Page 13 of Tormented Bastard
“No…smartass.” I muttered the last part under my breath. “What do you have in there?”
“The things you’d normally put in a garage. Motorcycle, a couple of cars, tools. You know, garage things.”
“Are you going to board up the house?”
“Which one?” he asked, leaning the plywood against the side of the garage and picking up an electric screwdriver.
“Which one? How many do you have?”
He turned to look at me, his hands on his hips. “Just two. This guest house and the main house. The guest house has automatic hurricane shutters. The main house is all hurricane-proof glass. It protects the best, I don’t have to do any work, and it looks better. But,” he said with a grunt when he picked it up again, “this wood works just fine for the garage here.”
I turned back to the structure he called a garage. It was small, but that was relative compared to the main house. Most people never lived in a house the size of his garage. I shook my head. “Whatever you say. Now, I’m supposed to help you, but I don’t have a clue what to do.”
“Come over here and bring the screws with you. I’m going to lift the wood up, and you’re going to drive in the screws about eighteen inches apart. Got it?”
“Yeah, I got it.” But once I got started, it was harder than it looked to screw in a piece of plywood against a house. I needed to talk to Chase about the job, but it took all my concentration to drive a damn screw.
“Eden, you’re going to need to get closer to get some leverage on that. Otherwise, it won’t go in straight.” With his head, since his hands were holding the wood, he gestured for me to get closer to him. “Come here. Stand in front of me.”
With a sigh and a roll of my eyes, I ducked under his outstretched arm and stood in front of him. “Like this?”
There was a hesitation and clearing of his throat before he said, “Yep, like that.”
It was then I realized our positions. The heat of his body was like an inferno behind me, his arms caging me in between him and the wall in front of me. I bit my lip and lifted the screwdriver, holding the screw at the end and trying not to show how affected I was to be so close to him. With a pull of the trigger, I drove a screw in before moving over the required distance and repeating the process.
“That’s it. Just like that,” he murmured near my ear. I swallowed hard as his breath tickled the hairs on the back of my neck. I moved up one side of the sheet and down the other, our bodies moving together as though we’d worked together like this before.
Of course, our bodies moving together had never been our problem.
When I secured enough screws to hold up the square of wood, he dropped his arms, but he didn’t step back. I lowered my arms and closed my eyes briefly before turning to face him. He was so close I could see the dusting of sawdust covering his skin and the brown specks that made his green eyes so unique. The smell of wood, leather, and man assaulted my senses and made me weak in the knees.
I leaned against the wall of the house behind me to keep myself vertical. Even after all this time, all the things we’d put each other through, he still had this effect on me. Was I ever going to get Chase Hanover out of my system?
I had to. I had no choice. As soon as he gave me the answer I needed, I was headed back to New York and my life.
His eyes wandered over my face and drew me in, just like they always had. It was like a tractor beam, and I couldn’t get away even if I wanted to.
“Oh, Eden. Why is it every time I see you, you’re more beautiful than the last?” He lifted a hand and brushed the back of his knuckles against my cheek. They were warm and a little rough from the dust, but that featherlight touch put me on high alert. Warmth spread in my blood, pooling in my core, causing my panties to become damp with more than just sweat. I closed my eyes and had to stop myself from leaning into his hand. When I opened my eyes, he was just inches from my face, his body caging me between him and the wall. I wanted to mind it, but I didn’t.
Our gazes held, and he brushed a lock of hair away from my face, tucking it behind my ear and under the edge of my baseball cap.
“Am I interrupting?”
Chase dropped his head and chuckled. “Fucking Chance.” He pushed off the wall behind me and turned toward his friend. “You’re making me regret giving you the code to the gate. What do you want now?”
I released the breath I’d been holding and tried to bring my system to rights. I couldn’t put myself that close to him again. I needed to get him to agree to my proposal and then hightail my ass back to the mainland and on the first plane to New York—and my sanity—tomorrow morning.
“…bridge closed.” My ears perked up at the last words Chance said.
I walked closer to them. “Wait, what did you say?”
Chance turned to me. “I was just telling Hollywood that if he needed anything from the mainland, he was SOL.”
Panic gripped my throat. “Uh, why is that?”
“We’re now under a hurricane warning. They’ve closed the bridge to the mainland.”
Well, shit.
