She suddenly gasped and sat up, looking all around then at him. Her wide eyes scanned his naked body and he held up his hands to show it wasn’t what it looked like, what he saw in her eyes. “I took my clothes off to give them to you because yours are wet and you’re running a fever.” Without taking his eyes from her wide shocked gaze, he pointed to the stove. “I’m drying our coats so you have something dry to wear.” He kept his voice gentle and hypnotic as he could.
“Why…” she swallowed and winced as though her throat hurt, “are we here?”
“You passed out and the storm hit. I couldn’t see the road and didn’t want to get stranded in the blizzard.”
Her jaw trembled and she looked around, holding her arms and shivering despite the fact that the room felt like an oven. Her delicate oval face was incredibly pale, except for the spot of bright red high on each cheekbone and the dark hollows under her eyes. Her hair hung in a stringy, damp brown mass, except for the right side, where it was burned nearly to the scalp. Damn. It didn't even resemble the silky chestnut he'd noticed when she strode into the ranch house kitchen.
“You can’t waste the wood. Don’t put any more on. We don’t have much as it is. We'll have to make it last until we can get out of here.” Her fearful gaze flicked over him again. “You look different without your… hat.”
What had she been about to say? Before he could ask, she coughed, deep and painful sounding, reminding him of her condition. How could he let that detail slip his mind for an instant? “You need to take this.” He held the medicine to her. “For your fever.”
She took the medicine from his hand not arguing. He handed her the water bottle and watched as she tossed the pills in her mouth and drank, then wiped her mouth on her arm before a violent chill took her. “Turn around, I need to get out of these wet clothes.”
Finally, something he could do to really help. “Oh. Here." He nearly dropped his shirt twice before he managed to hand it to her. "You can wear my shirt while you wait for your clothes to dry. Let me see if my coat is no longer wet, you can cover up with it.” He went to the stove and checked it. “Five more minutes.” He turned back toward her and she jerked her gaze up. She’d been staring at his body. Had she liked what she saw? “I only got out of my clothes to give them to you until yours dried.”
“That’s fine.” She seemed to try for no problem but her voice came out sounding small and tired. She indicated with a finger that he turn around. “Can’t wait for your coat, you’ll have to just deal with a half-naked woman. I hope you can?”
Her tone said he’d better deal and not give her any problems with it, she had enough already. He smiled after he turned. “Of course I can.” He allowed a hint of insult into his tone for added measure.
“Yes, of course you can. Don’t worry, I won't present any challenges to your virtue anyway. I’m my father’s daughter, the only thing not making me a man is what’s between my legs…or not.” Her derision tapered off toward the end of her sentence, and Toren heard the dark depression that lie had brought over the years.
He suddenly wanted to smash in the face of every human who’d rejected her. “That’s not at all why I’m able to not look.”
“Oh? Are you gay? Or married?”
He chuckled. “No.”
“Maybe you’re a virgin.” Her derogative tone said she knew he wasn’t.
Toren tried to decide if her thinking that would help him in his cause to win her. He checked his coat again. “Are you done?”
“Yes.”
He returned his coat to hang above the stove and went to the food container where he'd left it sitting on the bed, taking care not to look at her. Directly. But his peripheral only teased his curiosity, making him want to examine what it was about her body that she thought was so masculine. Everything he could make out was delicate, intriguing female.
He opened the food side of the ingenious container, reversing what Kassie had done to close it. “Hungry?” He handed her one of the napkin wrapped crusts and despite his best efforts, his gaze landed briefly on her chest.
“Thought you wouldn’t look." She took the food, her bold gaze drilling into him.
Toren choked on surprise. Before coming to Earth, he'd spent some time studying acceptable human social behavior. Samantha kept forcing him to reassess what he'd learned. “Sorry.” What else could he say?
She snorted back, not really seeming to care. “There isn’t a thing there to see darling, but I’m damn well glad for it.”