“I don’t have your faith.”
“Then you don’t know me very well,” she said.
I know you made these little helpless, broken noises when you came, he thought. I know you clutched me hard, like you were drowning and I was the only thing that could save you. I know how good it was to see you lose control and how good it feels to see you put back together again. The rest of the world only sees you like this, all polished and primped and presentable, but I saw you.
“I guess I don’t,” he said.
She held out the two shopping bags to him.
He took one in each hand. “This doesn’t do much for my masculinity, either.”
“Looks great on you. Very metro.”
The words didn’t matter. It was the sideways tilt of her head as she considered him, the appraisal in her eyes, that made his stomach tighten and his cock grow heavy.
“Come on,” she said.
“Where are we going?” he asked, though he would have followed her anywhere at that point.
“Socks and underwear?”
“I don’t need socks and underwear.”
“Your socks have holes in them.”
“Who cares?”
“I care.”
She was talking about his underclothes, and his stupid heart should know better than to speed up as if she’d made a confession. “I don’t need underwear,” he said. Because he couldn’t bring himself to say, I didn’t ask you to care.
“Does your underwear have holes in it?”
“If you want to know the answer to that, you’re going to have to do independent research.”
He watched with pleasure as color rose in her cheeks.
“Don’t do that,” she said.
“Do what?”
“Flirt with me.” She hurried ahead of him.
In the men’s accessories department, she was all business, piling pairs of socks and packages of undershirts and T-shirts in his arms. “I don’t wear boxer briefs,” he said.
“Now you do,” she said.
“Why is that?”
She didn’t answer. He decided that if being physical with her was off limits, he was going to cause her to blush a hundred times a day. He was going to make her miss what she’d decided it was impossible for them to have. He was going to go home knowing he’d left her wet and frustrated. If that made him a bad man, he wasn’t the least bit sorry for it right now. “Because you like them?”
She turned away. “Don’t wear the ones with holes anymore.”
“I don’t have ones with holes.”
She glared him into submission. Even that was hot. He was losing his mind.
“Okay, maybe a few with holes.”