Page 135 of Till The Sun Dies (Checkmate 2)

My dick thrums with anticipation.

Anticipation of what? Nothing. Because she’s not mine, but maybe I could touch myself and pretend it’s her.Wouldn’t be the first time, and God knows, it won’t be the last.

When she flips the tap off and snaps my jeans out, she turns to me and almost slams against my chest when I don’t move.

I should move, maybe even throw my stupid ass into the ocean and cool off. But I don’t. Instead, I bar her way and pray she doesn’t look down to my cock.

“I wonder why Kane and Jess didn’t come to dinner?” Her lashes flutter, drawing me in like a moth to a flame. “They can’t possibly bethatinto each other.”

I know why they didn’t come down; because they’re meddlers with ninja skills. “Maybe they fell asleep.” I step back and allow her room to move.

Who the fuck am I to corner her in the bathroom just because she had a drink and got giggly?

I’m the exact kinda guy I’d whale on if I knew what he was doing. Someone standing in her way when she was trying to walk by, someone encouraging her silly, giggly behavior, simply because she’d had a drink.

Fuck me. I deserve a beat down.

I step out of the bathroom and go to work unbuttoning my shirt. I don’t bother hanging it, I just toss it back into my bag and turn away to rearrange my dick. Snagging the TV remote on the way past, I move toward the bed and sigh.

“I’m gonna put a movie on. Is that cool?”

“Yeah.” She walks out of the bathroom just as I lower to the very edge of my side of the bed.

Five whole nights of this.

Five whole nights where I get to watch her parade around in shorts that cover less than some panties cover. In a top that, in the right light, shows off too much breast. With sleepy eyes, that, when I let myself forget I’m supposed to be her protector, and instead become that wolf, I imagine how they would look at me if I slid into her in the night.

Not the scared Laine.

Not the Laine that was abused and broken by Graham, and could never wake to someone sliding inside her in the night.

But the younger version of her. The freer version.

“What’s on?” She tosses her heels across the room, then stops at the mini fridge and bends forward to peruse. She kills me; the bending, the wiggling. The dimples just above the waistband of her shorts. “This room’s in Kane’s name, right? His credit card?”

“I guess. I didn’t hand mine over, so…” I turn to the movie channel and click through the menu. Anything to distract me from Laine, who parades through my sleeping space in clothes any standard wolf could chew through.

“Perfect, these will taste so much better if he’s paying.” She grabs a box of M&Ms and tosses them onto the bed beside my leg, then turns with a bottle of white wine and grabs two glass flutes from the counter before hip-bumping the fridge closed. “Have a drink with me? This is an eight-dollar bottle of wine, but Kane will pay thirty-nine… we can’t pass this up. That’ll teach him for being a smartass all the time.”

“Sure.” I accept a glass and sit back on the bed.

I’m wearing boxer shorts and nothing else, which is technically no less than what we’d swim in at the beach or lake. In fact, her pyjamas cover more than her bikini, so I need to cool my shit and stop acting like an idiot. But then she flops onto the bed and works the cap off the bottle, turning onto her side to lazily pour the liquid into my glass until the bubbles spill over my hand.

“Oops.” She ducks forward and sips at my glass before I can, and in her quest to chase the spilling froth, licks the side of the glass and taps my thumb with her tongue.

She freezes. Warmth rushes to her cheeks as the pulse in her throat pounds hard enough that I can see it, but when I say nothing – nothing, because I’m too busy mentally talking my dick off the ledge – she swallows and preoccupies herself with her own drink.

“Sorry. Didn’t mean to spill.”

“S’okay.” I take a sip and pretend I’m not placing my lips exactly where hers were. “You okay to have another? You’re not gonna make yourself sick?”

“Nah. It takes more than three drinks to break my iron gut. I’ve been partying at 188 for years; did you count my drinks?”Yes. I’ve always watched you.“I can hit five or six before shit starts getting fuzzy. Eight is where my gut starts rebelling.”

I laugh, but it’s a nervous chuckle where I wish and pray I could be back home in my bed. Who knew I’d rather be alone and away from her, when Icouldhave the option of being in the same bed as her?

Oh.

Me.

I knew.

Because now she’s tipsy, mixing drinks, and licking my hand.

“Oh! Homeward Bound!” She snatches the remote and turns it back to the channel I just flipped over. “Yes! It just began.”

“Are you serious right now?”

“Uh-huh. Look, they’re still at the wedding. Want some dessert? My burger’s already settling in.”

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