Page 39 of Overtime
“We should rinse off.”
“Right,” I agree even though I don’t want to.
It takes every ounce of willpower I have to lift my hands and get out of the tub. He follows close behind, and turns on the shower, letting the water heat before we slide under it. There are two shower heads side by side so we can rinse off at the same time. Because like the tub, everything in this house was built for two—for him and his wife.
He turns off the shower after he’s done, grabbing a towel, and then scrubbing it over his hair and body before wrapping it around his waist. He walks over to the side of the tub, grabbing another towel from the heated bar there, and motions for me. I turn off the water and walk toward him slowly, giving him a curious look.
He gently pats me dry with the towel and then holds it out so I can wrap it around me, grabbing me another towel for my hair that I use to get most of the moisture out of the ends. I’ve managed not to get it too wet, but I hadn’t exactly been using caution in the last few hours.
“Do you have any lotion?” I ask softly because this time of year if I don’t use some my skin turns into a desert in record time.
“Yeah. There’s some that came with the bath soak.” I watch him go into a cabinet and return with it. But instead of handing it to me, he squeezes some into his palms and motions for me to turn for him.
I do and slide my hair off to the side as he puts it on my back and shoulders. His palms gliding downward, over my upper arms, across my elbows, and all the way down to my wrists. His hands move back and forth over my skin, swirling little circles in their wake and making my whole body light up for him. I look at him, imagining I’ll see a devious grin, but I don’t. Just the furrowed brow of a man concentrating.
“Legs?” he asks, and I nod. I should point out to him that this is dangerously close to the hundredth violation of the agreement we made in as many minutes. That he’s well over the line considering he’s touching me, massaging me, making me want all over again even though what we just did should have sated me. At least taken the edge off for a short while. Would have if it were anyone else. But with Colton, I don’t think anything is ever enough.
His hands run over my knees, down my calves, and over my ankles, massaging tender circles as he works his way back up. He stops on my lower thigh, where the towel hits, and grabs more lotion, switching to the other leg. As he works his way up this time, his hand goes up the back of my thigh coming to rest just below the curve of my ass under the towel. He looks up at me for permission to go further, and I smirk.
“I think we’re approaching cheating territory.”
“And you don’t want to cheat?”
“What I want doesn’t matter.”
He stands then, rising to his full height and when I take a step back, he takes one forward. He’s switched again from the sweet caring guy with the boyish grin, back to the man who chases what he wants. He’s quiet but his eyes say everything for him.
“It matters.”
My heart thuds in my chest as I stare up at him, lost in his deep blue eyes. Because I want him so badly. Want to drive him to the point that he hauls me up against a wall again and this time doesn’t stop himself. But then I’ll crave him constantly. We’ll be out of this limbo and into the next. This one is where we just play a game over sex. It’s fun, harmless, and sexy as fuck. The next limbo? That’s the problem.
“Crossing this line is one thing. Of course I want to cross it. But the next line… the one after we do this and try to defineus. That’s where our hearts get involved. That’s where things can break. I don’t want us to break. I’ve missed you so much, Colt. So much I didn’t realize because I didn’t even want to let myself feel it.” My voice quivers with the words because I feel vulnerable admitting them, but I need him to hear it.
“I missed you too.” His face softens and he wraps his arms around me and pulls me close to him. I follow his lead.
For a moment I feel content again. Whole. Because sometimes I think Colt might just be one of those people for me. Just like Violet and Ben are, where they make up pieces of my soul, and when they’re missing, I’m not a whole person anymore.
“Stay here tonight. Sleep in my bed.” He brushes the hair back out of my face and studies me for a moment. “We won’t cross any lines, but I want you here.”
“Okay,” I agree because I don’t want to say no. I’m not ready to leave either. “But only if I get to pick the show we watch before bed. Cause Lord knows I’m not watching sports highlights.”
I feel him tighten his grip, and I can hear the amused tone in his voice when he speaks, “If that’s what it takes.”
TWENTY-ONE
Joss
I tryto sneak in through the front door to the hallway, but I’m in far too close proximity to the kitchen not to be heard, and just when I think I’m home free, there’s a throat-clearing sound. I turn and Violet’s standing there in her pajamas, coffee mug in hand and eyebrow raised.
“If you’re going to make me worry about you all night, then when you come home in the morning you at least owe me the juicy details.”
“Shit. I’m sorry. My phone was in the kitchen, and I was in the bedroom—” I stop abruptly when I realize what it sounds like I’m confessing.
“Uh-huh. When Ben tried to get ahold of Colt and he didn’t answer either, we assumed you two were together. Catching up. Revisiting old times. Bad habits. You know.” Her lips quiver and a smile flits over them before she takes another sip of her coffee.
“It wasn’t… We didn’t.”
“You just were in his bedroom, too busy to answer your phones for hours, and then didn’t come home until morning.”
