A Private Affair - A.C. Arthur Page 0,49
like being with you. I didn’t think I would, but I do.” There, she’d said what had been on her mind all night. Or rather the times that he wasn’t inside her and she wasn’t asleep.
“I knew I would like being with you,” he said. “Just not this much.”
His lips touched the back of her shoulder and warmth flooded her body. Why was it like that with him? It shouldn’t have felt right and she shouldn’t have wanted it to feel this way all the time. This couldn’t be happening. Not to her and definitely not with him.
“Shower with me.” She said the words and sat straight up in bed before she talked herself out of it.
When he didn’t answer, Riley looked back over her shoulder. “Take a shower with me, Chaz, and then I’ll fix us breakfast.”
“Music to my ears!” He jumped out of the bed.
Riley chuckled and pushed the covers back. She was about to get off the bed and walk to the bathroom but Chaz scooped her up into his arms and carried her naked body. He was naked, too, so once they were in the bathroom and he set her down, Riley reached for him. She laced her arms around his neck and drew his mouth to hers for a soft kiss.
His tongue was warm against hers, soothing her immediately. Riley didn’t need soothing from frayed nerves or even the fear of falling headlong into an anxiety attack, not this time. Instead she had questions that she’d never imagined having, and Chaz was the only one who could answer them.
The kiss was doing the trick. The way his tongue leisurely stroked hers and his lips slanted over hers should have started the inevitable sexual arousal. It didn’t. Not this time. Instead it made Riley lean in closer and ease her arms around his waist. The urge to hold on to him was strong. The need to feel him gripping her in the same way was deep.
His arms moved around her waist, his palms flat against her skin in what Riley would swear was a tender embrace instead of a heated one. Not that she minded the heat—this morning she just craved something more.
Chaz broke the kiss. He pulled his mouth away from hers but stared down at her for endless moments. She couldn’t look away from him. Not from his smoldering eyes or the thin line of his lips. When he brushed his knuckles over her jaw, she wanted to sigh. He dropped his hand abruptly and moved to the shower to turn on the water.
Riley stepped inside when he just stood by the glass doors. His shower was larger than hers. Probably because he didn’t have a tub in his bathroom and she’d insisted on a soaker tub and a large shower. The water was closer to being hot than warm, just the way she liked it, and Riley immediately stepped beneath the spray. She turned and tilted her head back, drenching her hair. Her eyes were closed so she didn’t see Chaz come to stand beside her but she did hear the click of the shower stall door closing. Then his hands were in her hair, running his fingers through the thick mass just like the water.
“Oh, guess I should have asked first—do you have a shampoo with conditioner?”
He reached behind himself into an alcove in the gray tiled wall and brought a white bottle up to her face.
“Will this work?”
Of course, it wasn’t her brand. She’d never found herself washing her hair without her own products, but she’d also never showered with a man before. Riley shrugged and reached for the bottle.
Chaz held it back from her. “I’ll do it.”
She was going to question him because she felt a trickle of fear at how serious and at the same time how wonderfully intimate this felt, but she couldn’t find the words. Instead she stood there and waited while he squeezed shampoo into his hand and then put the bottle back on the shelf.
“My hair’s really thick so you might need a little more,” she said, then clamped her mouth shut.
His hands were already in her hair, moving until he’d built up a lather. Then he was raking his fingertips over her scalp, massaging and raking, rotating until Riley could no longer hold back her moan.
“That feels fantastic.” And she wasn’t even exaggerating. It almost felt sensual in a clean sort of way. She couldn’t actually explain it, just knew that it was a