“You fight them?”
Tobias dipped his chin once, his eyes sparking. “My bear needs it.”
“Do all grizzlies need to fight?”
“Do you want to shower first?”
“Oh, no, Mr. Secrets.” Vera flipped onto her belly on the mattress and crossed her ankles in the air. “Spill them beans.”
A soft noise rumbled from Tobias as he lifted his gaze to the ceiling. “My brothers don’t need to fight. I do. You tethered yourself to a monster. Congratulations. I’m going to take a shower.”
He strode toward the bathroom door, but Vera launched herself at him like a flying squirrel coasting to another tree.
Tobias grunted and stumbled, then straightened and said, “Lady, get off.”
He was pinned with his arms at his side as she clung to him Koala style. “No,” she said, shaking her head for emphasis. “You can’t run from my affection. Not until you hear what I have to say.”
“Then say it and let me go.”
Leaning forward, she whispered into his ear, “I’m a monster, too.” Gooseflesh rippled up his neck, and before she could stop herself, she kissed him there just to feel the texture and inhale his sexy, masculine scent. “Admissions like that won’t chase me off, and it will take some time getting used to hotel living, but I’ll write down a list of pros and feel better about all this in the morning.” Loosening her grip, she slid down his body like a stripper pole and snatched her purple bag from the floor. Bolting around him, she said, “I call shower first!”
Pros: hot water, clean showers, and she was about to scrub three years of Alaskan bush grit from her skin. Vera stripped down, turned on the hot tap, and looked at her reflection in the mirror. Red, puffy eyes, streams of black mascara down her face, wind-burned cheeks, and tangled hair that had been in perfect curls this morning, but now lay limply across her shoulders and down to her ribs. Turning from side to side, she giggled. Tobias, that lucky dog. But when her eyes landed on the puncture wounds at the top of her breast, her smile faltered, and she twisted to study the ones on her back. Tobias’s bear jaws were huge to make the marks so far down.
“I’m claimed,” she whispered, shocked all over again. This had actually worked.
Plumes of steam were billowing from above the white shower curtain by the time she was done staring at the bite mark. When her eyes landed on the tiny, miniature bottles of hotel shampoo and conditioner by the sink, her smile returned tenfold, and she let off a long squeal.
“What’s wrong?” Tobias asked in a panicked voice as he threw the door open.
She turned and held the precious commodities up. “Vanilla scented!”
Tobias wasn’t looking at her newly discovered hair care system, though. He was frozen in the doorway, eyes glued to her boobs. “Holy shit,” he whispered.
Well now, that wasn’t the reaction the boys on Perl gave her when they spied on her while she bathed in the river. She frowned down at herself. “Bad?”
Tobias shook his head, back and forth, back and forth, eyes scanning down to her belly, then lower.
At last, he lifted those emerald green eyes to hers with a stunned look on his face. “You look…”
“I look what?” Pretty, gorgeous, like a goddess. Tobias was about to add another pro to her list.
“You look hearty.”
“Hearty?” She snorted. “Like beef stew? Dig deeper, Silver.”
Tobias straightened his spine and slowly covered his obvious erection with his hands, which was a better compliment than “you look hearty.”
“I mean you look hot. Sexy.” He cleared his throat and squeezed his eyes closed, then opened them again with an uncomfortable smile. “I like the way you look.”
Vera wasn’t modest at all. Not anymore. Not after Perl Island, but suddenly, her skin flushed with heat under Tobias’s gaze. “Do you want to take a shower with me?”
Tobias stood frozen in the doorway for a long time. She couldn’t even tell if he was breathing, but finally, he gave her a slight nod and began to undress. To give him privacy, she stepped into the shower and yelped at how hot the water was. It had to be almost boiling. Frantic, she turned it colder and pressed herself flat against the wall to avoid the scalding jets.
Just as she found the perfect temperature, Tobias stepped in and straightened to his full height. He was a tall man with wide, muscular shoulders and took up most of the room in the shower, but Vera didn’t mind. There was something intimate about this. Without a word, she lathered up a washrag with the bar of soap and began to run it over the hard curves of his body. His eyes darkened as she dragged the cloth down his pecs and abs, across the sexy strips of muscles over his hips. He turned for her slowly, and she ran soap suds down the taut musculature of his back. She’d never seen a more well-built man. “I like the way you look, too,” she murmured.