Her heart was beating so fast and so hard, she was sure he could feel it and honestly, she didn’t care. She’d waited to feel like this her whole life and she wanted to hold on to every second that she could.
“Ellie, are you okay?” the concern in his tone pulled her out of the lust cloud that she’d allowed herself to float away in.
Her eyes opened and she was back in the real world. In Harper’s Crossing. On the sidewalk. Her fingers were fisted in his shirt as she desperately clung to him.
“Oh, yeah…sorry…” she stuttered as she released her hands and stepped back and tried to gather her wits about her. Her brain felt like the mush her mom used to make her eat on cold Illinois winter mornings because she said it would stick to her ribs, whatever that meant.
After making sure that she was steady, he released his hold and the second his arms fell to his sides she missed his touch. Missed the feeling that only he’d ever inspired in her. She missed the connection that she’d only felt with him. In that moment she knew that he was the only man that she’d ever truly loved.
Too bad he didn’t feel the same.
Tears began filling her eyes and she knew if she didn’t do something fast, she was going to be a blubbering mess. She looked down to try to get herself together and that’s when she saw that her heart wasn’t the only casualty of the impact. Her Tempting bag had fallen to the ground and the contents were now scattered on the sidewalk.
Heat rose up from her neck in embarrassment as she bent down to gather them. Unfortunately, Nate had always had the reflexes of a superhero and he beat her to it.
When he stood, he had all six items in his large, tanned hands and just stared down at them. The erotic sight of him holding her unmentionables, and looking so casual, so right, doing it caused her to blush even deeper. She waited for him to hand them back to her, but he didn’t. He just kept staring at them.
His silence was causing a panic to rise in her. The anxiousness of what he was thinking caused her already clouded state of mind to fog up even more.
In a horribly misguided attempt to humor her way out of this embarrassing situation she heard herself blurt out, “I wanted you to see those, but on me, not the ground.”
The second the words came out of her mouth she wished she had the ability to suck them right back in. Her eyes widened and she tried to force herself to laugh, and play it off like a joke, when honestly that was as real as it got. But nothing came out except a squeak.
***
Nate couldn’t move, he couldn’t speak as he stared at the sexiest collection of underwear he’d ever seen. All he could hear was a loud buzzing and voices telling him to give them to their owner, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it.
At first his inability to act appropriately was due to the fact that he’d wanted to memorize the items because he knew every day from that point on, every time he saw Eliza, he would be wondering if she was wearing one of them. But that motivation quickly morphed into another, much stronger reason. When he thought about the next time he saw her, he knew it would be at the Masquerade Ball. The one she was attending with his twin. His mind swam with questions.
Would she be wearing one of these tonight?
Had she bought them with his brother in mind?
Would Neil be seeing her in these?
Would he be seeing her out of these?
No. That was wrong. Everything inside of him was screaming that it was wrong.
A distant sound of her voice drifted into his consciousness. He couldn’t make out the words she was saying but it served as a rubber band and snapped him out of his temporary paralysis. When he returned to the present he heard a high-pitched sound.
He looked up and saw Eliza standing in front of him and she was rubbing her thumb against the pads of her fingers so hard and fast he’d be surprised if there were prints left after she was done.
Shit. She must think I’m a total pervert.
Then in a move that rivaled “now-you-see-them-now-you-don’t” he returned the items into the bag he’d picked up off the ground and handed it back to her.
“Thanks.” Eliza’s voice was two octaves higher than it usually was and a forced smile was on her lips.
Double shit.
She was really upset and it was his fault. He needed to fix this and fast.
“I heard you’re going to the fundraiser with Neil.”
What the fuck?Why would he bring up his brother? And why the hell had he growled his comment through gritted teeth?
He knew the answer to one of those questions. His jaw was tense and his words animalistic because the thought of her and Neil attending the event as a couple made him feel like a lion that wanted to protect his pride. And she was his pride.