by Jill Shalvis
And two—holy shit—he realized she was completely, totally, one hundred percent naked beneath the layer of blankets.
And pissed. “Y-y-your pants!” she gasped. “Th-th-they’re c-c-cold!”
“Sorry, but I’m trying to do the right thing here,” he said through clenched teeth. He couldn’t see a thing below her neck, but he could sure as hell feel her. His hands were on her hip and low on her back, respectively, not touching anything he shouldn’t be, but damn she was soft, and at the feel of her, his brain clicked off. Just completely flatlined.
“I’m n-n-naked,” she snapped.
And oh, how well he knew it. He was pretty sure her nipples were boring holes in his chest. Just thinking about it had him warming up considerably. In fact, he might be starting to sweat. It’d been a while, but he was pretty sure he remembered nipples being one of his favorite parts of a woman’s body—
She gave him a shove.
“Sorry,” he said. “But you don’t want me to go away. I’m the one making you warm.”
“N-n-not what I m-m-mean,” she said. “Y-y-you have to be n-n-naked too!”
He stared at her. “That’s a really bad idea.”
“You w-w-want me to freak out?” she asked. “No? Then s-s-strip, Donovan.”
Bossy thing, wasn’t she.
“N-n-now,” she added, eyes sparking.
Yeah, bossy. And he liked it. “Whatever you say.” Still covered by the blankets, he shucked out of his pants—feeling more than just a twinge of pain in his shoulder now, something he ignored—and kicked the material away. “Better?”
“Are y-y-you…smiling?” she asked in disbelief.
He didn’t even try to hide it. “A beautiful woman just ordered me to strip,” he said. “But not because she wants my body. It’s funny, so yeah, I’m smiling.”
“Oh p-p-please,” she scoffed, and surprised the hell out of him by leaning in and carefully dabbing at the cut on his temple with the edge of a towel. “I’ve s-s-seen you and your partners,” she said, eyeing the cut and apparently deciding he was going to live. “You’re all l-l-listed on Lucky Harbor’s Tumblr as some of the hottest guys in t-t-town,” she said in a tone that didn’t suggest she was all that impressed by the dubious title. “I know you’ve got to have game.”
Seemed he wasn’t the only one warming up—her teeth were rattling less and less.
“You could probably turn a woman’s head with a single crook of your finger,” she muttered, rolling the towel to get to a clean spot to press against his temple.
He didn’t just smile now, he out-and-out laughed.
“What’s so funny now?”
“I was the runt all the way through high school. Small and skinny, and sickly too, even ending up in the hospital annually for strep and pneumonia. I’ve never crooked my finger at a woman in my life, though that’s definitely a skill I wouldn’t mind acquiring.” Luckily, in his senior year, he’d finally had his tonsils removed, and in the next year he’d grown eight full inches and gained fifty pounds of muscle, which had come in handy when he’d been working on the oil rigs. Unfortunately, there hadn’t been a lot of women on those rigs.
In fact, there’d been a total of three.
Given the odds—eighty-five guys to three women—Cole had done pretty well for himself, considering. But that was then.
He, Sam, and Tanner had come back to Lucky Harbor after the rig fire, having lost Gil. And in the time since losing his best friend, and then his father last year as well, he hadn’t had much game at all.
Correction. He’d had no game. “If I could turn a woman’s head that easily,” he said, “you’d be doing something other than dabbing the cut on my forehead.”
She went still for a beat, her eyes wide on his. He had no idea what was in her head, but he knew what was in his—the feel of the soft, curvy body practically in his lap.
And he nearly choked when she lifted the blanket and took a peek at him. “What the hell—”
She raised her gaze to his. “You left your underwear on.”
“Yes,” he said.
“But you told me to strip, and I did.”
“I didn’t say strip everything,” he said. “It never occurred to me that you’d lose the undies. Hot as they are.”
They both stared at the black lace lying innocuously on the floor. She flushed and lifted her chin. “Well, there’s only one thing to do now,” she said.
“What?”
“You have to do the same.”
“Excuse me?” he asked.
“Drop the boxers.”
He stared at her. “Tell me the truth. You hit your head, too, right?”
“No. And I’m not kidding,” she said, jabbing him in the chest with a finger. “Lose ’em, or a freakout of epic proportions will commence in three. Two. One—”
“Jesus, hang on.” He worked at shedding his boxers, doing his best to keep covered by the blanket. “I can’t believe you looked after I promised not to look at you—”
“Yes, well, one of us isn’t a gentleman, now are we?” she asked.
A short laugh escaped him, which he cut off when she—holy shit—lifted the blanket and peeked again.
Grabbing the blankets like a virgin at a frat sleepover, he swore. “Jesus, woman!”
“Just making sure,” she said.
“Sure of what?”
Looking pretty damn pleased with herself, she laughed.
And damn, she had a smile on her. Mischievous and full of secrets, but still contagious. “Okay,” he said. “I like that look on your face much better than the abject misery you were wearing, but didn’t anyone ever tell you not to look at a naked man and laugh?”
She just laughed again, the sound soft and musical and somehow both sexy and sweet at the same time.
He sighed. “At least you’re warming up.”
“A little,” she allowed.
“Maybe I should peek to make sure.” Teasing, he made to lift the blankets.
With a squeak, she fisted them tight to her chest. “Don’t you dare!”
“Uh-huh. What’s good for the goose and all that.” All he could see of her over the pile of blankets was her face, those fathomless eyes, and all that wet, dark hair. She smelled like ocean and sexy woman—his favorite scent—and he was suddenly struck by how beautiful she was.
Oh shit, Donovan, don’t go there…
“Cole?”
He had to clear his throat twice to answer. “Yeah?”
“I really need my phone—it’s on the dock where I dropped it. Hopefully. But I’m still cold.”
Still staring into her eyes, he pulled her tighter into him, and at the feel of her soft curves, his body gave up the valiant fight and tightened.
Some parts more than others.
He immediately began to work complicated calculus problems in his head, trying to remember the definition of the derivative of the function—
She pressed her icy feet against his calves, and he yelped like one of his sisters.
She laughed again, and he immediately lost track of calculus. All he could feel was her frozen limbs. Rubbing her arms to warm her up, he forced himself not to think about what she might look like under the blanket.
He failed miserably, which meant he was hard as a rock and buck-ass nekkid. And worse, she had to feel it pressing into her hip. He tried to pull back, but she made a soft, disagreeable sound and tightened her grip on him.
“You’re not warm yet?” he asked in a voice so low as to be almost inaudible.
He couldn’t help it. He didn’t have enough blood to run both heads. And on top of that, their bodies were melded together in a way that had him heated up and aching to lay her flat on her back on the bench and—
“You’re really warm,” she whispered.
Try hot as hell, babe. “I’ll go get your phone,” he said valiantly. “And something hot for you to drink.” Coffee, tea…me.
“Uh…” She shifted, bumping a bare th
igh right into his erection.
He hissed out a breath as his hips gave an entirely instinctive roll to get closer. Christ. And there, perfect, now she was back to staring at him.
“You’re…” She broke off. “Um.”
“Yeah.” He was “um” all right. “Involuntary reaction,” he promised. “Just ignore it.”
“But—”
“Seriously. Don’t give it another thought.” He went to shrug and had to bite back a grimace thanks to the pain in his shoulder. “Drink?” he asked again.
She bit her lower lip and nodded. “Tea, please.”
Tea for her, and never mind that it was the crack of dawn, he’d take a vodka, straight up. He grabbed a towel for coverage and worked at not further revealing himself, which involved gymnastics that should have won him a medal.
Olivia was smiling by the time he got all wrapped up. “I’ve already seen it all,” she reminded him.
“I really wish you’d stop smiling when you say that.” Shaking his head when her smile only widened, he moved up the stairs to go retrieve her phone for her, the irony that she was now amused instead of disgruntled—and he was disgruntled instead of amused—not escaping him.
Chapter 3
Olivia watched Cole go, nothing but a towel low on his hips, the muscles in his back all taut and delineated—and perfect. He moved like an athlete, with easy, economical, and innately testosterone-fueled grace—
Her smile faded as he rolled a broad shoulder, his other hand settling on it to rub absently as if it ached.
He’d been hurt. Which meant she wasn’t the only one of them good at deflecting attention away from herself.
Not that this surprised her. There was a sharp intelligence in Cole’s eyes, which went along with his healthy survival instinct.
Damn. She still couldn’t believe what had just happened. She’d been out for an early walk on the dock when she’d seen a guy in a knit cap, sweatshirt, and cargo pants hit the water and go under. And yeah, she’d mistakenly assumed he’d needed help and had jumped in after him to try to save him. So what? It meant that she still had a heart, that she could indeed care about someone other than herself.
And that was a good thing. A relief, to be honest. But she was feeling pretty damn naked about now.
Oh, that’s right. She was naked.
At least Cole was in the same boat. His wet clothes were still lying at her feet, mixed in with hers, which gave the situation an air of intimacy that she could have done without.
As if being bare as on the day she’d been born didn’t do that all on its own.
She nudged the clothes with a foot and curled in on herself a little. Having spent her formative years on a TV set where assistants and dressers had tugged and pulled at her nonstop, she’d long ago lost her modesty in urgent situations. Cole had said strip, and she’d done so.
But at the memory of his shock when he’d realized she’d stripped to her birthday suit, her face flamed all over again.
Cole came back in less than a minute, handing over her phone.
“Thanks,” she said, and thumbed the screen to activate it. Four missed texts, three from her mom, and though they hadn’t actually spoken in weeks, her mom got right to the point.
TV Land called. Again. They need your commitment to do the retrospective show, and there’s talk of a spin-off series where they’d want your voice-over!!!
And then, time-stamped only two minutes later:
Hello??? Sharlyn?? This is the big break we’ve been waiting for…
First, Olivia really hated it when her mom called her Sharlyn. She knew Olivia had changed it years ago. And second—we? No. It was the break her mother had been waiting for. Olivia didn’t want a break. She’d had her one and only break when Not Again, Hailey! had been canceled shortly after her sixteenth birthday. Yes, she’d gone on to have a meltdown of epic proportions. Britney Spears and Miley Cyrus had nothing on her; hence the name change from Sharlyn Peterson to Olivia Bentley.
She’d come out on the other side a long time ago and now lived a normal life. Or at least as normal a life as she could have ever wished for.
And she loved it.
She loved it so much she was willing to lie to everyone she met to keep it.
And had.
The third text wasn’t any more a surprise than the first two.
Remember I spent my 17th bday in the bathroom @ my high school graduation kegger party having you Sharlyn—you owe me.
No, her mother hadn’t exactly been the classic mom-manager, but it wasn’t as if being a teenage mom from a farm in Kentucky had exactly prepared her for Hollywood.
The fourth and last text was from Jolyn, Olivia’s older sister by eleven months.
Fair warning, she wants her boobs done again.
“What’s wrong?”
Olivia jumped and set her phone down on the bench away from her.
Cole studied her for a beat, and she took the opportunity to do the same. He had glossy brown hair gone wild thanks to their impromptu swim. He was also sporting at least two days’ worth of scruff on a square jaw, and his ready smile was devastatingly contagious. And then there were his eyes, ocean blue and deep and…mesmerizing. They held as many secrets as hers did.
Clearing her throat, she shook her head. “Nothing’s wrong,” she said. Or everything, take your pick.
“Nothing’s why you’re frowning at your phone like you wish it’d gone into the drink along with your keys?” he asked with a healthy dose of get real in his tone.
Olivia shrugged and pulled the blanket in tighter around herself with a shiver.
Swearing softly, he covered her with two more blankets, pressing the wool closer against her, his hands thorough but carefully respectful.
And damn, she missed his body heat.
Apparently not versed in reading a woman’s mind, Cole moved to the stove in the kitchen. Galley, Olivia corrected. On a boat, it was called a galley. And it was a damn fine one, too. In fact, the entire boat was nice. Beautiful wood accents and cabinetry, state-of-the-art interior and electronics. It was huge, and extremely well taken care of.
“What were you doing on the dock so early?” he asked.
“Just walking.”
“At five thirty in the morning?” he asked.
“Best time to go.” She’d moved to Lucky Harbor about a year ago and had taken over the vintage shop from a proprietor who’d run it into the ground. Olivia had wanted to come here since she’d been a child and her on-set tutor, Mrs. Henderson, had told her about growing up in idyllic, quirky, beautiful Lucky Harbor. Olivia had turned Unique Boutique around, babying the place back to life. It was a love affair for her, making the old valuable in a new way, and for the first time in her life, she was proud of her occupation.
She didn’t open up for business until ten, but her body’s inner