Page 90 of The Thing About My Secret Billionaire
And I’m lying on a blanket.
Shit, yes. Petunia. Is she okay?
I crank my eyes fully open to find the white miniature donkey fast asleep next to me.
“Miller.” There’s a hand on my leg. Frankie is crouched near my feet, wearing the black wool coat she left in yesterday, hair plastered to her head.
She must have gone into the house, realized I wasn’t there, and ran straight out to check on the animals without even grabbing a rain jacket.
Her beautiful, flushed face is shiny with moisture, and there are little streaks of black makeup next to the big blue eyes that are smiling down at me.
“You stayed with her?” Her soft voice is full of warmth and gratitude. “Because of the storm?”
The look in Frankie’s eyes says I’m not just Petunia’s hero, I’m hers too. And that’s the most valuable accolade I could ever hope to achieve.
I reach down and take her cold hand from my leg and wrap it in mine.
I nod. “I did.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
FRANKIE
At the first glimpse of Miller lying asleep next to Petunia with his hand on her back, my heart blossomed like a blooming sunflower turning toward the light.
This man, who’s only known these animals for a few days, noticed that she was stressed and stayed with her to make her feel better.
And he must have been so exhausted from running around in the storm to get them all inside that he nodded off.
His pants are cold and damp under my touch. Lord knows how long he’s been lying here, but they’re still not dry. He must have been soaked to the bone.
I might have thought I didn’t really know him, that he was a bit of a mystery, that I was letting my gut do the thinking and wasn’t sure if I could trust it. But this scene in front of me tells me everything I could ever want to know. It says everything about who he is. This is an actthat’s so thoroughly selfless, thoughtful, and caring that emotion gathers in my throat and pricks at my eyes.
It’s also sexy as all hell.
What could be hotter than a man who’s already as attractive, smart, capable and entertaining as Miller? An attractive, smart, capable and entertaining man who’s taking care of a stressed-out donkey, that’s what.
If seeing him lying here on his side, his firm legs outstretched, one arm curled under his head with his bicep for a pillow, hair flattened by the weather, face serene, broad chest rising and falling with relaxed breaths, hadn’t been enough to convince me I’d be a fool to miss out on this brief opportunity to be with him, I don’t know what would.
Oh, actually, yes I do. It’s the way he’s looking at me now, through sleepy eyes that send a heat washing through me that settles between my thighs and radiates to my chest, my fingers, my toes, my every extremity.
Even the two men I’d thought I was in love with—neither of whom was Bastard Brandon, one a college thing, one a guy I met at my first job—didn’t stir the core of me in the same way. Not with this lure, this yearning that’s so strong it almost hurts. Like if I found out I could never see him again I’d be a messy wreck of a human, even though I’ve known him for only a week.
Intellectually, I know it’s ridiculous. But try telling that to my soul, which is behaving like it’s found its fated mate.
It’s life’s cruel joke that someone I’ll be around for only a matter of weeks is the first person to make me feel like this.
I pat the solid curve of his calf. “Let’s go back to the house and get you warm and dry.”
“And clean.” He sits up, pointing at his muddy pants and boots.
His voice is low and gravelly and must be what it sounds like when he first wakes up in the morning.
“And clean. Of course.” I smile to myself at his consistent Milleriness.
But regardless of how he never ceases to make me smile, I can’t allow myself to think about what he sounds like when he’s all cozy and warm and naked in bed. Totally pointless. He might decide Warm Springs isn’t the place for him. He might choose California—or wherever. And I’m going back to Chicago anyway. So all these big, illogical feelings need to take a hike.
He reaches for Petunia and runs his hand over her shoulder. “Do you think she’ll be okay?”
