Page 50 of Fourth Base with the Alpha
“Come on, let’s go to bed.” He takes my hand and I attempt to pull him to his feet, failing miserably.
He laughs and lumbers up.
Then we walk into the house.
There’s a woman in a maid’s uniform waiting by the door, handing out guest towels and instructing those who look lost or wasted on how to find their room.
Hunter gives her his name, even though she must already know it, and her gaze flicks to me as she explains where our room is.
And then we’re climbing up some sweeping staircase, huge works of art hanging on the walls and a crystal chandelier the size of my apartment dangling from the ceiling.
We walk in silence down a wide hallway and halt outside a door with a handle I suspect may be solid gold.
Hunter stares down at me, opening his mouth like he might say something, but then he’s pushing open the door to reveal a four-poster bed framed against large windows, the dark beach behind, the new moon hovering in the sky and the curtains blowing into the room.
Hunter walks through and shuts the windows and I stand in the doorway with my mouth hanging open.
“Wow,” I say, “Layla wasn’t kidding. This is …” Romantic. Beautiful.
Hunter glances towards the bed. “It is pretty big but so am I. I can sleep on the floor.”
I run into the room and fling myself onto the mattress. It’s so soft I sink straight into the layers and my omega heart swoons.
“I may never leave this bed. Come tomorrow you may have to drag me away.”
“I take it you like it then?”
“It’s so soft.” I roll over, stroking my palms over the soft cotton sheets. “Like a nest should be.”
My nest at home is a corner of my bedroom where I’ve piled pillows and beanbags and comforters over the years. It’s crammed and hardly very private.
I’ve seen nests set up in rooms like this in magazines and the movies. It’s something I’ve always dreamed of.
After our earlier swim, I had showered and changed into underwear, so now I pull off my dress. I figure the giant alpha in the room has already seen me in my bikini so how different is underwear anyway? Then I snuggle down under the sheets.
“Aren’t you going to brush your teeth?” Hunter asks from the window.
“I don’t have a toothbrush so …”
“They always have guest ones in the bathroom.”
“Hunter,” I tell him, “I’m not leaving this bed until I absolutely have to.”
He chuckles, shaking his head and disappearing into the bathroom. I can hear him moving around in there, the run of water, the clink of the taps, as he goes through his nighttime routine. It feels almost as intimate as the singing did out by the fire. Like I’m being allowed a glimpse of something private.
I shuffle over to the left side of the bed and stare down at the right.
My heart thumps as I hear him switch off the bathroom light and pad into the bedroom.
But while my heart – and my body – wants nothing more than for him to climb into bed and take me in his arms, my head is a mess.
Because I can’t take anymore heartbreaks. I can’t give my heart away and have it crushed. I can’t lose someone else I love.
Falling in love is the worst possible thing I could do right now. And I know who I am. I’m a silly romantic who can’t even separate kissing from love – even when there’s a flipping contract. So with sex, I’d be doomed.
Yet, I can’t drag my eyes away from the man as he approaches the bed, shrugging his t-shirt over his head and his pants down his legs. Dressed in only his boxers, I’m rewarded with the perfect view of his body, as solid and muscular as he’d felt beneath my hands.
I shuffle further to the side of the bed, trying to make as much room as I can for him, trying to ensure there’s no chance that his warm flesh will touch mine.
