by Rosie Danan
Josh must have mistaken her guilt for pain because he said, “Easy, tiger. You’ve had a big day,” and then, seemingly remembering the flowers in his other hand, he placed them gingerly on her lap.
Her heart rate monitor picked up. It was stupid and vain, but Clara hated that he was seeing her in her hideous hospital gown. She considered this whole scene overdramatic for what amounted to a glorified fender bender. The damage to her pride would take longer to heal than her body.
Despite her protests that she was fine, just shaken, the EMTs at the scene had insisted she go to the hospital to get checked out when her blood pressure wouldn’t come down. She’d tried to explain that the physiological response stemmed from concern about her roommate’s and boss’s reactions, but her reasoning had not mollified the medical professionals.
At least they’d let her sign a release form and ride with Jill, who had left Toni Granger in the waiting room to rush to her side, instead of making her ride in the ambulance. Once at the hospital, she found no effective argument against the hours-long series of tests and waiting. She had only just managed to convince Jill to go back to the office and run damage control when Josh arrived.
Clara pointed her chin at the ceiling in an effort to slow her waterworks. If she looked at Josh she’d lose it again. Why was he acting like she hadn’t done this awful, selfish thing? If her family had taught her anything, it was that when you let people down you suffered the consequences. Hurt feelings at best, news articles and jail time at worst. You didn’t get flowers and you certainly didn’t get affectionate nicknames.
“Sorry, they’re a little smushed.” Josh turned the flowers so the less crushed side faced her and held them under her nose. “I, ah, may have accidentally sat on them on the ride over.”
Her heart throbbed, two sizes too big for her chest. His sweetness tortured her guilty conscience. “I’m so sorry, Josh. I know you must be livid, but whatever happens, I’ll make sure your car comes out of this whole thing as good as new.”
A tiny wrinkle appeared between his brows. “Wheaton, I could give two shits about the car right now. Someone tried to mangle you.” He was still holding her face in his hand, stroking back and forth over her jawline like she was made of glass.
“That’s not exactly true. The guy got confused. He’s from out of town, like me, and isn’t used to driving in L.A. and he felt so terrible, Josh. He really did. He was a wreck.” She pictured the older man with salt-and-pepper hair and a big mustache sitting on the curb next to her with his face in his hands.
“Mm-hm,” he said, noncommittal. His eyes traced over her face and neck, her arms, and he even peeled back the blankets to inspect her legs. “Where are you hurt?”
“I have whiplash in my neck and shoulders. The seat belt did more damage than anything.” I’m mostly worried you’ll never forgive me when you see what I let happen to your car.
“Jesus.” He traced a finger very lightly over the angry red line cutting across her clavicle. “They keeping you here?”
Clara shivered, but not from pain. Somehow his gentle handling wrought more havoc on her heart than any of their previous flagrant gyrating.
“No. They’ve run all the tests and everything came back clear.” These touches probably meant nothing to him, but Clara had once spent thirty minutes convinced that letting her thigh touch a boy’s at the movie theater equated to a steamy moment of intimacy. “Last thing I heard they were processing discharge papers. How did you even know where to find me?”
Josh stepped back and took his hands with him. “The police called me. My name is on the car’s registration. Don’t worry, I told them I’d given you the all clear to borrow the car, so you’re not in trouble.” He looked at his shoes. “I wish you had called me. Lance had too much to drink at the bar last night so I crashed on his couch to make sure he was all right. If I’d known you needed help, I would’ve come home sooner.”
Clara sank back into her pillows. “I panicked. I wanted to call you, but I thought you’d be mad.”
“Why don’t they put any chairs in here? Scoot over, would ya?” His tall frame filled the space she’d made for him and then some. “I am mad, you little jerk. You scared the crap out of me. I got home and the car was gone. No note. Nothing.” He shook his head. “I went wild. I thought someone stole it and I didn’t know if you’d been home at the time. If they’d tried to hurt you.”
Josh reached up and pushed her hair off her forehead. His eyes searched hers.
“You shouldn’t have borrowed the car without asking me. But if you thought for one second something like that would have stopped me from coming for you when you needed me . . .” He gave her a smile sexy enough to take out a whole legion of nurses. “Well, then you’re not as smart as you think you are.”
She brought her hand to her heart, hoping in vain to prevent it from escaping the cage of her body. “I’m still sorry. You have no idea how sorry. I took the car because I didn’t want to let Jill and Toni down.”
She folded her hands in her lap. “I’m not trying to excuse myself. There’s no excuse for what I did, but I thought you deserved to know why. I make myself really sick over not meeting other people’s expectations.” Clara released a hollow laugh. “But even when I try, I still end up hurting people. I’m really sorry that this time you were one of them.”
“Clara.” Josh tilted her chin until she met his eyes. “What you’re talking about? That kind of perfection? It’s impossible. You’re never gonna please everybody. Don’t get me wrong. You’re good, but nobody’s that good.”
Clara pressed her face into his chest, so he wouldn’t see the return of her embarrassing tears. He smelled sweet, like powdered sugar. “Did you buy donuts again?”
He rested his chin on top of her head. “What, are you a bloodhound? Yes, okay, I got you a ‘get well’ donut when I picked up the flowers, but the traffic on the way over was terrible and I had to eat it. For sustenance. It was an emergency.”
“I deserve that,” Clara said, trying to hide the amusement in her voice.
“You did crash my Corvette.”
“Very true.”
“You wanna know how I got that car?” He took her hand in his, drawing little circles over her knuckles with his thumb.
“Is this story going to make me feel better or worse?”
“Well, it belonged to my grandfather.”
“I wrecked a family heirloom? Seriously?”
“No. No, listen. I’m not done. Here. Drink this water.” Josh thrust the plastic cup from her nightstand into her hand.
“So my granddad bought the ’Vette back in 1976. Called it his midlife crisis car. Anyway, he loved it. All through my childhood, I have these memories of him waxing and buffing the thing. My grandmother said he wanted an excuse to stand next to it.”
Josh tucked the blanket carefully back around her legs from where it had slipped.
“Anyways, when I was old enough to drive there was no way in hell my parents could afford to buy me a car. Not a single fucking chance.” He accentuated the story with wild hand gestures. “But I got home one day after school and there was my grandfather with the Corvette parked in the driveway, holding out the keys.”
Clara warmed at the animation in Josh’s face.
“I couldn’t believe it. I told him I couldn’t accept it. Even though it was a total babe magnet, I knew how much he loved that car. But he looked me in the eye and said, ‘Take it. Please. Giving her to you, making you happy, feels better than the day I got her.’”
Josh took her empty water cup and returned it to the table. “For me, that car has always represented the idea that people are more important than things. Even things you love. Watching you driving this summer, conquering your fear, hell, even imagining you gathering your courage to start that engine by yourself this morning . . .” He looked up, catching her eye. “Somehow, i
t feels better than the day I got her.”
“That’s a really good story.”
Josh shifted so he could lean back against her pillows and gingerly put his arm around her shoulders. “Thanks, I thought so.”
“Josh, how am I ever going to make this up to you?”
“I wouldn’t worry about it, Wheaton,” he whispered, pressing his lips against her temple. “You look extremely goofy in that hospital gown and it’s going a long way.”
chapter twenty-four
OW . . . OWWW . . . OW . . . OW!”
Josh could hear Clara alternately yelping and whimpering through the bathroom door where she’d locked herself after insisting she could manage to shower alone despite her whiplash. The doctor had agreed to discharge her with the recommendation that she rest and take ibuprofen twice a day until the pain subsided.
Clara refused to acknowledge that maintaining her stringent daily routine now included unexpected challenges.
He leaned his face against the cheap plywood separating them. He’d been standing outside the bathroom for fifteen minutes since she’d gone in, in case she fell or something and he needed to break down the door. “For Christ’s sake, Clara, let me help you.”
So far she had spent the morning waddling around like a lost duckling. From his perch at the kitchen counter, he watched her putter into the living room, sigh dramatically, and turn around. A few minutes later she wandered into the kitchen and opened the fridge before seeming to decide it was all too much effort and settling for handfuls of dry cereal out of the box. His dry cereal.
He offered to make her scrambled eggs or grilled cheese, his two specialties, but she told him she didn’t deserve warm food after the mechanic said the ’Vette would be out of commission for at least a week.
She was acting like doing one bad thing could never be absolved, and it was getting on his nerves. Only someone who had never done anything wrong before would think borrowing a car deserved this level of self-flagellation.
He broke down and used the stupid three-knock system to request entry, browbeaten enough to employ her ridiculous household rule.
“Absolutely not,” she shouted over the noise of the shower.
“Clara, this is next-level crazy, even for you. The doctor said you shouldn’t raise your arms above your waist until the whiplash subsides. That’s half your body. I’m the one who has to be around you all the time. If you stink, it’s my nose that suffers.”
The sound of the water abruptly cut out. “But you’ll see me naked. Again. It breaks the guidelines for harmonious cohabitation.”
“I saw at least twenty naked bodies this week alone shooting for the website and nothing happened.” It was an occupational hazard. Years of on- and off-camera escapades had dulled his sexual senses. Even though they had worked with gorgeous women every day over the last few weeks it was like he was wearing earmuffs or dirty glasses during filming; nothing penetrated.
“I cannot express enough how your bruised and battered form is not going to send me into a sexual tailspin. This is all very simple. You’re hurt. You smell. Let me in there. It’ll be so impersonal you’ll think you ran through a car wash.”
A moment later, Clara opened the door, holding a towel around herself with one hand.
The tiny bathroom was easily ten degrees hotter than the hallway and full of steam. He blinked a few times to clear his vision. The combined effect of the environment and the sight of Clara with damp hair, her skin beaded with water was . . . arresting.
“Holy shit.” Her cleavage made him see stars.
Clara pulled the towel tighter around her breasts. He didn’t have the heart to tell her that the harder she pulled the material, the more he wanted to drown in the valley between her luscious tits.
Okay. So he might have miscalculated. Turned out he wasn’t totally immune. He’d forgotten that being on set meant lots of people, working and talking and eating. It meant cameras and lights and costumes and makeup and other signals of artifice.
The intimacy of seeing Clara in such a small, heated space made him want to peel off that towel and lick every inch of her.
Fuck.
“I’m sorry,” he said, turning away from her to pull himself together. He was probably scaring her. She’s wounded, you asshole. She needs help, not you slobbering all over her.
He closed his eyes and thought about sitting in traffic.
He thought about getting his teeth cleaned. Sitting in traffic while getting his teeth cleaned. There we go. That did it.
He turned back around to find her with a drop of water running down the slope of her nose. His heart squeezed.
“Sorry,” he said again around his thick tongue. “Overestimated my own endurance.”
“What do you mean?” Her fragile voice broke through his lust stupor, at least for a moment.
He finally took in the blue and purple splotches blooming on her neck. He straightened his shoulders with renewed resolve to take care of her. “Just that I should have prepared myself more before I came in so that I could help you without sporting a rampant erection.”
Clara’s eyes wandered to his groin at his words. When she licked her top lip, the tiny gesture made him almost double over.
“Jesus fucking Christ.” Traffic. Dentist. Grandma Pearl.
Clara’s eyes widened. “I’m sorry. I didn’t see anything. Honest.” She kept her eyes firmly trained on the sink behind him.
“Let’s get you clean.” He remembered he was going to have to get in the shower with her. Naked. The guidelines did not cover this shit.
Clara seemed to have come to the same conclusion because she’d directed her gaze to the tile floor.
“We don’t have to do this,” he said, taking the coward’s way out. “I could call Jill.” Yes, Jill. Her aunt wouldn’t be in danger of coming in her pants over Clara’s convalescing body.
Clara’s wet hair dripped into a little puddle at their feet. “It’s fine. I’m fine. Are you fine?”
“Yep.” Josh swallowed twice. “Fine.”
She’s just a naked woman. Just another naked woman. Seen one, you’ve seen ’em all. No big deal.
He ripped off his T-shirt like a Band-Aid. If he lingered in the act of undressing, his cock would continue to get the wrong idea. As he reached for the zipper of his jeans he made the colossal mistake of looking at Clara. The spark in her eyes, the hunger that she didn’t know how to hide made his hands shake.
This is how I die.
He left his briefs on.
They would be clingy and uncomfortable once they got wet, but even that thin layer of cotton felt like a shield against the siren song emitting from Clara’s skin.
He turned the knob to restart the hot water, holding his hand under the spray until it was warm enough to step inside the glass doors. “Ready?”
She held on to the towel for another long moment but then gave him a tiny nod and released it, draping the material over a hook by the sink before reaching for the hand he offered to help her step inside. There was about a foot of space in front of him for her to slide into.
Have mercy. He’d thought he’d be safe back here, out of the direct line of sight of her tits, but the sweet dip of her waist into her perfect peach of an ass was almost worse. Especially considering there was now only about four inches between his cotton-covered cock and her soft, slippery body.
When she turned to look at him over her shoulder, probably because he was breathing like an asthmatic, he ground out, “Turn around.”
He hadn’t meant for it to come out a gruff command, but he’d never get through this if he had to make eye contact with her.
Josh needed to unlearn his entire persona. Over the years he’d honed God-given charisma into a finely crafted weapon. He’d wielded his charm without thought for so long that Josh Darling became a natural extension of
him, as unconscious as breathing. But he couldn’t risk flirting with Clara, not now that he knew he might be falling for her.
He picked up her floral shampoo and poured some into his hand. Her head was a safe place to start. Nothing erotic about her hair. Besides how silky it felt.
“Close your eyes.” The words felt jagged in his throat. He massaged his fingers across her temples with quick, efficient movements.
But Clara didn’t play fair. She tipped her head back ever so slightly into his hands. He found himself slowing down, watching as her mouth fell open a little when he applied the right amount of pressure. She made tiny noises, breathy little moans, and he didn’t know if they were signals of pleasure or pain.
“Is this okay?”
Clara bit her lip and nodded.
What was happening to him? He felt insane. Hadn’t he done things fifty times filthier than this with five times as many women involved? Why was he falling to pieces over washing the hair of a pocket-sized WASP?
He kept his hands moving, down to the base of her skull, where he pressed in with his thumbs, making her gasp. It was becoming impossible to remember that this wasn’t supposed to be foreplay, especially when he could easily see her puckered nipples over her shoulder.
After what felt like a million years strung up on a rack, it was time to rinse the suds from her scalp. He guided her under the spray of the shower, avoiding any unnecessary touching. He received a brief reprieve when the water ran clear . . . before he realized he still had ninety percent of her body to cover.
“Just gonna keep washing.” He broadcast his mission for both of their sakes.
“Okay,” Clara said, but kept her eyes closed. Probably so she could pretend this wasn’t happening.
He picked up her body wash next, his eyes lingering on her lime green loofah. But as much as he knew he should, Josh couldn’t bring himself to give up direct contact with her skin. The cool liquid heated quickly in his palm. Clara was so much smaller than him. He’d have to kneel to reach the bottom half of her.