13. Clair #2
“Thank you,” he muttered.
“You’re welcome.”
He gave her a pointed look.
“Turn around.”
“What?” Clair frowned.
“You heard me.”
“Oh, please! You were practically naked in front of me last night,” Clair hissed.
The instant the words left her mouth, she wanted to snatch them back. Maera’s head started to turn—had she heard?
Clair pointed at her.
“Keep looking at the door, please—the ritual of the underpants is not complete yet!”
Maera obediently faced forward again.
Kaelus leaned closer.
“Must you announce our private activities to the entire household?” he growled under his breath.
“I didn’t announce anything,” Clair muttered.
“You just said I was naked in front of you.”
“You were naked in front of me. The same way I was naked in front of you. Because we’re married,” she emphasized.
He frowned.
“Clair, please turn around so that I may complete ‘the ritual of the underpants.’”
“Oh, fine.”
She turned around. Unfortunately, the silver liquid viewer in the bathing room was visible through the open doorway. Which meant she could still see Kaelus reflected in it.
Clair knew she should look away—she truly did. Instead, her eyes wandered sideways all by themselves.
Kaelus dropped the towel and she bit her lip.
Good Lord!
Clair immediately jerked her eyes away from the viewer and stared fixedly at the glowing flowers growing out of the wall.
She had already seen the front of him the night before and that had been shocking enough.
She had not, however, previously appreciated the rear view.
Apparently Beast/Blood Hybrids had extremely nice asses.
Clair swallowed hard.
“Are you finished yet, dear husband?” she asked sweetly.
“No,” Kaelus growled.
“Well, hurry up,” Clair muttered.
“I would go considerably faster if I did not have the distinct impression that you are watching me in the viewer.”
Clair’s mouth dropped open. “I am not!”
“You are.”
“I was looking at the flowers,” she protested.
“Of course you are,” he said dryly.
“I was!”
Kaelus made a skeptical sound and a moment later she heard the rustle of fabric.
“All right,” he said. “You may turn around. The ‘ritual of the underpants’ is complete.”
Clair did and saw that he had put on his underpants and a pair of the black trousers too.
Unfortunately they did absolutely nothing to make him less attractive.
They fit snugly over his muscular thighs and hips and sat low enough on his waist to leave the deeply defined V of muscle at his lower abdomen visible.
Why did her irritating coworker have to look like a Greek God?
This was a terrible idea, Clair thought. Not pretending to be married—well, that too—but specifically allowing Maera to make her dress him. All she wanted to do was run her hands over those incredible abs and feel his warm skin and smell his spicy, masculine scent…
“Now the upper garment,” Maera said, turning around again and interrupting her train of thought. “Something that pleases you, Doctor Donovan,” she said to Clair. “And make certain it compliments the lovely dress I gave you.
Clair looked through Kaelus’s clothing and saw a perfectly respectable black shirt. Well that would certainly match her metallic blue dress—black matched with everything.
She picked it up and started to hand it to Kaelus, but Maera shook her head.
“No, no—that won’t do!”
Clair frowned at her in confusion.
“It won’t?”
“No,” their hostess said firmly. “Surely you must have something more flattering to dress your husband in.”
Kaelus frowned.
“The black shirt is perfectly functional.”
“Yes,” Maera said gently. “Which is exactly the problem. It’s functional…practical—and not at all exciting.”
“I’m afraid my husband isn’t very into, er, exciting clothes,” Clair said. “He mostly lives in his lab coat.”
“Well, we must find something better than that,” Maera said bossily.
“Of course. Let me see what I can find,” Clair said politely. Personally, she thought the big Hybrid looked exciting enough as it was. His broad, bare chest and shoulders were drool-worthy in the morning sunlight. But of course, they had to keep their hostess happy.
She rummaged through his things again, but there was nothing “exciting” to be found. At last she turned back to Maera.
“I’m afraid my eminently practical husband has only packed plain clothing for this trip,” she said apologetically. “We, uh, thought it would be all about research—we didn’t know we’d have to dress up,” she added.
“That’s not a problem, my dear,” Maera said. “Just wait here—I have something that might suit him.”
She bustled off and returned a moment later with a garment in her hand.
“Here—have him try this.”
Clair took the garment and looked at it. It was a sleeveless charcoal-gray tunic made of some soft, fine material. It had an open V neckline and a series of small silver fasteners running diagonally across the chest.
Well—this was certainly different from Kaelus’s regular clothing, she thought. It was almost fancy. And the gray would go nicely with the blue-gray of her own dress.
“This is gorgeous,” she said, smiling warmly at Maera. “Thank you so much!”
“You’re welcome.” Their hostess beamed. “Go ahead and put it on him—I want to be sure it fits right.”
“Of course. Honey, let me put this on you.” Clair turned to Kaelus, who was looking like he regretted every life choice that had brought him to Titus Four.
“This is not the kind of garment that I usually wear,” he pointed out.
“Yes, but you’ll wear it now because our lovely hostess gave it to you which was extremely kind and generous.”
Clair gave him a warning look, and he stopped scowling quite so much.
“Fine,” he growled. “I will wear it.”
“Good.”
Clair stepped closer and held out the tunic.
Kaelus reached for it and she pulled it away.
He frowned.
“I thought you wished me to wear it.”
“I do. But apparently I have to put it on you,” she reminded him.
Kaelus’s jaw tightened with irritation and Clair tried not to smile.
“Arms up, big fella,” she said cheerfully, as though he was a giant, cranky toddler. “Let’s get this on you.”
“I know how clothing works,” he growled.
“Good—then this ought to go quickly.”
He muttered something in the Kindred Mother Tongue too low for Clair to hear—though she suspected was extremely rude—but raised his arms.
Of course, she couldn’t reach him. But Clair wasn’t about to give up. She stepped up on a nearby footstool and slipped the tunic over his head.
That should have been simple but even with her standing on the footstool, Kaelus was so much taller than she was that Clair had to rise onto her toes just to pull the garment down over his shoulders.
But as she did, the footstool tipped forward and she stumbled and she wound up pressed directly against his broad chest. Her breasts brushed his bare skin and both of them froze for a moment.
Clair looked up and Kaelus looked down. His golden eyes had gone half-lidded.
“Sorry,” she whispered.
“You need to stop apologizing every time your body touches mine,” he murmured, for her ears only. “It’s not like I mind the pleasure of your touch.”
“You acted like you did last night,” she pointed out breathlessly.
“I just said we shouldn’t do…what we did again—not that I didn’t enjoy it.”
“Well, you need to stop looking like you’re about to eat me every time we’re close,” Clair admonished him in a low voice.
His eyes flashed.
“That may be considerably more difficult. You look very beautiful today, wife.”
Heat rushed through Clair. She was suddenly thinking about the night before…remembering his deep commanding voice telling her what he wanted to see…remembering the way he had looked at her bare breasts and the hot suction of his mouth around her fingers after she’d touched herself for him.
But Kaelus had said they couldn’t do anything like that again. Which was fine with her, but if that was how he felt, he needed to stop looking at her like this!
“Could you bend down a little?” she asked, deciding to drop the subject.
He complied and Clair tugged the tunic into place and smoothed it over his enormous shoulders. Then she started fastening the little silver clasps. One…two…three.
Her fingers brushed his chest as she worked and Kaelus inhaled sharply.
Clair pretended not to notice. She fastened another…then another. The lowest clasp rested just above his abdomen, forcing her to stand very close as she worked. It was stiff and didn’t want to close.
“Hold still,” she muttered when the big Hybrid shifted restlessly.
“I am holding still,” Kaelus growled.
“No, you’re not. Your stomach keeps moving,” she accused.
He gave her an incredulous look.
“I am breathing, Clair.”
“Well, stop it,” she snapped.
Kaelus stared at her.
“Stop breathing?”
“Only temporarily until I get this clasp closed.”
Maera laughed softly, startling Clair–she had almost forgotten the other woman was there. She’d been so involved in being close to Kaelus—touching his skin and breathing in his warm, spicy scent—that she’d forgotten they had an audience.
“You two are very amusing together,” the Titus Four woman remarked.
Kaelus looked offended.
“We are not attempting to be amusing.”
Maera beamed.
“That is what makes it so charming.”
Clair smiled despite herself at the idea of someone describing her grumpy lab partner as ‘charming.’ She finished the final clasp and took a step backward.
“There,” she said, putting her hands on her hips and nodding in approval. “Now you look exciting.”
Kaelus looked down at himself. Then at Clair.
“I do not like to be exciting,” he growled.
“Well too bad, because you certainly are,” she said.
She hated to admit it, but the tunic looked fantastic on him. It molded to his shoulders and chest while leaving his muscular arms completely bare, and the charcoal color made his golden eyes seem even brighter.
Clair tilted her head as she studied him.
“You clean up pretty good, sugar-booger.”
Kaelus’s expression flattened.
“Do not call me that.”
“I didn’t complain when you called me Lissa’ra last night,” she murmured.