With the sun already high, the day promises to be hot and sticky, and I retreat into the cooler interior of the boathouse. Somehow it looks less ramshackle than when I first saw it and I notice the little details I was blind to on arrival. The coffee machine on the counter. A fruit bowl filled with apples and bananas. Throw pillows on the loveseat that’ve been squashed where someone sat down. Above the loveseat there’s a collage of photos. One of five boys fishing by the lake, a smaller boathouse in the background. One of a girl and a toddler sitting by the lake’s edge, aged around six and two, cute in their bathing suits with their feet splashing in the water. One with all seven kids crammed into a canoe, a much younger Bill and May Brodie standing in the water up to mid-thigh, smiling at whomever was taking the photo.
I spot Raiden without effort between all the other kids. Even as a child he seemed to have a presence that the photographer captured on film. I lean in and look closer at his boyish face and have to admit that he was—is—gorgeous, but my gaze snags on an angry scar that runs from his shoulder down the side of his chest where it disappears into the shadows as he leans forward.
That’s no joke. Something shifts in my chest. I can almost feel the wound piercing my own skin and tracing its line down my side, the pain reaching my heart.
The rumbling of an engine pulls me away from the photos and I listen closer. If that’s Raiden coming down from the barn, I’ve missed my opportunity to beat it without ever speaking to him again. I don’t dare go soft on him now. I can’t care how he got that scar on his body.
I slip into my room and take in the space. It’s much bigger than the outside of the boathouse gives away, with a queen-size bed, wingback chair, and a built-in cupboard I haven’t bothered to put my clothes in yet.
I could make a quick exit, but Raiden is walking into the house and in a second, the bathroom’s accordion door rattles closed. Then the shower turns on and my own body yearns for the water to flow over me. I never leave the house without a shower in the morning and the one in the boathouse is a good one. Whoever updated this place knew what creature comforts humans want.
More noises come from the bathroom and I hate myself for picturing him getting naked in there with the steaming water being guided down his side by that scar. I only have to gather my few scattered belongings and close my suitcase to be out of here, but I’ve gone into slow-motion mode as I listen to every shower sound that comes through the thin walls.
Things I’ve noticed about Raiden: his hands. Strong, tanned, long capable fingers that know how to do fine detail work like wood inlays and polymer clay potted plants for a tiny house miniature.
His eyes. Unwavering, cold, calculating. I suspect he sees everything.
His lips. Sexy and totally kissable, if only he showed some personality and talked with them too. Maybe he can keep the personality. How can I be so angry at the man and feel all this heat in me too?
With a groan at my body’s response and subsequent delay in proceedings here, I pull the bedding straight, toss a few random clothes and my book I had on the nightstand into my suitcase and zip it closed. I heave it up and roll it toward the bedroom door.
The water next door has reduced to a slow trickle. I push open my door with a finger, the urge to be totally quiet surging through me.
Steam billows into the small space where the bedroom doors and the bathroom converge, and I pull back as the accordion door jerks open.
Raiden steps out and blocks my way, shower wet, a towel in his hand and his jeans low slung and clinging to his wet body in all the right places.
My heart jumps into my throat at the intensity of him being so close, so wet, and so…naked. My eyes travel downwards and park without permission on the V that disappears into the front of his jeans…commando…nothing there except the alarmingly seductive shape of something I haven’t had in a while.
His eyes are up there, Georgie. Head north. I drag my gaze up his body, taking in every dip and rise of a six pack that doesn’t shy away from showing off, over his muscled pecs and nipples that are hard from hitting the colder interior of the boathouse after his shower. Water drops ease down, connect with each other and run down the natural flow of his body, but my gaze stalls on the scar that’s still there, no longer an angry red as in the photo, but a silvery white line of a jagged cut that had been stitched neatly together.
When I finally make my way to his eyes, he’s hooked the towel over his neck and is glaring at me.
“Bailing?” His tone is dry and his blue gaze pierces right through me. “For good?” His gaze travels down my body as if he is checking if I have the family silver in my back pockets, but the reaction his slow inspection unleashes is totally unwanted and inappropriate.
I close my eyes, unwilling to take in any more of him this close, because he’s distracting me from my mission. I need to leave. The space is cramped and either I squeeze past him, which I don’t know if I can do, suitcase in hand, without touching his chest, or I retreat back into the safe territory of my assigned bedroom.
“Yes, I’m leaving, and don’t worry,” I say with a smirk as I look into his sky-blue eyes, “I’m not taking any of your things for a ride-along.”
He leans in and his lips pull. He presses them together, then he looks away and exhales and inhales as if he wants to say something, but I seem to have left him speechless.
Somehow the space between us shrinks even more and before I can think clearly, I raise my hand and press my palm to his chest to force him back against the bathroom doorjamb, then quickly drag myself and my stupid suitcase out of the boathouse.
I throw everything in the trunk, clamber into the car and drive off in a huff.
My hand is burning from his body’s heat. My cheeks are on fire from having touched him and my thighs are clenching against the sudden tug between my legs.
At the top of the farm road where I need to turn either to the barn or to Ashleigh Lake, I pause and take a breather.
That happened too quickly. That reaction to him was also too intense.
But he was bare chested and heavenly. I swallow, trying to wipe the image of Raiden closing in on me from my mind’s eye.
I have to stop and think. It’s my third impulsive decision in how many weeks, and so far, not one of them has turned out any good. Getting away from Raiden and going home might seem to be the easiest solution for now, but I don’t know if it’s the right one. Least of all if I want to achieve something here and not go home, tail between my legs like a bad, bad dog.
9
GEORGIANA