Clearing my throat, I watched a pink flush cover her. “I’ll, uh, stay here with the dogs while you go and…” I attempted to look away. “Do that,” I finished, but we continued to stare at each other for the longest minute of my life which in reality was only a few brief seconds.
“Chase, you’ll have to let me go.” It was only a whisper, but it broke through the beating of my loud and obnoxious heart in the silence of the house now that the dogs had stopped barking.
“Huh?” I followed Winnie’s glance down and realized my one hand had never left her waist from when I grabbed her in the tumble. Funny, I didn’t remember grabbing her there. I was securing her so she didn’t hurt herself. It was like an old automatic football roll I’d practiced years before my injury. My knee was smarting, but the sting felt worth it if I was touching her now. “Yeah. Go on.” My fingers lingered, rubbing the skin trailing up to the bottom of her ribcage, fascinated by how delicate the skin was over her muscles and bones.
“I’ll be right back.” Winnie grabbed the dress, which had fallen to the floor in the tangle, and used it to cover her front side as she walked backward to what I assumed was her bedroom. She bumped the wall and with a smile turned, giving me one last glance at her perfect heart-shaped ass before closing the door.
“Hurry back,” I whispered to no one in particular. The dogs were lolling their tongues and wagging their tails. Roswell, though, the little terror had found a couch pillow and resumed humping the shit out of it. Thinking about the gentle slope of curves on Winnie’s body had me thinking similar thoughts. “I wish, buddy…damn, do I ever.”
8
Winnie
Sliding down to my ass behind the closed door, I let my head sink between my knees to gather a steadying breath. Holy crap! Today was not going at all according to how I envisioned it might. A casual date, if we could even call it that, and now he’d seen me pretty much naked. I was mortified…and if I was being completely honest a little turned on by the whole ordeal. My belly clenched and that gooey light feeling filled me from head to toe. A tentative smile eased across my face as I recalled Chase’s hard, hot body underneath mine and the thick ridge in his cargo shorts pressing against my lace clad lady bits. It was…divine. I was still pissed the little dog betrayed me in the first place stealing my dress and being a huge pervert, but now I knew Chase was totally into me or at least my body. Pressing a fist to my lips I squealed silently. Right now, I could live with that.
None of the other guys I dated if we could call it that filled me with the wild uncertain feelings that Chase did. He had a way of breaking through my barriers despite my effort to keep them firmly planted. He wasn’t using elaborate ploys to get in my pants like city boys, he genuinely wanted to be there. I wanted him to be there too.
Nervous energy filled me as I carefully got up to assess any possible bruises and to actually get dressed. A peek in the bathroom had me frantic to fix my hair, reapply my makeup, and give myself a spritz of perfume that left me less doggy and more human. A record breaking five minutes later, and I was slipping out of my room, adjusting the contents of my small clutch with my phone and lipstick.
“Ready?” Chase smiled when I emerged from the bedroom. His grin reached wide, nearly splitting his face leaving me flushed with embarrassment, but there was nothing that could be done about that now. I tried to equate it to that one weekend filled with ecstasy and too much alcohol where I had danced for nearly forty-eight hours across the Texas border to Mexico during spring break with my wild and reckless girlfriends. This was definitely better.
Infinitely.
“Yes, finally.” Huffing out a huge breath, I took a step forward, checking my clutch purse for a moment.
“Wait a second.”
Chase made me pause and I glanced around my aunt’s house wondering if I had forgotten something.
“What?” I turned, and Chase stood there looking odd yet smirking at the same time.
“This isn’t like, completely awkward now, is it?” His hands rested on his lean hips I had trouble dragging my gaze away from. It was hard for him to hide the evidence of his arousal and I wasn’t so shy I would give him a break and look away. It was impressive to say the least even covered by his shorts.
“Should we talk about what happened?” I offered unsure how to respond because while I did have that one drug induced spree of exhibitionism this was different.
“I don’t know, but I don’t want you to feel weird the rest of the day…because you shouldn’t. You look great and…”
Now it’s gotten awkward.
Chase continued to fumble for words and I needed to stop him before this ruined the rest of what should be a perfectly nice and wonderful day.
“Okay…” I stepped up to Chase and put my hand on his T-shirt covered chest, tapping him lightly to appease him and whatever odd prince charming male ego thing was going on. “It’s a boob, not the end of the world. As long as you don’t start thinking it’s going to happen every time you come over, I think I can get over it.”
“So you want me to come over more often, huh?”
I rolled my eyes. Chase Calloway was a cheeky devil.
“How about if we learn to walk before we start running and jumping?” I hedged.
“What about if we even things up?” he smirked again tugging the corners of his face upward in a full smile that threatened to melt me if he got any hotter. His eyes held a magnetism that pulled me closer though I would have sworn I hadn’t moved a muscle standing there.
I gave him a playful tapping punch to the stomach, which was rock hard, making me wonder what was under all that organic looking cotton. “I think we’re a little beyond tit… for tat, don’t you?”
Surprising me, he stepped back and pulled his shirt off one-handed by grabbing the back of it and tugging it up and over his head slowly.
“Whoa,” I whispered like I was having a Fifty Shades moment. You know the one were Christian does that shirt pull which I think is a romance movie must have as he crawled over the bed to bite Ana–and well you know... Hormones, desire, whatever the hell it was surged through me, infusing my body with heat and the inability to speak. All the circuits in my brain fried at once, overloading my sensory receptors.
“Now, what was that about tit…for tat?” He left me staring open-mouthed, internally twitching and completely helpless. Who knew small towns harbored a hotbed of sexy pet doctors? Ones with a snarky, healthy sense of depreciating humor I obviously had a weakness for?