Page 52 of The Billionaire's Teacher

I needed to move. Idefinitelydidn’t need to lie here reveling in the sensation of being held. And I needed to figure out a way to erase this memory from my consciousness.

I reached down and slowly eased his arm off me and onto his abdomen. I got a brief mental flash of him standing shirtless on the deck of the yacht. My mouth watered and my gaze flicked up to his mouth.

No.

Bad idea all-around for more reasons than I could count.

I scooted away, careful to keep my movements slow and quiet. When I’d created space between us, I crawled across the room to where I’d initially set up a resting spot for myself and stood.

What had I been thinking?

I gave myself a mental tongue lashing as I used one of the extra logs I’d brought in from the garage to prod the fire in the hearth back to life. Then I dug out the small camping pot, took the lantern, and headed into the hallway. I blinked in the light when I turned the corner, then spun and set the lantern back on the floor in the living room. If Wes woke while I was gone, he’d probably piece together that I’d gone this way.

I looked out through the trees to the water. I could see the yacht, still stuck on the rocks, tipped slightly to the left. I frowned. That was probably bad.

I needed to swim out and check. If I hadn’t used the inflatable as a gurney to lug Wes into the house, it wouldn’t have huge rips in it and I could get back out there much easier. I sighed. I’d make the same decision again.

But first, food.

I strode down the hall to the end where a door led outside. Rainwater buckets lined the outside wall of the house and I blessed the previous owner for their forethought as I dipped into the pot.

I took a moment to breathe in the clean, fresh post-storm air. The sky was clear. The water was calm.

Other than the water dripping off the trees, and the branches littering the ground, it would be easy to doubt there’d ever been a storm.

I carried the pot back into the house and to the living room. Wes still slept.

Good.

I wasn’t ready to interact with him yet. I needed to get myself back under control. Find the professional footing I was so proud of. Because I had taken plenty of good-looking single men on boat trips. Granted, not usually as a solo passenger, but that shouldn’t matter.

I opened the bag that held our emergency food and found a freeze-dried breakfast scramble. My stomach rumbled as I read the description. It wouldn’t taste as good as it sounded—I’d been camping enough to know that—but it was better than a granola bar.

I put the pot on the hearth near the flames. There was no rack. No way to put the thingonthe fire. So we’d just have to hope that proximity would get it boiling.

My gaze flicked over to Wes. Proximity to some things could certainly make heat.

Ugh.

I looked away. He was myclient. I was responsible for getting him safely home. At which point, I would never see him again.

I should have gone and slept in the closet by myself. I certainly shouldn’t have moved closer like I had. Thankfully, right now I was the only one of us who knew what had happened. So. Good. I would pretend I hadn’t woken up in his arms. I would ignore the blissful delight it had caused from my head to my toes. We would figure out how to get out of this mess we were in. And we would go our separate ways.

I moved closer to the fire and stared into the pot.

“Pretty sure that’s how you keep it from ever boiling.” Wes’s voice, low and husky with sleep, did crazy things to my insides.

I forced my lips into a smile before I turned. “I’ve heard something like that. But I’m hungry. You?”

“I could eat.” He pushed himself up and twisted from one side to the other before rolling his head in circles. “I’m too old to sleep on the floor.”

I laughed. “I’m older than you.”

“You’re too old to sleep on the floor then, too.” He flashed a grin and wobbled to his feet. “Did the storm stop?”

I nodded. “We should open the shutters again, let some light in.”

“Any idea what time it is?”

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