the way back from the restaurant last night, we both bought swimsuits. We climb into the bus where we left them.
“I’ll hold this towel around you, you can change here,” Wrage says.
I stare at him, wondering if this is a trick. He’s wearing his innocent face. Maybe too innocent.
He’s easily a foot taller than me. Holding the towel around me will keep prying eyes at ground level away from me—but not his.
“You have to promise not to peek.”
“But you’re my mate,” he objects.
“I’m your mate in name only,” I remind him.
Sometimes I wonder if I can read minds, because it’s almost as if I hear him saying, ‘but not for long’.
“I promise,” he says levelly. “I was just teasing.”
“Teasing, my ass.”
He holds a big, fluffy beach towel around me, keeping it so tight around my neck even I can’t see myself. I manage to shimmie out of my clothes and into the two-piece suit by feel alone.
“Okay. You can let me out.” When I glance at him I see his eyes are closed. I’d assumed he was watching every move I made, waiting for a peek. It strikes me that maybe I can trust this male. That would be a first. Even before my epic adventure of kidnap and enslavement I never had a man in my life I could actually trust.
“You didn’t peek?” I ask, still amazed.
“You asked me not to,” he says as if it’s the most obvious statement in the galaxy.
After handing me the towel, he steps a foot away, shucks his clothes as casually as he ordered dinner in the restaurant last night, and then bends to grab his swim shorts, his ass delightfully pointed my way.
Why does my mouth go dry when I see this display? Stupid question. His butt is perfection. And he seems to know it, because he’s in no hurry to cover it. Finally, after I watch every twist and bend of that fine body as he steps into the shorts, he glances at me.
“You’re peeking,” he scolds, a shocked, disapproving look on his face.
“You never told me not to.” I figured he was happily putting on a show for me.
“I assumed . . .” He has that ‘I just sucked a lemon’ look on his face.
“I’m sorry. I—”
I’m interrupted by his bark of laughter. “I’m a gladiator, Elyse. We often fight nude in front of thousands of people. Any modesty I may have had was beaten out of me annums ago.” His expression changes, his gaze lancing into me as he asks, “Did you like what you saw?”
“Uh,” I squawk, feeling my face turn hot and red.
He turns away from me in slow motion, bends at the waist, and pulls his swim shorts down. That doesn’t end the performance. No. Poking his naked butt at me must not feel like enough of a show to him. He wiggles it at me. Not a fast, funny wiggle, either. He stands and undulates his hips. It’s more sexual than what he did last night when he was singing.
My hand flies to cover my mouth. I’m not certain why—maybe to keep myself from drooling. I swallow my spit and notice my channel clench in lust. What I do not do, however, is drag my eyes from the show.
He glances over his shoulder and tosses me a serious, molten look that could set the world on fire. Then he laughs.
“You should see your face,” he teases.
“You should see your ass,” I fire back after somehow finding my voice. “You need a full-time aid working with a loofah.”
“You forgot one thing,” he says, unphased, as he points to one of his mreen. “I couldn’t have too many pimples on my ass. I smelled your arousal.”
“Dork,” I accuse.
“Teesa,” he responds.
“Jerk.”
“Let’s swim.”
He’s never swum before, but has a blast playing in the waves. After watching me for a few minutes, he figures out the basics of the crawl and keeps up with me pretty well. This male has spent his whole life in a gym. I shouldn’t be surprised he’s athletic as hell.
Justus calls to us over the breaking waves, “Time to get on the hover!”
When we climb out of the water, Wrage shakes out the towel and wraps it around me. When he leans in, I catch a whiff of his scent. It's beachy and salty and clean. It strikes me that I want to take a snapshot of this moment—with smellovision of course—to remember forever.
He and I might start fighting any minute now, but this, this