Broken Wings (A Romantic Suspense)(38)

She lies on her back, naked under the sheets, her burned hand resting on her chest, her lush auburn hair fanned out around her head. I slip out of bed, stopping when she shifts and makes a little noise. Her other hand stretches across the bed.

I touch her palm, tracing the lines with my finger. “I’ll be right back.”

I haven’t showered in two days. I don’t know how she could stand to be close to me like that. She’s only half awake, or maybe one quarter awake. She murmurs something affirmative, rolls onto her right side, and starts snoring.

Yeah, I did that.

Without bothering to dress, I step into the bathroom and leave the door open. It feels weird, sort of…domestic, for lack of a better word.

I need a hot shower. I scrub up hard, lathering myself with the cheap hotel soap. I rub it into my hair, just to feel cleaner. Before I get out I turn the hot water up as high as I can take and stand under it until I turn bright pink , then step out.

When I walk into the room Ellie is awake again, her head propped up on piled pillows. All the pillows. She doesn’t say a word. She just watches me dry off.

“Turn around.”

I shrug and do as she asks, facing away from her as I dry myself.

“Why?”

“I like your butt.”

She snorts and giggles, then stops herself. When I turn around again she’s staring off into space, her lip trembling. I quickly buff my hair dry and climb into the bed with her, take her in my arms, and pull the covers up to our necks.

“You okay?”

“Yeah. Very okay.”

She yawns.

Her skin is so soft. She feels amazing to touch. I wince a little when I run my fingers over the scars from the cuts and burns on her side. It must have hurt so much. A sympathetic pain wells up in my chest when I think about her all alone in the hospital, tied down and hooked up to a bunch of machines.

“I should have been there for you.”

“Why me?” she says.

“What?”

“Why me? Jack, look at me—”

“You know what happens when I look at you,” I murmur in her ear.

She shudders. I can feel it in my arms. We move together and she flops halfway on top of me, her head falling on my chest. She lies there in silence for a while. Her breath tickles my skin.

“I can hear your heart.”

I slip my arm under her and pull her on top of me. She lies on my chest and rests her head on my shoulder. The scent of her fills my lungs like hot smoke, and I wrap my arms around her and pull her to me, tight, so I can feel her breathing against me, feel her breath tickle my neck.

“I’m hungry,” she says.

“Let’s order a pizza.”

“That means we have to get dressed.”

“Well, one of us does. The other can stay in bed. Naked.”

She lifts up and shakes her head at me, in a weird, affectionate way, and slips off the bed. Of all the clothes to put on, she plucks my dress shirt off the floor and slips into it like a robe. For some reason, watching the white silk fall over her skin and cling to the curve of her ass is just as hot as watching her walk around naked, if not hotter.

She sniffs the collar and sits on the bed.

With great effort, I get up and pull out the phone book from the drawer, flip it open to the Pizza section, and dial the first local place with an ad. I could have looked on the Internet, but what the hell. After checking my wallet to make sure I’ve got the cash, I order a large pizza, covering the motel phone receiver with my hand to ask how Ellie wants it. Extra cheese, half pepperoni.

When it arrives, Ellie ducks into the bathroom. I pull on a pair of sweats and collect the pie from a bored delivery driver, and Ellie comes back out as I open the box on the table.

We end up sitting in bed, eating it silently while watching Storage Wars with the volume turned down low.

Between bites, Ellie says, “No way this isn’t fake. Who leaves a collection of vintage Barbie dolls in some storage bin?”

I just shrug. I don’t care. I’m up against the headboard, and Ellie is up against me.

“I think sex makes pizza taste better.”

She nods. “Mm-hmm.”

“Clearly we need to have sex before every meal.”

“Mm-hmm.”

She’s quiet for a while.

“We need to be careful.”

“You’re right. We’ll get some condoms. Have you ever thought about that? Having kids, I mean.”

She snorts. “No. I thought I was a virgin for life, to be honest.”

I take my slice of pizza and stick it in her mouth. After a few bites we start feeding each other, each chomping on the other’s slice. Ellie giggles a little when she gets some sauce on my cheek, and wipes it off for me.

“So how’d I do?” I say.

“Do?”

“Devirginizing you?”

She gasps and makes a funny little sound. “You did great.”

“It didn’t hurt?”

She shakes her head.

“It definitely did not hurt.”

“Good. You were pretty good, yourself. I wasn’t expecting you to jump on top and show me some moves.”

She turns even redder. “I didn’t even know what I was doing. We need practice.”

“Yeah, we do. Now eat this.”