Chapter 11 #2
“Cameron was the opposite, in the beginning at least,” I explained.
“He’d take me to dinner at whatever restaurant he worked at to show me off.
Kiss me in front of his friends.” From the corner of my eye, I watched Alistair’s tongue push against the inside of his cheek. “Okay, I’m fine with hand-holding.”
Christ. I sounded ten years old.
“Good.” He didn’t write it down. Instead, he dropped the pen and extended his hand. I blinked at him. Then at his long fingers, taking far too long to understand he was asking for permission. Asking me to take it.
A whooshing sound filled my ears. I barely managed a nod, holding out my own shaking hand, and we both watched as our fingertips tangled together. He kept the movement slow, the graze soft, like I was a startled doe.
My breath caught anyway. Windpipe contracting around the painful prickle in the back of my throat as a wave of heat circulated from every tiny point of contact.
Was I really so touch-starved that simply holding hands on my lumpy sofa made me want to cry?
Pathetic.
“Is this okay?” he asked.
Our eyes met. Awareness zinged through me like a live wire. His hand was warm, a little calloused – nothing like my clammy skin. His fingers slotted between mine, right down to the last knuckle. Breathe, I ordered myself. You have to breathe.
“Is this okay?” he repeated. “The hand-holding?”
“Oh . . . yes,” I started. It was so raspy, my cheeks burned. His fingers tightened. “What about – what about other stuff?”
“I give you free rein to touch me anywhere you want.” An invitation, yet he sounded entirely nonplussed by the prospect. Even as the warm pad of his thumb swept an unhurried circle around the heel of my hand.
Was he even aware of the action? Or was this nothing more than a rehearsed dance he’d planned ahead of time? He must touch countless people at the surgery all day. This would be nothing to him.
“Okay.” Bloody hell, I couldn’t have sounded more eager. Having him in my space was making me hazy. Making my pulse thud tackily in my ears. Low in my belly. “And . . . kissing?” God. I’d practically gasped it.
“No kissing.” Suddenly his hand fell away. His shoulders straightened, expression pulling tight, as unreadable as always. It felt like whiplash. “Unless we really have to. Kissing . . . complicates things.”
“Sounds like a plan,” I croaked.
Good. That was good. For the best, even. Exactly what I’d planned to tell him. Then, why did I feel like I’d been dropped off a cliff?
I squeezed my eyes closed, trying to shake some sense into myself. When I opened them, all I could see was Alistair. Straight nose, firm lips. Hair sliding over his forehead while he bent over the notebook to write No kissing beneath our names.
The memory of yesterday – the kiss – fizzed through me. Only this time the replay was different.
Mouths open. Ravenous. His hands in my hair. My spine curving beneath his palm. The hint of mint I hadn’t got to taste on his tongue, though I’d been oh-so close. I’d beg on my knees to experience a kiss like that a single time in my life.
I could ask him now. Just once . . . for practice.
“Alistair—” I licked my dry lips.
“You’ve got chocolate on your shirt.”
“What?” I swallowed. Trying to collect myself.
“You’ve got . . . I assume it’s chocolate.” He pointed to his own chest. “Right here.”
I glanced down, deflating against the sofa cushions. Yes, that was indeed a chocolate stain, right over my left nipple. And I was still bare from the thighs down. I didn’t even recall changing out of my work clothes last night. Too much caffeine, not enough food.
Standing, he crossed into my messy kitchen and turned on the tap, dipped his fingers beneath the stream, then grabbed a clean towel from the stack. “Is there something wrong with your boiler too?”
“I hope not.” I couldn’t afford to fix one more damn thing in this house.
“The water’s running cold.” He switched it off and opened the boiler cupboard, pressing buttons I hadn’t even known existed.
“Oh.” Yawning, I followed him into the kitchen and opened the box of cereal on the counter, scooping a handful into my mouth. “That’s because the hot water’s switched off.”
“Why?”
“Too expensive.” I shovelled another handful of cereal into my mouth, barely aware of what I was saying, when he turned, fixing me with a dark look.
“Please tell me you’re joking?”
The implication of my words made the cereal clump in a painful knot at the back of my throat. “I heat the water for Teddy, obviously, before she takes her bath at night. I swear . . . I’m not a bad mum, I’m not, I just . . . I’m the only one who takes cold showers. Never Teddy.”
It felt like watching a domino effect. His entire face shuttering behind a cold mask before I stopped speaking. He stared back at me, much too close. Until I began to feel like a probed piece of meat. He really was ridiculously tall. No one had the right to exceed six feet tall. “How long?”
“I can shower in a minute or two so long as I don’t need to wash my hair.”
“I’m not asking how long it takes you to shower, Lang. I want to know how long you’ve been taking cold showers.”
My brain tripped. Why did that matter? “I don’t know. Since we moved in.” The first month had been the worst. Early spring still felt like winter in the mornings, and I’d dressed for the day with chattering teeth.
Something sparked in his eyes. Like he’d just solved a maths equation that had been niggling at him. “Is that why you’re always using your hairdryer?”
I swallowed, unwilling to answer as his nostrils flared. Probably remembering every time he’d thumped on the wall while I held the heat to my frozen toes. “Sometimes. But it’s really not a big—”
“From now on you can shower at my place.”
“What? That’s – that’s ridiculous.” A little splutter accompanied my words.
“I don’t see how.”
“What if you’re busy?”
“I didn’t realise you’d need my assistance.” That damn eyebrow went again. I wanted to hold it in place with my finger.
“Okay.” My face felt medium rare. “But what if you aren’t in?”
“We have a connecting door. Problem solved.”
Problem solved. There he went again, like he could just wave a magic wand, and all my problems just went away.
I folded my arms. “A few months ago you thought I planned to sneak into your house and rob you at knife-point, now you’re perfectly okay with leaving the door unlocked? Just like that?”
“I’m not telling you to let yourself in and take a nap in my bed—”
“Shame, I’ve always dreamed of sleeping on Egyptian cotton.”
His lips quirked. “—but I’m willing to admit – on occasion – the door has its uses.”
I couldn’t make sense of it, why this man was suddenly coming to my rescue after weeks – months – of treating me like a creature that had crawled out the depths of the ocean.
“Don’t overthink it, Lang, just take the offer.” He nodded to the door. It loomed large in my peripheral vision, like a vortex to another dimension.
“Teddy—”
“I’ll wait here with her.”
“What if she wakes?”
“I’ll teach her how to use a scalpel.” He rolled his eyes.
“I have nieces; I think I can figure it out.” I hesitated, and he huffed again.
I was beginning to think that noise was for me alone.
“Unless you plan to wow your customers with the chocolate in your hair. With any luck, Cameron will be there, and you can really show him what he’s missing. ”
I flinched at the deliberate dig. I hated that I flinched.
“Screw you,” I said, turning to thunder down the hallway, shaking my head at my own stupidity.
I never should have let him drag me into an argument in the first place.
Just get through these next few weeks and you can go back to ignoring him, I promised myself, grabbing a towel and a change of clothes from my bedroom before poking my head in Teddy’s room.
She was still sound asleep, face more relaxed than I’d seen it in months.
Back in the living room, the connecting door already stood ajar.
Alistair was back on the sofa, one arm strewn across the back.
He didn’t look up from his phone as I entered, or crossed the threshold between our cottages.
Didn’t offer to show me how to work his shower.
He didn’t even tell me not to snoop, I thought.
In his living room, I turned in a slow circle, taking in the rigid-looking black sofa, the moving boxes still lining the walls.
Snooping would involve him actually owning things. There was no clutter. No dust bunnies in the corners. No knick-knacks or the blurry city-lights artwork every single man seemed to own. The one that was supposed to be sophisticated but really said: I own a throw pillow and shop at IKEA.
He didn’t even have a TV. What did he do every night, listen at my wall with his stethoscope?
Creeping down the hallway, I couldn’t help popping my head into what turned out to be a very sterile bedroom.
Crisp white walls and an immaculate bedspread – hospital corners, of course – it better resembled a psychiatric unit.
The only personal touch was a stack of language textbooks on his bedside table.
Of course he’s learning German. I rolled my eyes.
How did he live like this?
Ah well, I’d smell all his toiletries instead.