Coldhearted Boss(46)

Being around him zaps it right out of me. I have to be on, aware, and mentally present at all times. He keeps me on my toes, and my toes are tired, and I should not have collapsed onto this bunk because it smells like Ethan. It’s a smell I can’t quite categorize. Normally scents are either good or bad. Some thrust you right back to a favorite memory, like freshly sharpened pencils and elementary school. Ethan’s scent—masculine, woodsy, fresh—makes my stomach flip over and my chest ache right near my heart.

I roll off his bunk and step away, scared of what that smell could do to me if I let it linger.

Then I realize I’m stuck here, all alone. Again.

The fact is, I have no ride home, and even though Ethan told me not to, I’m going to have to stay here over the weekend. I’ll just have to be careful. No long leisurely baths on Sunday afternoon. In fact, no baths ever. Also, I should probably make it look as if I return to camp after him, just so he doesn’t think even for one second that I might have disobeyed him.

Plotting out how to do that eats up the first half of my Saturday at the lake, the second half of my day consumed by reading. Oh yes, I found another book. This one was tucked in one of the mess hall cupboards, and I found it while I was cleaning this week. It’s a well-worn romance from the 70s. The pages are so yellowed they’re nearly brown, but I tear through that puppy and enjoy every delicious glance, every teasing innuendo and playful conversation between the hero and heroine. It gets my loins burning and I’m forced to swim in the lake as a reprieve because there is no man in sight to soothe this ache—no man in the whole entire state, it seems.

I walk back out of the water and shake my limbs, flinging water everywhere. Then I lie back down on my towel and pick up the book.

Though I wish I didn’t, I think of Ethan with Isla. I imagine her just like how the author describes the heroine in my book: tall, blonde, effervescent. What a word. Can a woman wearing oversized jeans and work boots even attempt effervescence? I hate Isla on principle.

I glance down and take in my wet t-shirt clinging to my curves. My underwear peeks out just below the hem, and I think of when Ethan accidentally walked in on me bathing last week, how there was no time for me to register my nakedness because I was too preoccupied with getting caught reading his book.

Now, I indulge the memory, twisting it into a create-your-own-adventure story in my mind. I imagine that in another world, Ethan strolls in and loses himself at the sight of me, lounging there, breasts barely visible over the top of the water. Maybe in this world, we’re friends, more than friends. Maybe in this world, he strolls over and uses his hands—the hands I’ve only seen doing busy important boss things—to pick up my soap and washcloth and start to bathe me. I tuck my knees up against my chest, rest my cheek on my knee, and sit patiently while he starts on my lower back. The towel drags up my spine and I groan with pleasure in the simple act of him touching me with reverence and awe. No one’s touched me like that before. Gently, beautifully.

Even in this other world, though, Ethan isn’t the perfect gentleman, and what starts out as an innocent bath tips toward something more playful when he tugs on my shoulders and forces me to recline, legs stretched in front of me.

He kneels down behind me, outside of the tub, and uses his hands to soap and lather my chest, creating a wake of bubbles between my breasts and down across my stomach. My head tips back against the lip of the tub, my eyes flutter closed, and he continues south. His mouth slants over my neck and his lips press against my pulse point just as his hand slides between my thighs.

Oh, Ethan.

OH, ETHAN!

I snap back to reality and fling the book away from me like it’s a hot potato, realizing what I’m doing: fantasizing about him! A man I loathe! A man who brings out the worst, most childish side of me. Even this line of thought seems like another mark added against him, though rationally I know he had nothing to do with it. But didn’t he? He’s the one who sleeps in our cabin without a shirt on. He’s the one who purposefully walks out of the bathroom with a low-slung towel around his hips.

Of course, it would be best to handle this as an adult and tell him I’m not comfortable with the lengths he’s resorting to in an effort to get a reaction out of me.

Instead, I wonder if two can play his game.





Chapter 19





Taylor





Sunday evening, I kill two birds with one stone. I carry all of my clothes to the mess hall and hide out in there doing my laundry, that way when Ethan arrives back at the cabin it’ll look like I’m still gone for the weekend.

My plan works flawlessly until he strolls by the window and sees me sitting up on the washing machine, finishing my book.

I hear his voice before I see him.

“When did you get back?”

I jerk out of my reading haze and slam the book closed, glancing up in time to see him lean his tall frame against the doorjamb. He’s wearing jeans and a white cotton t-shirt. Somehow, it’s the best he’s ever looked.

“Not long ago,” I say with a casual shrug.

“Huh.”

His eyes are narrowed, but his mouth is edging toward an amused smirk.

“What?” I snap, my good mood wiped clean in five seconds flat.

He tips his head toward the dryer. “It just seems odd. I watched you pack all your stuff on Friday before you left.”