Chapter 6
Wyatt
The air in the cabin grew thick with tension as I helped the woman lie back down in my bed. It was an unusual situation, to say the least, and neither of us seemed to know quite how to navigate it.
But I was the one who’d brought her into my space, so I figured it’d have to be me who took up the lead. Michael Keaton looked up at me, huge questions in his eyes. I had answers to none of them but could feel his silent judgment.
“Thanks,” the woman said softly, her eyes meeting mine. I noticed a spark there, something unspoken. It made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.
“Um… I’m Wyatt, by the way,” I stammered, looking everywhere but in those arresting blue eyes of hers.
She gave a small, amused smile, as if she could sense my unease. “Nice to meet you, Wyatt. I’m Taylor.”
The moment lingered, like it was waiting for something more to be said. I was coming up empty. I hadn’t had to make small talk in years, and definitely not with a strikingly beautiful woman. Naked. In my bed.
I cleared my throat, trying to break through the weird grip awkwardness had on me. Why could it never be something cool, like confidence or awesomeness that took hold of me?
“Well, you should rest. You’ve had a rough time out there.”
Taylor’s eyes twinkled mischievously, and she didn’t miss a beat. “And where will you be resting, Wyatt? That couch doesn’t look very comfortable.”
And to think, she was nearly passing out in my living room a few minutes ago. She had more game than Bruce Wayne on a rooftop in the middle of the night.
“Couch is just fine, thanks.” I dropped my eyes, pretending to really care about how much the top of the blanket was folded over.
I could feel her eyes on me, and my cheeks burned because of it, totally betraying my desperate attempts at being cool and composed. Michael Keaton gave a little yap next to me, as if asking me what the deal was. He’d never seen me this flustered before.
“Just fine is fine, I suppose. If that’s what you’re into,” she hummed, settling back into her pillows. My pillows.
I looked up to find her smirking at me. Didn’t know me from Adam, and yet here she was, pushing my buttons for her own amusement. Whatever sympathy I had for her took a back seat, so that desire and curiosity could drive up front.
I didn’t know what it was about her, but I liked it. Apparently.
“You know what? Before you rest…” Taylor’s eyebrow quirked up as she looked at me. I bit the inside of my lip to keep from smiling. “You’ve been out for about a day, and I think I should check your dressing. It might need to be changed.”
The sudden jolt back to reality made her playfulness visibly waver, and I watched her expression cloud over. It almost made me feel bad for doing it, ruining the vibe, or whatever.
“A day?” she asked, her voice soft, contemplative. It was like she was trying to make sense of it, trying to remember.
I sat down on the bed beside her, watched the wheels turning as her eyes seemed to unfocus, seeing something that wasn’t this room. Or me.
“Is it bad?” she asked then, slowly coming back to the moment. “It felt bad. How bad is it?”
For all the difficulties I’d had with my own anxiety, there was no problem at all when it came to calming Taylor down. I placed my hand over hers and waited for her to look at me. Slowing my breathing, it only took her a moment to begin mirroring the intentional rise and fall of my chest.
“Better?” My voice was soft. That wasn’t the calm—that was me being utterly entranced by the woman in front of me. “How’s the dizziness from before?”
Taylor nodded. She dropped her eyes from mine, a little embarrassed by the momentary lapse into vulnerability. I didn’t move my hand. For whatever reason, I wanted to make her feel okay.
Michael Keaton whined and rested his head on my lap. His paw came up like he wanted to pat Taylor and comfort her. He’d done it to me so many times I’d lost count. But he didn’t touch her.
“And to answer your question, it’s not that bad. You just got a little beat up on your way down that hill,” I said. My thumb drew lazy circles on the soft flesh of her palm of its own accord.
Once my brain caught up to what I was doing, it immediately stopped.
I withdrew my hand, taking a breath that I prayed was filled with a butt-load of common sense. I had to get a grip. She was essentially a stranger, and allowing any kind of closeness went against everything I’d spent the last few years building my life around.
Why was I so drawn to her?
“What’s wrong with your face?” Taylor studied me closely, her eyes narrowed. “You’re saying it’s not that bad, but the way you look makes me feel like I shouldn’t believe you.”
I shook my head abruptly, as if I could shake the damning thoughts clean out of my brain.
Without a word, I went to my closet and pulled out a t-shirt.
It was a blind move, because I wasn’t looking for anything in particular.
So when I held it out to her and saw that it was my favorite—vintage Batman Returns official merch, white with the black bat symbol on the chest—I nearly snatched it back.
“I’d gladly comply, if you let me.” There was a slight smile in her voice as she looked up at me.
I released the t-shirt and turned around out of decency, facing my back to her. The self-satisfied chuckle she gave was poorly veiled, if at all, and my cheeks grew hotter.
“Once you have it on, I’ll change your dressing and you can get some sleep. You need to rest.”
Already, my voice was betraying me. Because only then did it occur to me what checking up on that wound entailed.
It would require a certain… proximity that I wasn’t sure I could survive.
With the way the heat was rising up the back of my neck, and pooling in, well, other areas, chances were good that Taylor would pick up on it instantly.
“Trying to get rid of me so soon?” she teased, proving the conclusions I’d drawn about her were absolutely correct. The woman was astute, among all the other things she was being.
But I was determined to hold her off. There was no reason I couldn’t regain my composure and control of the situation. No reason at all.
Or so I thought.
I wasn’t ready for it when I turned back around—what she’d look like wearing my t-shirt. Or the way my eyes would automatically lock on the telltale point of her nipples, perfectly positioned at the end of each bat wing.
The phrase ‘good enough to eat’ sprang to mind, and I nearly choked on the breath caught in my throat.
No.
This was a medical thing. Strictly medical. Her gaze burned into me, setting every nerve ending under my skin alight. It also made me glaringly careful about where my eyes wandered, and it took a surprising amount of effort to keep them off her chest.
“I’m gonna… kit… it’s over there...” We were off to a blazing start of regained composure, where my ability to form a complete, coherent sentence totally disappeared.
I made a mad dash for the supply closet where I kept my first aid kit, and Taylor’s eyes tracked me the entire way. I didn’t have to look to know it was true. I could feel her attention, electrifying and daunting at the same time.
“Keep it together, Wyatt,” I muttered to myself, behind the safety of the closet door. They were the words I’d been using as a mantra since I’d stripped her frozen clothes from her bruised and beaten-up body.
Only when I was sure that I’d no longer make a total fool of myself in front of her did I go back.
Taylor rested against her pillows and allowed me to peel back the covers. The t-shirt granted her some modesty, but there was no ignoring the fact that it was all she was wearing. Especially when I had to get up close and personal.
Whatever the frost had sucked from her skin when Michael Keaton came to her rescue was now back in milky rose petal tones, leaving her thighs looking as though they were blushing at me. For some inexplicable reason, the urge to lick her came over me. Just a taste.
“Ew, that’s so gross.” Taylor scrunched up her face and unglued her eyes from the now open wound on her thigh. She stared up at the ceiling, biting her lips.
I didn’t take her for a squeamish one, not with the sharp tongue and heaps of attitude she’d been giving me. I stifled a little laugh, surprisingly relieved to have uncovered this nugget of information.
“Sutures are holding, and there’s no sign of infection,” I said, dabbing the area with a cleansing swab. “That’s good news.”
Taylor’s head whipped back around. “Sutures?”
She inspected the area, this time with curiosity instead of disgust. I watched her eyebrows go up and felt a bit of my own self-satisfaction creep in.
“You- Are you a doctor?” she asked, her finger carefully tracing the slightly swollen ridges along the wound.
Her question ripped me from my cloudy daze and I turned my attention to the Medkit at my side. The pride I felt in my meticulous work didn’t last long, replaced by the standard gargantuan-sized brick wall that cordoned off my insides.
“We’ll get a fresh bandage on, and you’ll be good to go.” I used my teeth to tear through the packaging.
A spark surged through me the moment my hands made contact with her soft thigh. I would’ve chalked it up to my imagination, but I felt Taylor tense up under my touch and knew that she’d felt it, too.
My gaze met hers, and in one silent heartbeat of a moment something passed between us. Something I hadn’t felt in forever.
It scared the living crap out of me.
“Is that a condition, or…?”
I frowned at her, pausing with the bandage in midair. “What?”
A wry smile curled her lips. “You’re shaking. Is that something serious, or am I just making you nervous?”
Oh, she enjoyed that one, all right. I could tell by the mischievous glint in her eyes.
“You like pushing people’s buttons, don’t you?” I got back to work, focusing intently on the task at hand. Nothing but the task.
Not her smell tantalizing my senses, or her breath kissing my cheek with the way she leaned over me. I clenched my jaw tight.
Nothing but the task.
Then I froze. Froze like it was my turn out in the blizzard with no protection.
Because Taylor’s hand was moving toward me. With the softest of touches, she gently tucked a stray piece of hair behind my ear, her fingertip running along my jaw. All the while, my eyes were trained on the bandage, heart threatening to hammer clean out of my chest.
“There, now you can see better.” She leaned back again, taking her hand with her.
But even as I carried on wrapping the bandage around her thigh, I could still feel the ghost of her touch on my skin.
“Thanks,” I murmured without looking up.
She gave me a throwaway, “You’re welcome,” that thawed me right out.
If this were a movie, and I had even an ounce of Bruce Wayne’s confidence, I’d have access to some suave line that’d win her over. The moment would breathe, escalate, and we’d allow ourselves to be overtaken by unbridled passion.
Escalate.
What was I thinking?
“There.” I patted her thigh gently and straightened, busying myself by packing up the Medkit. Anything to keep from looking at her. I swear, if I did, she’d see everything I was feeling.
I was also vaguely aware of the fact that my avoidance might give away exactly what I was hiding. But before I could come up with a better way out of that particular tight spot, Taylor provided the perfect distraction.
A low rumble filled the space between us, and when my eyes found hers the moment had been diffused. She laughed softly, rubbing her belly.
“Don’t judge me. It’s been more than a day since I’ve eaten, and whatever you have on that stove smells amazing.”
I rose from the bed to stow the kit away, grateful for the mundane escape that’d presented itself. At the same time, I was left wondering how much longer it would be before the need for another one presented itself.