Page 95 of Just One Look
Testosterone Fest
It wasthe weirdest casual drinks date Elizabeth had ever had, and she’d once gone out with a general surgeon who’d decided that his winning dating strategy was describing Memorable Cysts He Had Known. Tonight, though, it was as if Luka and Gerald were playing squash, and Luka was winning. He was somehow managing to look even bigger and taller, for one thing, like a lizard puffing himself up during mating season. He wasn’t smiling, and every move he made was decisive. Body language, dominant example of.
It was effective. At least, she was extremely distracted. She also had a sort of tingling sensation in the soles of her feet, her lower belly, and her general … groin area, though that was normal. Physical exertion did increase sexual stimulation in women. Neurotransmitters, hormones, autonomic nervous system activity, as well as an enzyme that increased genital blood flow and arousal, all of it suggesting every movie that had the couple running for their lives, then falling into a wild kiss, ripping at each other’s clothes, and having urgent, desperate, sweat-soaked sex up against the wall. She’d never experienced it at this level before, but then, she’d never played squash before.
It worked for men, too, although differently. The same adrenaline and dopamine production, plus testosterone levels increased by strength training, not to mention stronger erections from the increased blood flow. That was clearly what was happening here, minus, hopefully, the erections, because unless she was crazy, you could cut the tension at this table with a knife, and Gerald and Luka could hardly have been more obvious if they’d been gorillas.
No question which one was the silverback, though. And if that increased her sexual stimulation even more … well, evolutionary biology was a concept. Her body was saying, “Pick this one! He’ll make the best shelter! He’ll bring home the most meat! He’ll put babies in you! He’ll come in the door at night like thunder and throw you down and …”
At this point, her body got extremely inappropriate.
Also, women tended to respond positively to the smell of a man after a workout, and the more testosterone in his body, the more they responded. More of that evolutionary biology, clearly, because Luka’s T-shirt was clinging to him a bit, and he smelled like he knew how towork.
After about fifteen minutes of that, during which she tried her best to continue the conversation while the rest of her operated at a whole different level, Gerald said, “Well, it’s on to dinner for me. Join me, Elizabeth? I know quite a nice spot. All tiny plates, so we can share.”
She should want to go, if only to pay Luka back for whatever this Testosterone Fest had been, but she felt about as much like walking away from this table with Gerald as … She couldn’t even finish the sentence. Another woman might have enjoyed this battle, might have seen how much she could stoke the flames, but she didn’t seem to be another woman. Also, she should make sure Luka was all right, shouldn’t she? Didn’t she owe him that, after he’d been so understanding of her little … episode, last week? Yes, she did. Definitely. Also, she didn’t like sharing. She said, “I’d better not. I’m still a little shaky from the squash, to tell you the truth. I need to recover. At home,” she hastened to add. “To recover at home. Probably watching TV.”
Gerald’s eyes had narrowed. His jaw didn’t look all that relaxed, either. “Right,” he said after a moment. “I’ll say goodnight, then.”
“Cheers, mate,” Luka said. He drained his beer, which was a light one, fortunately. But he still didn’t smile.
She said, when Gerald was gone, “Excuse me? What was that?”
“What?”
She wanted to glare. She couldn’t manage it. “You know what. Who’s going to teach me to play squash now?”
“Oh, that fella? Yeh, didn’t like him. Blonde. I don’t trust blonde men.”
“Excuse me? Aren’t about three of your teammates blonde?”
“Yeh, they are. Shifty bastards. I’ll teach you to play squash. Seems I’ll have time.”
“Do you know how to play squash?”
“No.”
“Then how are you going to teach me?”
He looked at her out of hard eyes, because nothing about him had softened yet. “I’ll ask somebody, pick up a few games, and then I’ll know how.”
She was trying to figure out if that was arrogant or just factual when he said, “Want to go to dinner with me? Last meal, eh.”
Oh. This wasn’t about her and her hormones and her enzymes and her strangely troublesome libido. It was about him feeling vulnerable. He was reacting to his fear by increasing the power of his force shield, because that was how he would always respond to a threat. She put her hand on his and said, “You know, you don’t need to be concerned. The surgery’s the easy part, and the rest of it, the part that’s hard for other people, that takes discipline and effort and a willingness to work through the discomfort? That’s the part you’ve got covered. But tomorrow? No. Mortality rates for your surgery are around point-one to point-two percent, and for somebody as young and fit as you, they’re much less. Also, Dr. Larsen is very—”
He leaned over, put his hand on her face, and kissed her.
His hard mouth, and his hand tightening on her head, all of it going from gentle to … to not gentle at all. At thetable.In thegym.His tongue was in her mouth, his hand clutching her braid, his workingman’s scent in her head, and her heart had accelerated so much that she could feel it banging in her chest. Adrenaline,she thought dimly. Arousal, and an excitement that was almost fear. It was all just adrenaline, right?
When he sat back at last, she clutched the table and tried to think. He said, “Wait ten minutes for me to take a shower, and I’ll take you to dinner.” The words were casual enough. What she was getting from him was anything but.
“I just …” He’d kissed her. Again. Did he just go around kissingeverybody?“I told Gerald that I couldn’t, remember? The shakiness and all?”
“The shakiness is good,” he said. “Makes everything you do next feel that much better. And I reckoned you were sparing his feelings.”
“Why would I?” she asked. “He’s a surgeon. He has a perfectly healthy ego. Probably picking up somebody else in the parking lot right now.”
He looked at her. Scruff of beard, creased face, endless shoulders. “He could be hurting a bit tonight all the same. Now that he knows you wanted to go out with me.”
