His Captive Lover (The Thorpe Brothers Series) (11 page)

By the end of the day, just as the sun was setting over the horizon, he stood next to her as the last of her neighbors gave her a weak hug and walked down the sidewalk to their own homes.  Every single one of them told him to call if he needed anything to get her out of this mess.

When the door closed on the last one, Mia looked across the room at Ash.  “You stink,” she teased. 

Ash laughed and moved forward.  “And you look sexy as hell,” he replied.  He’d enjoyed working with her today, laughing with her, watching her with her neighbors.  She treated each of them as if they were special and, in turn, they treated her as if she were one of their children. 

Mia rolled her eyes.  “I probably smell worse than you.”

“Where’s your shower?” he asked. 

Her eyes widened.  “Shower?”

“Yes, the place where water comes down out of a faucet and there’s generally soap?”  He didn’t wait for her to answer.  Instead, he walked up the stairs to find it himself.  “Never mind,” he called back down the stairs. Then slammed the bathroom door closed. 

She heard the water turn on and her mind couldn’t stop picturing him in the shower.  And she had an extremely good imagination.  The hot water running down those muscles would be like a work of art, she thought.  She could just imagine taking her washcloth and smoothing soap all over his chest, those powerful arms and all of that delicious skin on his back.  On second thought, forget the washcloth.  She wanted her hands on him.  She didn’t want anything between her fingers and his skin. 

In less time than she would have liked, the water shut off again.  It took him only moments before the door opened.  He moved down the stairs, one hand holding a pink towel over his head as he rubbed his hair and another pink towel precariously wrapped around his lean hips.  The towel was perfectly sized for her, but on him, the material barely went around his muscular legs, giving her an eyeful whenever he took a step. 

She knew she was staring, but as he approached, she didn’t think any woman in the world would blame her.  The man was…shocking!  Every part of his body was covered with muscles.  She suspected that his body fat percentage was somewhere in the zero range.  There wasn’t a single part of the man that wasn’t perfectly chiseled. 

He was standing over her, looking down at her before he said, “Your turn,” with that sexy, no-nonsense voice of his.

Mia wasn’t sure what he was talking about.  “My turn?” she asked, wondering if she was going to get her turn at touching all that wonderful, delicious, incredible…

“For a shower,” he clarified. 

Mia was stumped.  A shower had been so far from her mind that it didn’t even make sense.  And then it struck her.  “Shower!” she exclaimed and stood upright.  “Yes, a shower!” 

She stepped around him, moving up the stairs as quickly as possible.  She was proud of herself for only stumbling on three of the steps but figured she earned extra credit for not turning around and gawking at him some more. 

In the shower, she leaned against the door, smelling her own soap mingled with the maleness that was pure “Ash”. 

“You’re in deep,” she whispered to herself. 

“Hurry up, Mia.  I’ll make some dinner.”

That startled her away from the door and she reached in to turn on the shower.  She didn’t see where his clothes were, but she stripped off her own and threw them into the hamper.  She stepped into the warm water, feeling a strong sense of intimacy, knowing that Ash had been in here only a few minutes ago.  She loved how it felt to have the bathroom already warm from the steam of his shower. 

She was so lost in the fantasy in her mind where Ash was still in the shower and he was helping her wash off…and she got to help him wash off, she didn’t hear the knock on the door. 

It wasn’t until he poked his face behind the shower curtain that she realized he was in her bathroom and she yelped, trying to hide her nakedness with whatever she had.  And the plastic scrunchie filled with soap really wasn’t up to the task.  His smile, and the dark glance down her body, told her that she was failing completely. 

“You’re too slow, babe.  Hurry up.  Dinner is ready.”

With that, his face disappeared again and she heard the door close softly. 

It still took her several minutes before she was able to move again.  But after that, she rushed through her shower in record time, rinsing out the shampoo and conditioner faster than she thought possible. 

In her bedroom, she tightened the towel around her chest, staring at her closet, trying to figure out what to wear. 

“What’s taking so long?” he asked, standing right behind her.

Mia spun around, her fingers once more grabbing the towel that was knotted just under her arms.  “What are you doing in here?” she gasped. She looked him up and down, painfully disappointed that he’d lost the pink towel and was now wearing a clean pair of jeans and yet another one of those tee-shirts that made her drool as she took in the muscles straining the fabric to the limit. 

“Trying to figure out why you’re letting our dinner get cold.”  His eyes traveled up and down her damp figure with appreciation.  “If you’re trying to figure out if that works for you, let me be the first to say that I am in full agreement with you coming down exactly like that,” he said with a sexy leer on his handsome face. 

She grabbed a pair of yoga pants from her closet and a clean tee-shirt.  “I’ll be down in less than five minutes,” she promised.

“Make it two,” he told her, then disappeared again. 

Mia didn’t challenge him.  She pulled on the yoga pants, a bra and tee shirt, then added a pair of socks, as if they could protect her against what she was feeling right now.  Socks really weren’t the best protection against throwing herself into Ash’s arms, but she didn’t have much else.  Her thinking was, if she looked homely enough, it would keep her from wanting him as much. 

As soon as she walked down the stairs, she knew that her thinking was painfully flawed.  His hot eyes looked up from the plates that he’d already set up on the counter.  Those eyes traveled from the top of her head where her hair was still wet, all the way down her body to her sock-clad toes peeking out from underneath her yoga pants. 

“Is that what you wear to yoga class?” he asked, gripping the spatula in one hand and the handle of the pan in the other. 

“Yes,” she replied, smoothing her hands down her thighs self-consciously. 

He nodded slowly, his eyes still moving along her petite figure.  “I might just take up yoga so I can watch one day.”

The idea of this big, strong, masculine man attending her yoga class, moving into all the various positions, somehow seemed hilariously funny to her.  “I don’t think that would be a good idea,” she replied.  “What did you make for dinner this time?” she asked, walking up to the counter and looking down at the plates.

“Pancakes.   You need to get food other than diet meals,” he growled and looked down, piling two more pancakes on her plate.  “And what’s with this veggie sausage?” he asked with obvious distrust.  “I don’t think anything that isn’t meat should try and pass itself off as meat.”  But he plunked three of them on his plate and two on hers. 

She laughed again, relieved by the slight dispersion in the sexual tension between them.  “The sausages are delicious,” she replied, shaking her head because she usually had only one of them for breakfast with a piece of fruit.  She’d never be able to eat all that food, but Ash couldn’t seem to grasp that she ate about a third of what he could go through during a meal. 

“And you need real syrup,” he snarled, plunking the sugar free syrup onto the middle of the table.  “Sit,” he said but softened the order by pulling out her chair, then sliding it in when she was seated.  He then moved to the chair opposite her and she couldn’t help but smile at how sexy he looked in her periwinkle kitchen surrounded by shabby chic curtains and pillows, not to mention the flowers on the window sill looking out from over her sink.  The police hadn’t done any permanent damage and even her inside plants and flowers were saved from their ruthless search, probably because they knew she couldn’t hide a body in their small pots. 

“What’s so funny?” he asked as he cut up his enormous stack of pancakes, then poured her sugar-free syrup all over them. 

“You.”

He looked up, his dark eyebrows raised in question. 

She couldn’t help but laugh.  He was just so tough looking – the complete antithesis of her entire household décor.  “You just don’t fit in with the pretty periwinkle kitchen,” she said, laughing once again.

He rolled his eyes.  “I should probably take offense at that, but I can’t help but agree.  My masculinity is at risk here.”

She giggled but stuffed a bite of pancakes into her mouth, savoring the amazing taste.  “What did you put into these?” she asked, closing her eyes in surprise.

“Vanilla and cinnamon,” he came back, pouring her a glass of milk.  “You need beer, too.”

She sighed as if she were in heaven.  “I have lemonade if you don’t like milk.”

He shook his head as if that were completely out of the question.  “You’re too wholesome.  I need to do something about that.”

Mia cringed.  “Not totally wholesome,” she said under her breath, thinking of her thoughts as he came out of the bathroom. 

She was looking down at her plate when she said that but her eyes snapped up when she heard his knife and fork clatter onto the plate.  “What do you mean by that?” he demanded, his eyes staring into hers with an intensity that caused all rational thinking to fly out the window. 

“Um…I…just…”

“What unwholesome thoughts are you thinking, Mia?” he asked.  His tone was soft, but it definitely wasn’t gentle.  Coaxing was a better term to describe the way he was speaking to her.  As if he wanted her to reveal….

“I just…” she shrugged, blushing painfully and unable to maintain eye contact with him. 

“Might you be having unwholesome thoughts about me?” he asked.

Mia looked up, startled that he could read her so easily.  But then again, what else was he supposed to think.  “I…”

He could see that she was embarrassed.  But he could also see the truth in her eyes.  “I can guarantee that almost none of my thoughts are very wholesome when you’re around.” 

With that, her whole body heated up in flash so intense, she thought her chair might catch on fire.  In fact, she wiggled slightly, uncomfortable now that she was on one side of the table and he was on the other.  “You’re my lawyer.”

“I am.  But I won’t be soon.”

“Because I’ll be in jail?” she gasped.

“No.  Because you’ll be free.  And you won’t be my client any longer.”

She fiddled with her fork, not sure what to do with her hands when she desperately wanted to run them over those shoulders like she had the last time he’d kissed her.  “You’re that far ahead on the case?” she asked, hoping that he would confirm that.  She didn’t even think about her being free.  She just wanted him to want her, to believe in her innocence. 

“I spoke to the prosecutor this morning before you decided to head over here to investigate.  We discussed your case and every time he brought up an issue, I was able to slap it down.  He doesn’t have much to go on now.  And he knows it.”

Mia breathed a sigh of relief.  “So the charges are going to be dropped, right?”

“I can’t guarantee anything,” he cautioned. 

She smiled slightly, knowing deep down inside that he believed in her.  That he knew she hadn’t done this horrible thing they were accusing her of.  “So that’s it?  It will all be over?”

“Don’t get too excited,” he said and leaned over to hold her hand.  “I don’t want you to get your hopes up about anything because I don’t know what will happen tomorrow.”

She looked down at his dark fingers tangling with her paler ones, her eyes entranced by the image.  What would it be like to have more than her fingers tangled with more than his?  What would it be like to have him kiss her and not stop?  She’d never wanted this from any other man and she wanted this from him so desperately. 

No more fears, she told herself firmly.  So when his fingers tightened around hers, she went willingly into his arms, feeling his strong body against hers and reveling in the magic of his touch. 

“What about dinner?” she asked, uncaring herself what happened to the food as long as she could continue to feel him touching her like this. 

“That’s not dinner,” he groaned as he lifted her into his arms.  “That’s unreal sausage and unreal syrup.” 

She couldn’t stop the laughter, but it quickly died when his mouth covered hers.  A moment later, he lifted her into his arms and carried her back up the stairs, laying her gently on the bed.  “Are you sure about this Mia?” he asked carefully, leaning over her but holding his weight away from hers. 

Mia writhed under him, almost angry that he was holding his body away from hers.  “I’m very sure,” she gasped out.  That was the last time she had a moment to talk.  He didn’t wait for her to change her mind or realize that this wasn’t a good idea.  If he were a better man, he would hold back until her name was cleared.  But he couldn’t and he wasn’t.  He wanted her and it felt like he’d wanted her for so long. 

With gentle fingers, he lifted her tee-shirt up and over her head then took a moment to stare down at her soft, full breasts that were almost spilling out of her white, lace bra.  “Not too wholesome here,” he said with a gravelly voice while his fingers traced the line of her bra, just at the edge, teasing her ever so carefully.

“Ash!” she cried out when he didn’t stop or move closer to where she wanted his fingers.  “Please!” she gasped.  And then he moved closer.  Right where she wanted his fingers to be.  When his thumb rubbed against the hard nubbin of her nipple, she jerked in reaction and pulled his hand away.  But as soon as the sensation was gone, she needed it back again.  With her hand holding his wrist, she brought his hand back to her breast, her hand forcing his to cover the whole area. 

“Mia!” he groaned and then his head bent, his mouth covering hers while his fingers blindly explored her breast again.  First one, then the other, his fingers and palms learned the way she liked to be touched.  It seemed that there wasn’t any wrong way to touch her, she was so responsive that it made him nearly mad with lust while her body pressed against his hand, her mouth becoming more ravenous as he discovered more secrets about those magnificent globes.