What the hell was it with men’s forearms anyway? Most underrated part of men’s bodies. So inexplicably sexy. Nah, for her the temptation was not mystifying.
Forearms led to wrists, and wrists led to hands that were so often holding implements, and yeah. He really would look sexy as all get out snapping a folded over belt between those hands.
She really shouldn’t be drooling over the guy she’d just raked over the coals. But where, precisely, was the harm in imagining the man she’d just chewed out eating her out after striping her backside? Only in her own mind, in a file labeled Regrets.
His brows crunched, and he set his hands on his hips, framing the narrow width of them. Yep, hot hottie hot.
“I want you to know I wasn’t laughing at you earlier.”
Tamsyn had resolved to give him a shot, if only because she desperately wanted to be under those hands, but she couldn’t help but mutter, “Are you fucking kidding me?” because he’d been in stitches, and it had clearly been a result of something she’d said.
His near-black brows ticked up a fraction of an inch in a way that made her pulse between her legs. Why did it have to be this man whose every gesture seemed to have a hotline to her libido?
“Sorry,” she grumbled, even as heat bloomed in her cheeks and her chest tingled.
Elder would give excellent lectures, she was sure of it. Not that she’d let him if this explanation turned out to be a whole bunch of bullshit. And maybe he wouldn’t be interested anymore after she’d lit into him. But somehow, she didn’t think that would be a problem. Not from the way he dipped his clean-shaven chin. It felt like chastisement and forgiveness all at once and she wanted more of both from him.
“It’s just that you weren’t wrong. About the twin thing,” he clarified. “I do actually have an identical twin. Which in itself wouldn’t be all that amusing.”
Tamsyn felt as though her breath had gotten tangled up in her ribs. There were two of them? She could barely keep from melting into a puddle of middle goo when faced with just the one, and there was a carbon copy? Heaven help her if she ever faced both of them at the same time, because if Elder’s brother was anything like him, she’d do any goddamn thing they asked. There was nothing funny about that.
The corner of Elder’s mouth twitched up like he was thinking about something he hadn’t shared and it made her want to demand what it was. Before she could, he was pressing on.
“I know you said the other day that you’d just moved here, and this is going to make me sound like a narcissist but…I still thought you might know who I was. You clearly don’t follow politics professionally or recreationally.”
“Not really,” she conceded. “But I vote.”
“Glad to hear it,” he told her, flashing a smile that might’ve dazzled if that was the only one he’d gifted her with. But she knew better. He shook his head as if to clear the expression like he’d drawn it on an etch-a-sketch and then rubbed a hand over his jaw. “Anyway, I’d ask that you keep what I’m about to tell you to yourself, even if everyone here already knows. It’s the ethos of the place, you know.”
“Of course.”
Did he think she’d fallen off the turnip truck yesterday? Sprouted from the cabbage patch this morning? No, she knew well enough to keep her mouth shut about the people and things she saw here.
Elder’s chest swelled with a breath inhaled and then he held out a manicured hand.
“Huxley Foster-Webb, former Congressman of the Sixth District of Connecticut.”