I don’t move. The next second, I’m shoved up against the wall by something hard andwarm.
Not something.Someone.
A hard chest crushes my breasts, and male hips dig into my stomach. I’m so thrown it takes me a moment to catchup.
But it’s his scent, cedar and sunshine, that keeps me from freaking out the way I did withKellan.
“Annie?” Disbelief cracks the anger in his voice, his lips inches from mine in thedark.
“I know,” I whisper. “You didn’t recognize me without the garbagebag.”
Tyler steps back, and Isway.
He lunges for me, wrapping an arm around mywaist.
Even though I want to shove him, I’d fall in a heap without his support. So, my fingers close over his hand, and as he helps me across the floor, I imagine away the heat of hisbody.
Six uncertain steps later, I'm deposited on somethingsoft.
Hisbed.
The glow of light—the nightstand lamp switched on—has me wincing until my eyesadjust.
Tyler’s staring down at me, a shirtless, scowling god. His toned chest floods my field ofvision.
I swallow. The buzz from the alcohol has my gaze sliding down the muscles of his stomach, lingering on the indentations left by the shadows, the faint trail of hair that disappears into the top of his unbuttonedjeans.
“What did you take?” His voice is commanding, forcing my eyes up tohis.
“Nothing. I had one—two drinks?” Tyler lifts a dark brow under the thick fall of hair. “Two and three-quarters drinks,” Idecide.
He doesn’t smell like cologne and liquor. Tyler smells clean and warm, like aforest.
“And you’re herebecause…”
I think I prefer my treesquiet.
I slide onto my side, closing my eyes and sinking into the relief the new position brings. “Kellan wanted to wrestle in the roses. Ididn’t.”
A string of impressive curses drifts through my head, almost as if I’d uttered them, but the voice isn’tmine.
Then he’s gone. I feel him vanish from the side of the bed only to reappear a momentlater.
“Did he hurt you?” Tyler’s voice is so low it’s barelyaudible.
I shake my head, and the room spins. I force my eyes open to see him braced over me, close enough his knees brush the bed, holding aglass.
“It's water,” he says flatly. “You’redehydrated.”
“You don’t have to sound like youcare.”
The growl would have made me jump if I wasn’t sobuzzed.
I’m not trying to be a brat. He doesn’t need to pretend when we’re alone. It’s not like with Dad and Haley, when civility is amust.
Okay, maybe I’m being a bit of a brat, but I’m protesting Kellan, the fuzziness in my head, my own stupidity in thinking I could win these peopleover…
Plus the shirtless Hottie McTraitor in my poolhouse.