Sitting behind him on his bike, she held onto the rear grab handles in a death grip, determined not to lean into his back. She couldn’t risk any more body contact with him. Not if she wanted to keep her sanity. And dignity.
All it would take was the feel of his strong muscled back pressing to her breasts and she would be gone.
So she clung to the Ducati’s rear handles, anchored her weight to the pillion-passenger seat with her inner thighs and prayed for a smooth, red-light-free journey.
What was only a twenty-five-minute trip felt more like a lifetime of exquisite torture, her body thrumming with sexual need, the powerful vibrations from the motorcycle between her spread legs sinking into her already stimulated clit. By the time they pulled into the hospital’s parking area, she was damn near on the cusp of an orgasm.
She practically threw herself from Aslin’s bike, her pussy throbbing, her pulse pounding, her nipples so hard they hurt.
Thank God Chris was waiting for her in the ER. If it weren’t for that simple fact, she’d probably do something completely stupid like beg Aslin to fuck her there and then.
Again.
She didn’t bother to slow down as she hurried toward the hospital’s access elevator. Nor did she check if Aslin was following her. He was. She not only heard his footfalls behind her on the concrete—long strides that echoed around the underground parking area like a slow tattoo—she felt his gaze on her back. Steady. Direct.
Intense.
It made her pussy squeeze. Damn it.
A childish part of her wanted to break into a sprint, dash to the elevator door and get inside before Aslin could join her. It would be easier than standing in the small, confined space with him.
She didn’t know what unsettled her more, the way her stupid body was behaving around him, or that he hadn’t tried to broach the subject of what had occurred in the alley between them before Chris called.
Either was bad enough.
For Christ’s sake, woman. Control yourself.
Easier thought than done, especially when his hard, tall body brushed against her back, his oh-so-perfectly muscled arm extended past her and his index finger depressed the elevator button just as she was about to jab at it.
She sucked in a sharp breath.
Control. She needed to find her control. And her focus. Her brother had called for help. That’s what she needed to concentrate on, not Rhodes and his sexy-assed muscles, sexy-assed accent and sexy-assed…everything else.
It wasn’t until the door closed, imprisoning them both in the small metal space, that she realized she was still holding her breath. Or maybe it was when Aslin moved with silent speed to stand directly in front of her, both hands pressing to the wall behind her head, his intense dark stare capturing her.
“This isn’t finished, Rowan.” His British accent sent shards of wet tension into her sex. “So don’t think it is.”
She swallowed, the pit of her belly a churning, twisting mess that had nothing to do with the elevator’s rapid ascent to the ER level. “W-what isn’t?”
His nostrils flared. “What started in the alley. It’s not finished.”
Before she could respond, the elevator bounced to a halt, a soft chime screamed through the heavy silence and the door slid open with a clunking jolt.
The smell hit Rowan first—the stinging odor of disinfectant. She stiffened, the memory of the night her parents were killed slamming into her like a fist. Five hours waiting in the ER after the break and enter that changed her and Chris’s lives, covered in her mother’s blood as the doctors tried to save the unsavable, Chris sitting beside her, shell-shocked, a cop doing his best to get answers from Rowan that weren’t coming—who did it, what they looked like, how it happened.
Aslin’s stare on her face narrowed. For a heartbeat. And then he turned and, with a gentle pressure she didn’t realize she wanted until it was there, smoothed his hand to the small of her back and walked them from the elevator into the ER’s waiting rooms.
“Hey, is that Nick Blackthorne’s bodyguard?”
Aslin’s hand grew firm on her back at the muttered question, a second before a blinding flash detonated to Rowan’s right. And another. Rowan flinched. Which was stupid given how many times she’s been photographed while out with Chris.
“Enough,” a female voice ripe with contempt rose over the sounds of the crowded floor. “I told you scavengers to bugger off already. Stay and I’ll order colonoscopies for the lot of you.”
Rowan jerked her attention toward the nurse storming toward her and Aslin, her mouth falling open. Now there was an intimidating woman. Five eight plus, one hundred and seventy pounds at least, and scowling like a grizzly with a sore tooth.