Muscle for Hire(24)

Rowan let out a sigh. “I wasn’t ready for this. It’s a problem I’m not prepared for, and I don’t know what to do next.”

“Fuck me,” Aslin growled. “And let me fuck you. Simple.”

She chuckled. “Not simple at all. And I can see through your bluster, soldier boy. You’re as freaked out by this whole thing as I am.”

His gut knotted. That she could read him so well already should have angered him. It didn’t. It only highlighted exactly what she was saying—what was between them had the potential to be so much more than sex. And he could tell it scared her.

And it doesn’t you?

“Rowan,” he began, but she shook her head and took a step backward, hugging his helmet to her breasts. “Goodnight, Rhodes. I’ll see you tomorrow on set.”

And before he could utter another word, she turned and strode through the hotel’s glass doors and into the foyer.

Leaving Aslin to watch her go.





Chapter Six

Fifty laps of the hotel’s swimming pool hadn’t helped her. Working out in the hotel’s twenty-four-hour gym hadn’t either. Masturbating in the shower had achieved fuck all and consuming ice-cream sundaes smothered in hot chocolate fudge sauce from room service while watching in-house movies back to back did little but make her feel guilty for charging so much to Chris’s hotel bill.

It didn’t matter what Rowan tried through the agonizingly long hours after Aslin left to when the sun broke the eastern horizon—six hours that felt like forever—she couldn’t stop wishing she hadn’t told him to go.

Now here she was after maybe two hours of restless sleep, sitting on the spacious balcony of Chris’s suite feeling drained. Coffee in hand, she watched the morning’s golden light flow over Sydney Harbour and the Opera House, turning a simple thing like morning into a stunning spectacle. The sight pissed her off to no end. All she could do every time she looked at it was wish the Brit was here with her so she could smile at him and share the moment.

And then ask him to take her inside and fuck her brains out.

She lifted what was left of her croissant—her third of the morning, this one slathered with strawberry jelly and cream—and popped it into her mouth. If she hadn’t, she would have let out a very disgusted snort.

Oh yeah, she was definitely well on her way to solving the Aslin Rhodes problem, wasn’t she? Ice cream, movies, exercise and masturbation. The perfect tools needed to decide what to do about him.

She sighed.

Somewhere around four a.m., she’d decided she was going to sleep with him. After she got that out of her system, she was going to see if she could spend more than fifteen minutes in his company without thinking about sex.

Now however, in the light of day, she wasn’t sure if that was a wise move.

For starters, what if he was a hopeless lover?

Rowan did snort this time. And then coughed around the remains of her croissant she’d yet to swallow.

Huh. It wasn’t possible. With the way he kissed? With the arrogance of his touch? The mastery of her pleasure?

A shiver rippled through her. A tight, hot, delicious ripple. She had no doubt whatsoever that Aslin Rhodes would be an amazing lover. What she did doubt was her ability to walk away when it was over. Because a British bodyguard, or whatever he was now, wasn’t exactly part of her plans for her future. Looking after her brother was her plan for the future. Making sure people didn’t take advantage of his far-too-easygoing nature.

Aslin Rhodes did not fit into that plan at all.

Which is why you haven’t stop thinking about him, right?

With another snort, she pushed herself to her feet and turned from the breathtaking vista of the harbour and its architecturally weird opera house. She needed to call the hospital, find out when Chris was going to be discharged and order a taxi so she could get there before hand. Then she’d have another shower, dress and ring Nigel McQueen and let him know she was collecting her brother.

She didn’t have the time to sit and ponder her inconvenient pre-occupation with Aslin Rhodes. Maybe if she was lucky when she next saw the British soldier-cum-bodyguard-cum-whatever he was now, she’d be over him. After all, it wasn’t like she’d never had a man make her moan with pleasure before.

Just not on the back of a Ducati. In plain view of anyone who might come along.

Her pussy contracted in an almost painful throb.

Letting out a huff, Rowan crossed to one of the suite’s many phones and had hotel reception connect her to Sydney Royal North Shore Private Hospital. Ten minutes later, having been told by the nurse that she could not divulge any information about Chris Huntley over the phone no matter how many times Rowan insisted she was Chris’s sister, she walked into the opulent bathroom, stripped off her PJs and stepped into the shower.