Love Will (19 page)

“And Shea, I already know I want to see you tomorrow, too. I told you last night, you’re not like them. That wasn’t a lie, either.”

“I think the blizzard’s messing with your head. And it probably doesn’t help matters that I’m the only woman you’ve been able to find in town, right?”

I shake my head at her and at her ridiculous suggestion. “I never looked further than you. I see no reason to. And before you accuse me of using another line…” I know it sounded like one. I crawl over to her tentatively until I know she’s receptive to another kiss. This time, it’s not a deep kiss. No tongues, just lips, but still very slow and as sensual as the other ones. I don’t think this woman knows how to kiss without it evoking reckless, carnal thoughts in a man. If she does, I hope she’s reserved those kisses for every other man she’s ever known intimately.

Look at me, trying to feel special
.

We both pull away when we hear our food sizzling again. This time, we stick to casual conversation so we can finish the meal together. It’s even better left over.

Shea uses the afternoon off catching up on some accounting tasks she had been saving for the weekend, and I write three-quarters of a song in one sitting, which I’ve never done before. I had to draw my own staff paper and record myself singing and playing a few times, but it’s good. It’s uptempo, and I think Damon and Tavo will especially enjoy performing this one. When Peron pulls his head out of his ass, I think he will, too.

After the sun goes down, no amount of stoking the fire is working to keep the apartment very warm. Although we’re both bundled in multiple blankets, now huddled together, we’re shivering. Shea’s even resorted to drinking spiked hot apple cider while I sip on coffee, but it’s of little use to either of us. I didn’t want to tell her the minute amount of alcohol she’d added had undoubtedly boiled off over the flame and was adding nothing to her unique concoction because I didn’t want her to have too much to drink tonight. As a trained chef, I’m pretty sure she knows that, anyway.

“I have a couple of suggestions,” I say to her.

“Shoot,” she says.

“We go to the hotel. I think Ben left me his room key, so I’d have my own room tonight. Yes, it’s next to the rest of the guys, and it’s small, but it has electricity. At least it did earlier. I can call and check before we trudge back over there.”

“It’s next to the other guys’ room?”

“Yeah. And, oh, I mean… You can have that room tonight. I’ll stay with them.”

“What’s the other option?”

“It’s a physics principle. Thermal contact conductance.”

“Which is… I mean, thermal is heat… contact is obvious. It sounds like we’re already doing it,” she says to me.

“Well, we’d have to be in thermal contact, which means we’d have to be able to exchange energy through heat. Obviously, we’re sucking at that right now,” I tell her. She nods in agreement. “Remember, I’m giving you options. The first one’s not ideal, but it’s not bad.”

“I know,” she says.

“That sweater you’re wearing, and this jacket and shirt I’m wearing… these jeans… they’re not good conductors of heat. Blankets? Not good conductors of heat. They can keep heat in, but when your body’s just getting colder anyway, what good is that doing?”

I take a deep breath before looking down at her to see her reaction. She’s doing that smile-thing again. At least she’s not poised to slap me.

“So what are you suggesting?”

“A little scientific experiment of the thermal contact conductance principle?”

“You want me to get naked?”

I swallow before responding. “Not by yourself…” I’d expected that to sound reassuring, but it didn’t at all. It totally sounds like I’m coming on to her, but I only am about fifty-percent.

“It’s freezing in here!”

“Is it warmer in your bedroom?” I ask her bravely. Her face gets serious.

“The fireplace is in here.”

“I know,” I tell her. “But it’s not doing any good. Maybe the other room is in a better spot. Has a better window?”

She looks directly in my eyes and starts to nod her head. “It does.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“We’ll take the blankets?”

She grins and stands up, gathering one of them. I bring the other two and follow her around the corner. The bedroom actually does have a better, west facing window. It’s possible the sun had been heating it up more when it was setting, but it’s just as cold in her bedroom, if not a few degrees colder. She doesn’t change her mind, though.

I help her straighten the blankets on her bed, but then we’re both left shivering on opposite ends of it. “Just to keep warm, right?” she asks.

“If that’s what you want,” I tell her, crossing my heart again. She doesn’t say that it is, and I don’t want to come out and ask her directly. I won’t make a move on her, but I certainly won’t stop her.

Without hesitation, she starts removing her clothes in front of me with no modesty whatsoever. I follow suit, and don’t look up until I’m stripped to my boxers. She’s completely naked, her arms hanging loosely by her sides. I had no idea she’d be so comfortable–so confident–in her body, but she has every damn right to be. My jaw drops as I scan her impolitely. “You are sexy as fuck and I… just won’t look at you.”

“You’re taking those off, right?” she nods to my shorts.

I look down at my growing problem, but nod affirmatively. “He’s paying very close attention to you, so you may not want to look down there right now.”

She laughs it off, but I see her eyes widen as they dart below my waistline. I’m just as confident as she is, and don’t bother to hide the way I feel about her. She should know.

“Maybe we should get under the covers,” she suggests.

“We’re not conducting heat this way,” I tell her, lifting the blanket for her to get in first. She lies on her back, staring at the ceiling, so when I crawl in, I do the same, tucking the blanket around me to keep the heat in as much as possible. “Yeah, just for scientific purposes,” I tell her, reading her body language.

“Just to keep warm,” she reiterates.

“No funny business,” I say aloud.

“Not at all,” she says, but her hand brushes mine as she says it. “We’re supposed to be touching, though, right?” she whispers playfully.

I roll over on my side to face her. “Technically…” I pull my hand out from under the covers and move a few hairs off her forehead. She looks over at me. “We’re supposed to have as many contact points on the body to keep the heat moving between us.”

“Okay,” Shea says, nodding at me and turning on her side.

“Can I?” I ask her, reaching my arms out for her.

“Yeah,” she says, allowing me to envelop her into my body.

“Just ignore whatever is happening down there. I’ll make him behave.”

She starts laughing, causing her whole body to move. “I don’t know what to do with this arm,” she finally says of her right arm.

“Tuck it under the pillow? Or under my neck?”

She chooses to place it under my neck, which puts our faces about an inch apart. Our legs are intertwined, and we’re pressed up against one another as much as we possibly can be.

“How do you feel?”

“Your body’s warm,” she says.

“You gettin’ hot?” I tease her.

I notice the fingers of her right hand running through my hair. I close my eyes and revel in the feeling.

“Do you like that?”

“I do, yeah,” I tell her.

“So, scientifically, what will warm us up more?” she asks. When I open my eyes, she is wearing the most suggestive grin I’ve ever seen in my life.

“Scientifically?”

“Yeah. This is just for science.”

“Yeah, right, well, contact pressure has the most influence on contact conductance because it causes the surface area of the contact to grow.”

“I feel like we’re touching everywhere now.”

“Oh, no. There are tiny air pockets everywhere.” I pull her into to me, tighter, and rub my torso against hers. “But that action right there gets rid of a lot of those air pockets.”

“And causes friction.”

“That it does,” I agree, feeling both of our heartbeats against my chest.

“What does kissing do?”

“If it arouses you, it will cause increased blood flow that will warm–” Her lips are colder than they were the last time I kissed them, so I’m more than happy that she felt the need to steal the warmth from mine. “Hold up,” I say, resting my hand on her ear and holding her back about an inch. “Is that confirmation that kissing me arouses you?”

“You got confirmation of that last night, Will,” she says.

“Did this just become non-scientific?”

“I think so…”

“Is that okay with you?” I ask her, swallowing to try to calm myself in case she tells me no.

“Definitely,” she says.

Enough talking
. I push her onto her back and nudge my way between her legs, savoring every second of this one, prolonged kiss until I literally think I’m going to pass out. “Holy shit,” I say, gasping for air as I tuck my head into her neck. “I have never been this turned on in my life. And we’re just fucking
kissing
.”

“And we just fucking
started
,” she adds with a mischievous smile.

“Hold that thought.” Without getting out of the bed, I reach for my jeans and find my wallet in the back pocket and pull out the three condoms I have in there. “Is this okay?”

“I would have been upset if you told me you didn’t have any.”

“Okay, good. I didn’t want to be presumptuous.”

“I am not that much of a tease.”

“Oh, thank God. Wait,” I stop at the sound of the word
tease
. “We, uh… we haven’t talked about you at all.”

“I passed all my tests with flying colors.”

I smile at her, looking her in the eyes. “Do you know how heartbroken I would have been if you had said anything else?”

“I can only imagine. Now pull that blanket back over us and let’s get some friction going.”

“You’ve got to kiss me like that again,” I beg her, lying on my side and pulling Shea on hers. I could easily just have sex with her right now, but I really want to prolong the foreplay.

“It’s the only way I know how.”

“Oh, fuck, thank you.”

She runs the tip of her tongue along my bottom lip before I give in to my own impulses and press my mouth to hers once more. It’s the way she holds in the air between us, sucks in her breath when we kiss… that’s what it is. That’s what makes it so carnal and sexual. It’s the light sucking because it makes my one track mind think of her doing that elsewhere. Once that thought’s in my head, I can’t let go of it, and then I get caught up in the kiss and forget to breathe. She
must
know what she’s doing.

Once again, I’m left struggling for air. “You have to know that is the dirtiest fucking kiss outside of Arkansas, Shea,” I tease her. When I look at her, her tongue is peeking out through her teeth and she has this faux angelic look on her face. “Oh, you
so
know.”

“What do they do in Arkansas that’s dirtier?”

“They do it with their cousins,” I say.

“Oh, gross!” she yelps.

“A part of me wants to know where you learned to kiss like that, but no. I’d rather you just keep doing it. This is… astounding.”

“What is?” she asks.

“Just… no. Never mind.”

“Say it,” she urges me, but I wish I’d never made the comment.

“I just thought I’d experienced everything,” I tell her quietly, pushing her hair back again. “I didn’t think I’d feel something
new
.”

“Tell me that’s not a line,” she pleads.

I shake my head and break away just enough to cross my pummeling heart. “Not a line.”

“I feel pretty special right now.”

It scares me to admit that I think she really is. We return to the kiss again, the lightheadedness ensuing, and the erection’s getting more out of control, throbbing and wanting a proper warm place of its own. Clearly, it’s not behaving, so I decide to switch positions before we get ourselves into accidental trouble thanks to a few kisses that are depriving my brain of oxygen, and therefore relieving my mind of any rational thought.

Plus, I seriously need to breathe.

Keeping with the trend of slow, deliberate and thoughtful kisses, I move my lips down her smooth body, pulling the blankets over me entirely as I venture further down to make sure she’s still warm since I’ve removed nearly all of my contact points from her skin.

Suddenly I hear a whirring that stirs me from under the covers. The lights are on, and a blast of air is coming from an overhead vent.

“The electricity just came on,” I state the obvious, noticing her eyes are closed.

She pushes the top of my head while she shakes hers. “Your imagination. I’m sure of it.”