Make Me - Tessa Bailey Page 0,12
I’ll leave an outline.”
“I don’t care if you smell, but if you want to take a quick shower, there are extra towels in the hall closet. Don’t use the purple one, though.”
“Why not?”
“Louis’s birthday gift from Roxy is rolled inside it. You don’t want to know.”
“I assure you, I want to know.”
Her eyes twinkled, and he experienced some serious relief at seeing something besides fatigue on her. “Edible underwear. For him to wear, not Roxy.”
Russell executed an overhead first pump. “All the worry you put me through today just became marginally worth it, Abby.”
Her drowsy laughter followed him from the room, knocking him square in the chest. As soon as he’d closed himself in the bathroom, he started with the now-familiar breathing exercises. A few hours. He could get through a few, measly hours.
Chapter 4
REMINDING HERSELF IT was only three o’clock in the afternoon, Abby forced herself to sit up before she lapsed into a coma. Russell had blown off the rest of his workday to keep her company, and it would be rude to fall asleep on him. She could hear the shower spray drumming in the adjacent bathroom and pictured him scowling at her pink loofah and white-grape body gel.
Smiling to herself, Abby set aside the bag of peas and eased to her feet before limping to the kitchen. Her ankle had started to throb, and without any painkillers in the house, she would have to employ the ancient alcoholic remedy known as tequila. And wow, her roommates were really rubbing off on her. She’d never been much of a drinker and was still considered the resident lightweight among the super group, but she enjoyed the buzz a couple of shots gave her. Maybe it would take her mind off the avalanche of work she would have to complete when Russell left. Work that would probably take her until dawn.
Determined to ignore anything but a couple hours of laughing with her friend, Abby retrieved two shot glasses and the bottle of Patron left over from their last indoor summer barbecue. By the time she returned to her bedroom, the shower spray had quieted, so she poured two shots in anticipation of Russell’s coming in and left them on her bedside table. Using the piece of furniture for support, she peeled off her nylons and flopped back onto the bed. Abby didn’t realize she’d closed her eyes until Russell’s heavy tread forced them open, and she saw him standing in her doorway.
Shirtless. Damp. Jeans sitting low on his hips.
A red-hot fist formed beneath her belly button. For Russell? She tried to shoot into a sitting position so fast, the back of her head bashed against the headboard, which really didn’t help her confusion. Not a bit. She wasn’t supposed to notice Russell in that way, right? But when a water droplet rolled down the center of his abdomen and vanished into the waistband of his jeans, she noticed. And she noticed good. Today marked the first time she’d ever seen him without a shirt. It also marked the first time they’d ever been alone, without their friends around. Both facts occurred to her simultaneously and out of nowhere, she wasn’t just watching a movie with a friend, anymore.
She was watching a movie on her bed. With an extremely well-built man. A man with chest hair. A man with his family name—Hart— tattooed across his chest.
Russell dropped the towel he’d been holding and came toward her. “What was that reaction about? Did you forget I was here?”
In a manner of speaking. “No. I just . . .” She sucked in a silent breath when he stopped beside the bed, reached out, and cradled the top of her bumped head, rubbing gently. A touch that would have comforted her two minutes ago but now felt very intimate. “I brought tequila.”
He must have already noticed the filled shot glasses because he picked one up without looking and held it to her lips. “I would have gotten it for you, gimpy.”
Needing to buy herself some time before speaking, Abby tilted her head back and let him feed her the shot, another gesture that felt like . . . foreplay. Or what she’d always envisioned foreplay would feel like. She was grateful for the burn tracking down her esophagus because it distracted her, but as soon as the fire hit her belly, she wished she’d gone for iced tea instead. It only exacerbated the still-undefined problem. “Thanks,” she whispered.
Russell watched her with suspicion as