The Private Serials Box Set(23)

Eventually, he did turn his head toward me, my face still pushed deep into his fluffy pillows.

"Are you okay?" he asked quietly.

"Mmmhmmm," was my response.

"Lena, please, I need some actual words."

I groaned, but then lifted my head from his heavenly pillow and stated,  "I'm fantastic, thank you." Then I plopped my head back down and enjoyed  the afterglow. He chuckled, but then there was silence and I settled in  again.

After a few minutes, the bed shifted and I watched as Preston walked his  naked self into his attached bathroom. Luckily for me, I didn't have to  move my head at all to watch his entire trip as his gloriously chiseled  body gracefully left me. He was exactly what God had envisioned when he  created man; I was sure of it. Every muscle moved in accordance with  the others; long and lean muscles in his legs complemented the bulkier  muscles in his chest and arms. I knew I'd never be able to look at him  in his leather jacket and jeans again without picturing him like this,  naked and strutting through his house.

Then I was treated to the front view when he came back out and walked to  me. I swallowed hard and tried not to stare, but the man was so  goddamned beautiful. He stopped at the edge of the bed and leaned down,  placing both hands on the mattress.

"Wanna shower with me?"

I lifted my head once more from the pillow and felt my hair fall in a  mess around my face. "I would love to shower with you, but I'm afraid  I'm not ready to walk yet. So, go on without me." Just after I'd  dramatically flopped my head down onto my pillow once more, I yelped as I  felt his arms slide under me, flip me over, and then lift me from the  soft heaven that was his mattress. I squealed as I wrapped my arms  around his neck.

He walked to the bathroom, carrying me in his arms, a stupidly handsome  smile across his face. He plunked me down in the shower, which was the  most gorgeous walk-in shower I'd ever seen, right in the middle of a  steaming hot stream of water. It was even more heavenly than his  mattress.

I sighed as I let the water run over me and moved to wet my hair, closing my eyes, enjoying the moment.

"This is like every wet dream I've ever had combined into one."

I opened my eyes. Preston was obviously ogling me, watching every part  of my body as the water cascaded over it. Then he moved into me, his  arms coming to rest at my hips, and his mouth moving in toward mine. He  kissed me gently, the beast I'd met earlier that morning apparently  sleeping. This Preston was warm, sweet, and tender. If someone forced me  to pick which Preston I liked better, I'd never be able to choose. Each  one was sexy in their own right.

We kissed in the shower until I was wrinkled and then he washed me.  Neither one of us tried anything besides stealing a couple of kisses,  which I was thankful for. I didn't think I could take another round with  him if the beast made an encore appearance. I wasn't too tired,  however, to take in his glorious form as he rinsed the shampoo from his  hair. Everything I'd admired about him the night before and even this  morning, was only magnified and amplified by the water. The man looked  good wet.

He led me out of the shower and handed me a towel.

"Is everything you own soft and fluffy?" I asked as I wrapped the towel  around my shoulders. It might have been the softest towel I'd ever felt.

He chuckled. "I hope not."

"Seriously. Your pillows are like clouds and your mattress is the most  comfortable one I've ever been on. And now the towels." I looked at him  and smiled. "You like nice things." My smile grew wider at my  realization. I thought about it for a moment and then other things  started popping into my mind. His car-perhaps the nicest car I'd ever  seen. His fancy leather jacket. The scotch. It all made sense. What  single, thirty-something man had towels this nice? I brought it up to my  nose and grinned when I smelled the fabric softener. He either hired  someone who furnished his house with nice things and a maid who used  fabric softener, or he totally enjoyed all this stuff. "Did you buy  these towels? And the pillows?"

"Yeah," he said, wiping his towel through his hair, flinging water droplets everywhere.

"So, it's true. You like nice things?"

He thought about it for a moment. Then he shrugged. "I guess. Who wants scratchy towels?"

I shrugged back at him, smiling. Walking back into the bedroom, I looked  around for my clothes, trying to remember which way they had been flung  the night before.

"What are you looking for?" Preston asked as he walked back to the bed and climbed in.

"My clothes," I said as I walked around his bed.

"No clothes. Today, we lay around like naked, lazy people." He threw the  comforter down, opening up the side of the bed he wasn't in, and then  nodded me toward it.

"You want to spend an entire day naked in bed?" I didn't move from my  spot, feet away from the bed. I knew if I got in I probably wouldn't get  back out.

"Give me one good reason why not?"

"Well, I should go home, for one." I watched as his smile fell away and the muscle in the side of his jaw tightened.

"You're not going home. There's no reason for you to be there."

"It's my home. And Derrek is probably already wondering where I am."

"He's not," he said firmly.

"Preston," I tried to reason with him.

"I want you here, with me. Fuck, Lena. I was inside you not two hours  ago and now you're just going to go running back to that life where  you're unhappy and unsafe?"

"I'm not unsafe and Derrek can't know that I didn't go home last-"

"HE DOESN'T CARE IF YOU CAME HOME OR NOT, LENA!" Preston was out of his  bed and yelling as he stalked toward me. "He couldn't care less what you  do or whether you slept in your bed last night. He. Doesn't. Care. But  don't let me stop you from running home to him." He was right in front  of me, loud and angry, but I didn't feel threatened by his outburst. I  was, however, confused by this new Preston.

"I'm not running home to him. I'm simply trying to manage the situation.  You know what's at stake for me, Preston. You and me. We're the only  ones who know what happens if he finds out I've been with you. But the  only person it will affect is me. I thought we were on the same team."

"This isn't a team. This is some sick and fucked-up game you signed up for seven years ago that you can't imagine not winning."

"What would you do if you were me, huh? You'd let your wife fuck some  other guy and then walk away with nothing? I highly doubt it. I didn't  sign up for this. I was forced to play this game, and I'll be damned if  your ego is going to cause me to start my life over from scratch. I'm  entitled to what's mine."         

     



 

"And what about me? Aren't I entitled to what's mine?" He closed the  distance between us and his strong hands wrapped around my shoulders as  he hauled me to his chest. "You're mine, remember?" He brought his face  so close to mine our noses lightly touched. "You made that decision. You  gave yourself to me, and now you're mine and I'll be damned if I let  what's mine walk out the door."

In the matter of a millisecond, his lips were on mine and my hands were  on his chest, trying to push him away, but one of his hands wrapped  around my waist and the other cupped my cheek and even though the kiss  started urgently, it melted slowly into desperation.

His hands pulled at me as if he was afraid I was going to float away. So  I did the only thing I could think of and held on to him. I held on to  him just as hard as he held on to me and eventually we found ourselves  in that bed again, only this time we weren't fucking each other, or even  having sex; I was simply letting him hold me.

I fell asleep on top of him, still naked, only covered by the soft blanket, one of his hands cupped around the back of my neck.



I woke up to his kiss pressed against my forehead.

"Hey," he whispered when my eyes looked up to his.

"Hey," I said, laying both my hands on his chest under my chin. "Are you still mad at me?"

"I was never mad at you," he said as he tucked a lock of wayward hair behind my ear.

"Well, all the yelling gave me a different impression."

His eyes bored into mine for a moment and then he sighed heavily.  "Listen, I didn't mean to snap like that. I've just watched him ignore  you, treat you poorly, undervalue you, and when you were just going to  walk out to go back to him, well, it rubbed me the wrong way. I'm sorry.  I shouldn't have yelled and I definitely shouldn't have yelled at you,  but I couldn't let you leave."

"I wasn't going back to him. Nothing about my marriage has changed in  the last twenty-four hours, Preston, but I am still married and I can't  let him know what's happened."

"He's not at your house. He didn't go back to your house last night, either. Your alibi is still intact."

"Maybe I should hire someone else to handle the investigation," I said  softly. I watched as that muscle in his jaw started twitching, and I  braced myself for angry Preston again.