Tawny unlocked the door and they stepped inside. Inside it was as hot now as it had been when they’d left.
“Hold on a sec and I’ll have this lit,” Simon said. A small votive flickered to life. He turned off the flashlight. “Don’t want to run the batteries down.”
With a meow, Simon, née Peaches, greeted her. Amazed, she scooped him up.
“Hey. Did you miss us?” She glanced over at Simon, who now had two pillar candles lit. “Wow. He’s never greeted me before.”
The cat batted at her chin with his clawless paw. She laughed and put him back down. “Okay. Enough already, huh?”
“It’s the name change,” Simon said, a ghost of a smile hovering around his mouth.
“Maybe. Or it could be my faith that he’d come around one day. Our perceptions become our reality.” Wow. Where had that come from? She must be tired if she was spewing philosophical sound bites.
Exhaustion rooted her to the spot. Physically, emotionally, mentally, she was spent. She stretched and caught a whiff of her underarm. Ew.
“I could sleep a week, but I’ve got to shower first. Want to hop in with me? Just to shower,” she tacked on, making sure he knew she wasn’t offering sex.
“Sure.” Simon laughed. “I’m not capable of anything more right now. I don’t think I could get it up. Not even for you.”
She smiled. That was one of the things she loved about Simon. He was so real. How many guys would admit that? She skirted the couch. “Good. I couldn’t do more than lay there and I’d probably fall asleep, even if you could get it up.”
He slipped his arm around her waist and she welcomed the support. “Okay, then. Shower only.”
Votive in one hand, the other arm wrapped around her, he ushered her down the hall and into the bathroom. He put the candle on the sink, the mirror reflecting the light.
Tawny toed off her shoes and skimmed out of her shorts, panties and socks. Her top and bra joined the heap of dirty clothes on the floor.
She watched as Simon finished undressing—boots and jeans took a little longer to shuck. Absolutely lovely. Lean and muscular. He looked up and caught her watching him.
“What?”
“I’m tired, Simon, not unconscious. I’m just taking a moment to enjoy the view.”
He grinned at her and walked over to turn on the shower. Those shoulders, trim waist, tight butt, muscular thighs. Arousal fluttered low in her belly. She felt the instant rush of desire that translated to slick, wet heat between her thighs.
“If I wasn’t so beat, I’d try to seduce you into sweaty, nasty, on-the-floor, banging-my-head-against-the-wall sex,” she said.
He quirked an eyebrow at her over his shoulder and she laughed softly. His expression was part hopeful and part weary disbelief. She shook her head. “It’s a shame to waste the moment when you’re all naked and—” she eyed his tight, bare buns “—well, naked. But I’m just too tired.”
He laughed and stepped over his piled clothes to take her hand. “I may have to burn these clothes when I get home.”
He led her to the shower. She didn’t want to think about him going home. She didn’t want the magic of the night to end. “I don’t know about burning them...maybe just a fumigation.”
She stepped beneath the shower’s icy spray. The cold water felt delicious against her sticky, sweaty skin. An easy silence encompassed them as she and Simon alternated turns beneath the spray. When she’d shampooed and scrubbed every inch of herself and Simon had done the same, she turned the water off.
She swayed on her feet. Now clean and cool, she gave in to the fatigue weighing her limbs and numbing her mind.
“Hold on.” Simon grabbed her towel off the hook and gently began to dry her.
“I can do that,” she protested, but she made no move to take the towel from him.
“Of course you can,” he agreed. He reached around her and blotted the water from her back. She gave in to temptation and rested her head against his strong shoulder.
“Hold on just a little bit longer,” he said. He straightened and toweled her arms, chest and belly.
She stared, fascinated by the water clinging to his dark lashes and the drops caught in the stubble darkening his jaw.
“Mmm.” It was nice to be coddled. “Believe it or not, I require more than an hour of sleep.”
Simon chuckled as he knelt to dry her legs. The faint candlelight danced along the ripple of muscles in his shoulders, reflected off