulders. “But don’t think I don’t know what just happened.” He shuffled a couple of inches toward the toilet. When the heavy muscles of his thighs and chest brushed along the front of her, her nipples tightened into painful buds.
It’s because his clothes are wet and cold.
At least that’s what she told herself for all of a half second. In all honesty, touching Dan always felt incredibly carnal. Sexy and intimate in a way she couldn’t quite explain.
It’s because we have a connection…
Now that was the truth. Had been the truth since the first moment they laid eyes on each other, and definitely since the first moment he touched her. She could still recall the jolt she got when he shook her hand and his long fingers closed around hers. It’d been like a lightning strike to her core. A warm, delicious bolt of electricity that woke up a part of her she hadn’t realized was asleep.
But the question was, were they connected on something more than the physical level? She certainly felt like they were. In fact, she knew they were. But that didn’t mean Dan would agree with—
“I am well-trained in the ways of you women,” he continued, pulling her from her introspection.
“Ways of women?” She lifted a brow. “I haven’t the faintest idea what you mean.”
He’d finally managed to get around her to sit on the toilet lid. To combat the aching loss of not having him pressed against her length, she busied herself pulling the door closed. Then she dug some antiseptic wipes from the first-aid kit and stepped toward her patient.
“That whole It will make me feel better shtick is the oldest trick in the Women’s Guidebook to Men,” he explained. “Get us to do whatever is it you want by appealing to our chivalrous natures.”
“What two-bit, traitorous hussy gave you a copy of the guidebook?” she demanded. When she planted her hands on her hips, her left elbow slammed into the wall and her right elbow smacked the tissue dispenser bolted above the sink. “Ouch!” She rubbed at her funny bones, feeling laughter welling inside her again.
The whole situation was veering toward the ridiculous. The ridiculous and the strangely…comfortable. She’d never been as natural, as much herself around any man as she was around Dan. It was like they had been old friends, maybe old lovers in another lifetime. Which brought her to the last thing this situation was, which was hot. Being in a confined space with Dan was always sensual and provocative and filled with a sort of suffocating sultriness. Like he was taking up all the air as well as all the space. Like the heat from his body was turning the wetness clinging to his clothes to steam.
She imagined herself ripping off his sweater and jeans so she could run her tongue over every stray drop of water that clung to his firm, tanned skin.
Mercy.
She refrained from fanning herself by bending forward. “This may sting a little,” she warned, not surprised to hear her voice was not her own. It was much lower, huskier…dare she say sexier? Carefully, her hands still shaking—now with unrequited lust instead of shock—she swiped the antiseptic towelette over the blood near his cut.
“You never did answer my question,” he said.
“Which question was that?”
“The one about what you’re gonna do now that you’ve quit the Service.”
“Oh.” She tossed the soiled wipe into the little trash bin and grabbed a new one. “As soon as I sell my condo in DC, I’m moving back to Brooklyn.” Unless you think there’s a reason I shouldn’t? The question was right there. On the tip of her tongue. But she bit it back because she didn’t want to scare the crap out of him. “My uncle, the one I told you about, the recovering alcoholic, runs a security firm. He’s already said I could work for him. It’ll be nice. A regular ol’ nine-to-five.”
“Is he your dad’s brother?” he asked as she used the new wipe to wash away some of the blood that had crusted near his hairline.
“Yeah.” She frowned down at him. “Why?”
“Just wondered if it ran in the blood,” he said.
“What?”