Chapter 5
Stupid, stupid me.
I’d read that all wrong, or more accurately, I’d done that all wrong.
I thought for sure Theo would understand I was flirting but the way he’d stared at me then told me to go back into the bathroom and change told a different story.
Gah . I sucked at this. Not only that but it really wasn’t the right time for me to be flirting nor was it the time for me to think about how much I’d missed him when I left to go into witness protection.
I finished buttoning up his shirt, trying my best not to sniff the material like a stage-five weirdo.
But when the woodsy scent filled my nose I couldn’t help but to inhale deeply.
That wasn’t creepy, right? I was just breathing.
Everyone needed to breathe. But did everyone moan when the scent filled their senses? Yeah, probably not.
I had no idea what cologne Theo wore, but whatever it was it should’ve been named Hero.
No, it should’ve been called Sexy Hero. I could plan a whole branding campaign around the scent, which would include Theo’s gorgeous face being on all the marketing materials.
And now that I’d seen his bare chest I confirmed what I’d suspected was a tossup over which was better—his strong, chiseled features, stubbled jaw, and deep brown eyes or his strong, chiseled chest and abs with a dusting of brown hair that did wonders for highlighting his muscles.
Face, chest, abs, each individually could sell the worst-smelling cologne.
All together, the bottles would be flying off the shelves regardless of the scent.
Two knocks on the door pulled me from my ridiculous thoughts.
“You okay in there?” Theo called.
No, I was not okay. I was embarrassed I’d flirted.
I was sort of embarrassed I’d snapped at him, though I was forgiving myself for being bitchy since I’d had a shit year and a horrible couple of days.
And apparently I’d also gone crazy since I was standing in the bathroom of a hotel room thinking about ad campaigns for a make-believe cologne.
Great. Awesome .
I was a nut job.
“Yeah, I’m good!” I shouted through the door.
I blew out a breath, snatched my backpack off the counter, and opened the door.
I made it no farther when I came face-to-face with Theo.
Face-to-face but not eye to eye since his were cast down on what I assumed were my legs.
Make that my bare legs. I’d checked and double checked that the shirt covered all of the important stuff; actually it fit me like a dress.
Not a sexy one, but a mid-thigh loose dress that I would have no problem wearing out in public.
Then why did I feel like I was naked?
When his gaze didn’t immediately lift, and with less than a foot separating us, I had an overwhelming urge to retreat.
Somehow this was different from all the times Theo had seen me in shorts.
Different in a way that his eyes had never lingered.
He’d never stared. He’d never actually acknowledged I was a woman.
I mean, he obviously knew I was a woman, but he’d always treated me like I was a client—period.
But right then he was staring and when his gaze slowly lifted to mine it was like he was seeing me for the first time.
And when his hand lifted and his thumb gently skimmed the now faint bruise on the apple of my cheek I watched his eyes narrow before he dropped his hand.
“Ready?” His rumbled question took me by surprise.
Ready?
Did I miss something? I was stuck back on the way he’d looked at me, not to mention how sweetly he’d touched me. What was I supposed to be ready for?
“For what?”
“Bed.”
The area between my legs screamed yes while my brain played catch up. Unfortunately when it did, I remembered I’d asked him to lie with me until I fell asleep. But it was too late—my mind had wandered in a different direction and the evidence of the sharp turn it had taken was dampening my undies.
“Sure,” I squeaked out.
Theo quirked one brow.
“I mean, yeah, I’m ready,” I tried again in a lower octave that didn’t make me sound like I was overeager to jump into bed with him.
When his brow didn’t drop I knew I’d missed the mark by a mile.
“Are you sure you’re okay? If you’ve changed your mind, I can take the chair.”
At his offer my eyes slid to one of the two chairs by the window.
There was no way Theo was sleeping in a chair. And not just because his large frame would barely fit in one to sit, forget sleeping.
“I haven’t changed my mind.”
“Then what’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
Gah . Why was my voice pitching high?
“Bridget—”
“I’m fine,” I rushed out, needing to end this conversation. “Let’s just go to bed.”
As soon as the words left my mouth I felt my face heat.
Theo’s hand lifted again but this time he brushed his knuckles over my cheek, a good indication that heat had manifested itself on my cheeks which was crazy embarrassing.
“You’re…” he trailed off, dropped his hand, then shook his head.
“I’m what?”
Without missing a beat he said, “C’mon, you’re tired.”
I was pretty sure that was not what he was going to say, but unlike Theo I wasn’t brave enough to push.
Theo turned and when he did I was happy he could no longer see my face.
I was quite positive I wasn’t hiding my reaction to the way his lats winged out and peaked in hard muscle, making a deep valley down the center of his back.
A dip I wanted to trace with my tongue. Shoulders I wanted to dig my nails into, and smooth, taut skin I wanted to run my hands up and down.
If I hadn’t been so stunned I might’ve questioned my thoughts, I might’ve even reprimanded myself for staring. However, I was using all of my focus to stop myself from rushing across the room and begging Theo to do all of the crude, dirty things I’d been fantasizing about since the day I’d met him.
Now that snapped me out of my daze.
Unluckily, I was too late and he’d stopped by the bed and shifted to look at me. Since I’d been openly gawking there was no hope of hiding it.
Maybe I shouldn’t be hiding it. Maybe I should wise up and use our very limited time together to put this stupid crush to rest. Or maybe I should stop thinking about him altogether and save myself the rejection.
“Bridget,” he called.
With a mental shake of my head I dislodged my inappropriate thoughts and made my way to the bed. I didn’t stop when I neared him nor did he stop me from crawling onto the mattress and settling in on the farthest edge.
“You comfortable?”
The bed wasn’t huge, but it was a queen-size. If I stayed on the very edge he could fit and we wouldn’t touch.
But was it comfortable? No.
“Sure.”
Through the silence I didn’t dare to look at him, too afraid he’d see through my lie. But Theo didn’t need my gaze to know I wasn’t telling the truth.
“Is there a reason you’re lying to me?”
Yes, there were about ten reasons why I was lying to him. All of them revolved around the months’ worth of dreams I’d had and the desire to have him get into bed next to me now in hopes that I could sleep.
“I’m not—”
“Stop,” he barked.
I pressed my lips together and kept my eyes trained on the ceiling.
“Let’s start again,” he suggested. “Is there a reason half your body’s hanging off the bed?”
Before I could think better of it I answered.
“Yes.”
“And that would be?”
“To give you room.”
Suddenly the bed dipped and Theo was close. So very close I was afraid to turn my head and verify his proximity. I was hauled to the center of the bed. Then he dropped to his side, twisted, and clicked off the lamp before he fell to his back.
Then there we were lying side by side in the dark.
My mind whirled in an attempt to come up with something to say while at the same time I tried to get my heart rate under control. Failing at both I started to panic and I was no less anxious when Theo’s voice rumbled from beside me.
“Relax.”
Relax?
Was he crazy?
“Sure.”
Damn, was my voice squeaking again?
“Baby, relax.”
“Just because you add a baby to it doesn’t make it any easier.”
Truth be told, him calling me baby made me want to squeeze my thighs together to relieve some of the excitement the word created.
“I have a brother,” he weirdly announced.
In all the months he’d been my bodyguard he’d never told me a single personal thing.
He’d listened to me tell stories about growing up in California but he’d never shared where he’d grown up.
I’d blathered on about my grandmother, waxed poetic about all that she’d taught me, but I knew nothing about his family.
I wasn’t entirely sure what to do with this information.
But lying there in the dark I felt like he’d given me a gift, a huge one, which was strange because telling me he had a brother wasn’t exactly earth shattering. Yet it was.
“Are you close with him?” I asked.
Silence. Then he blew out a long breath.
“We used to be. He’s actually my half-brother. My dad died when I was two. My mom remarried. I was five when Bronson was born.”
There was no missing the pain in Theo’s voice and I wasn’t sure if it was because of his brother or because, like me, even though years had passed talking about a deceased parent still caused his heart to ache.
“I’m sorry about your dad,” I whispered.
“I don’t have memories like you do.”
I had memories of my mother—a lot of really great memories.
They were both a blessing and a curse. Some days the only thing that stopped the pain was remembering the good times.
But other days the memories made me miss her more.
They were a reminder she was gone before she had a chance to see me graduate high school.
She wasn’t there for my eighth grade formal or my prom.
She didn’t see me off on my first date. She hadn’t been there when I had my first kiss.
All the firsts she’d missed. All the conversations I needed to have with her, all the questions that had gone unanswered. All the time that was lost to us.
Instead of commenting, I slid my hand closer to Theo’s until they were touching. What I didn’t expect was Theo to hook our pinkies together and continue with his story like he hadn’t just melted my insides with the tiny gesture.
“I fucked up and now my brother won’t forgive me.”
“People fuck up,” I told him. “Sometimes it takes time to heal the hurt and forgive.”
The silence stretched on for so long that there in the dark with Theo’s pinkie hooked with mine my body started to relax. I was drifting off to sleep when I thought I heard Theo whisper, “I should’ve stayed dead.”