Page 16 of The Arabis Triad

“Okay. You win.” She stepped sideways.

They parted, allowing her to move across to the shower. Keeping one eye on them, she placed her palm beneath the flow of water. It was nicely warm. Neither too hot nor too cold. Perfect.

Now she didn’t care if she had an audience or not. It was too much temptation. She stepped beneath the flow, keeping her back to them, tilted her head back, and let the water run over her face and through her hair. She moaned. She would never take a shower for granted ever again.

The towel became soaked and heavy, and it slipped to the floor. She gasped, covering herself as best she could, and came eye to chest with Paxt.

He calmly handed her a washcloth. “Take this. I will aid you upon your request.”

Her gaze dropped downwards of its own volition to see him soaking wet and still in his leathers. She relaxed marginally.

“That doesn’t look comfortable,” she managed.

“And neither will you be if I take them off. Now turn around.”

She blinked up at him, dumbstruck. “What?”

He poured a gel into the palm of his hand from a container. A flowery fragrance permeated the air. “I will wash your hair. It is matted and will be difficult for you to properly treat it.”

“That’s shampoo?” She eyed the solution, and then noticed they were the only ones in the room.

“I sent Coltan and Ashir to secure the perimeter. We thought you would be more comfortable with just one of us.” Paxt waited for her, cupping the shampoo in his hand.

It looked innocuous enough. She turned around, holding the washcloth to her chest.

“I’m going to wash your hair now, mate,” he said. “Is it okay to touch you?”

She momentarily thought about taking the container of shampoo from him, but she couldn’t hold the little hand-towelandproperly use the shampoo in the tangle that was her hair. It also looked like he was doing his best not to overstep. Feeling a little more in control, she nodded.

“I’m going out the hair cleanser in now.” His fingers threaded in her hair, moving slowly in little swirling movements, just at the top of her head. There was nothing sexual about his touch. He massaged the shampoo in much like a hairdresser would, functional and perfunctory. She waited for his touch to change, to become more than it should.

It never did.

His contact was firm, gentle, and there was a part of her that wished it was more, but then the scared, vulnerable side of her shoved the thought away.

She needed to think about something other than his fingers working the dirt from her hair. “Tell me about your… planet.”

“It is beautiful.” He let out a sigh. “There are three Homelands divided by great oceans that contain aquatic creatures. The Drod have huge fins and tails and can travel great distances very quickly. They are very hard to catch. The Qil are slower and glow in the dark waters. They are very tasty.”

“They glow in the dark?”

“Yes. It makes them easy to catch when fishing at night.” He helped rinse her hair out and then applied a fresh lot of shampoo.

“We have fish like that too, but they’re found at the bottom of the deepest oceans. I don’t think anyone eats them. I don’t think anyone wants to,” she said.

“They are not to be eaten?”

“I guess you could. They’re just really ugly. And I don’t think there’s a lot of meat on them,” she said. Just thinking about the prehistoric-looking creatures was enough to give her the shivers. “Although some people would probably consider them a delicacy.”

“Ahh. If you want delicacies, then you will need to try our pastries. Do you like sweet things?”

Did she ever. She was known for her regular mid-morning coffee and donut, or she was a casualty of too-low blood sugar.

“I do like a treat.” Or two.

His sexy chuckle went right through her body and straight down to her groin. “Then we shall get some for you.”

He rinsed her hair again. She felt a silken strand, surprised at the lack of knots. “That’s some good shampoo you have there.”

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