I helped him out of the jacket, briefly noting the breadth of his shoulders and the strength in his arms. Why hadn’t he put up more of a fight? He was probably even fitter than me, but he’d allowed me to overpower him without much effort on his part.
“Here, hold on to this.” I applied the ice pack to the back of his head. “It will prevent a giant-sized goose egg from appearing tomorrow.”
I loosened his tie and opened his top button. Charles’s hand came down on mine. “What do you think you’re doing?”
I glanced up at him. His eyes were full of panic. Had he smacked his head harder than I thought and had a concussion?
“Checking that I didn’t hurt you worse than I think,” I answered. “Relax.”
“I’m fine.”
“You don’t know if you’re fine.”
“I’ll be fine.”
“You need to let me check you out, or I’m taking you to the emergency room.”
He inhaled deeply. “Jesus, don’t make a big deal out of this. I mean, I can’t tell the last time I was ever manhandled like that, but I’ll survive it.”
“Charles, let go.”
With a deep sigh, he released my hand and remained silent as I unbuttoned his shirt. I tried to concentrate on what I was doing instead of cataloging in my brain how different he looked from me.
I had a hairy chest, but Charles’s was completely hairless. His chest was sculpted with muscles and six-pack abs. Damn, Charles was smoking hot. Nothing turned me on more than a man with sexy abs. He had to work out a lot to keep this physique.
“Well?” Charles prompted. “Did you dent an ab?”
At the dry humor in his tone, I relaxed my throat and let the chuckle seep out. “I doubt I could. Shit, you make me want to hit the gym ASAP.” I poked gently at his stomach. It was as hard as it looked. “Tell me if anything hurts.”
“You don’t have an ounce of fat on that body,” he said, his voice sounding steady. No pain, then. That was good.
“True, but for sure, I don’t look this good with my shirt off.”
Charles snorted. “In case you didn’t notice, you don’t have your shirt on. Looks pretty decent to me.”
I glanced up at Charles, and his cheeks turned red. He shifted his eyes around the kitchen to avoid looking at me, and I hid my smile. I went back to pressing my fingers against his flesh and caught a wince on his face when I applied pressure to his side.
“You’re sore right here.” I felt along his ribs. “But I think you should be fine.”
“I’m no doctor, and I could’ve told you that.”
God, he had a sassy mouth on him that I would love to think up ways to keep closed. I rose to my feet and stepped back from him, fighting the urge to pop wood while I touched him. It was one thing to be aware of the attraction between us and another to act upon it.
Besides, he was unavailable. Married with a baby on the way, and he was my stepfather’s father. Nothing could get any more complicated than that.
“Now that we’ve covered that you’re physically okay”—I pulled out another chair and sat—“what are you doing here?”
He removed the ice pack from his head. “I didn’t know anyone was staying here while they were away.”
“That doesn’t answer what you’re doing here.”
He placed both his hands on the table, drawing my attention to them. They were beautiful hands. I knew from experience that they had no calluses and were smooth to the touch. Like the rest of him, they were elegant yet strong.
“I needed to think,” he finally said after silence stretched between us.
“And you got all dolled up to do that?”
He frowned at me. “I was at a friend’s cocktail party. I was heading home when I decided that’s not where I wanted to be. I would’ve gone to a hotel instead, but then I thought when the whole world is just a bit fucked-up, where do you go?”
I didn’t get it, and the look on my face must’ve shown it.
“You go home,” he said.
“Home?”
“Yes, I lived here all my life. I started my family here.”
Now it made sense. This was where he’d made a home with Declan’s mother.
“Fuck, where did the time go, August?”
The deep sadness and bewilderment in his voice tugged at my emotions.
“One minute I was happily married with a son who thought the world of me. The next I’m married to