Page 3 of Four on the Floor: A Menage Romance

There’s a main lobby with a huge fireplace, and then each wing of the hotel also has a lounge with a bar, plenty of cozy seating, and another fireplace. The fireplaces all have bearskin rugs in front of them, and I’m a little afraid to ask if they’re real.

There’s a ballroom. There’s a sunroom, even though it’s freezing in there right now. There’s a conservatory and I don’t really even know what thatis.

Right now, Poppy is walking me toward the indoor pool, still talking all about the history of the hotel.

“This was added in the 1920s, dear,” she says. She’s taken to calling medear, and frankly, I’m fine with it. “And of course we’ve updated and renovated it since then, but the mermaid mosaic on the bottom is original, as are the personal dressing rooms. Back when this was built, of course, it wascompletelyinappropriate to go through the lobby in your bathing costume…”

I look down into the clear water of the indoor pool. There is, indeed, a mermaid on the bottom, waving up at me.

“…and I won’t drag you outside to see the hot springs, but if you come over to the window you can see them pretty well. Oh, hello!”

I’m still looking at the mermaid in the pool when Poppy starts waving through the window at someone outside.

“There’s one of them,” she says cheerily, still waving as I walk over to her side. “I was wondering where they were hiding, though bless their hearts they often aren’t up until noon or later and goodness knows if I’m not out of bed by six at the very latest I can’t get anything done all day…”

She keeps talking, but I’m looking at the person she’s waving to, and I swear I can’t hear a single thing he’s saying. There’s just a buzzing sound filling my ears as my eyes go wide.

Holy shit, I’m going to be here with him for three months?!

The hot springs are three pools, sunk into the ground outside and surrounded by big gray stones, and in one of them is a shirtless man.

He’s not looking at us. He’s got his eyes closed and his head back, only in the water from the waist down as the steam from the springs rises and coils around him, almost like it’s licking his perfect abs, caressing his bulging biceps, and snaking through that hip V that really hot men always have.

And I amstaring. My mouth might be open. I might be drooling. I don’t know, I just know that all my nervousness about my co-artists-in-residence got multiplied by about ten because I didn’t know that one of them was going to be a seriously hot guy.

Still talking, Poppy raps on the window, knocking me out of my reverie.

“Dalton!” she calls, knocking again.

The guy in the pool looks up suddenly, confused for a split second. Then he sees Poppy waving like a maniac and smiles at her, waving back.

“Larkin is finally here!” Poppy shouts at the glass window, pointing at me.

The knots in my stomach draw tighter, but I wave politely at him through the glass. He smiles and waves back as I hear my heartbeat echoing through my ears.

Then he lifts himself out of the hot spring, all in one smooth motion, the muscles in his arms and back bunching and rippling in a beautiful, perfect symphony. He jogs down the wooden boardwalk toward the door to the pool, which Poppy opens for him, already scolding.

“—any of you die on my watch, you’ve already signed something saying you won’t sue,” she says as he comes through the door, reaching for a giant, fluffy towel.

Good Lord, he’s even better up close. He’s got auburn hair, bright green eyes, and faint smattering of freckles that cover his whole body — or at least what I can see of it. He quickly runs the towel over his hair, making it stick up in every direction, then drying the rest of himself off just as fast.

“Bit chilly out there,” he says to me by way of greeting. “I’m Dalton, by the way.”

He wraps the towel around his hips, gives me the most charming smile I’ve seen in my life, and holds out one big hand.

I take it, trying to remember my manners and not stare, which is very hard, because did I mention that he’s got a six-pack and that hip V that hot men always have? The one that points directly to their junk and then forces you to think dirty, dirty thoughts about them?

“Larkin,” I say. His hand is improbably warm, and he smiles at me as I say it.

It’s also a very good smile, the kind that makes my stomach feel like it’s turned into some sort of warm pudding.

“Glad you got here all right,” he says. “With all the snow we were afraid you might not make it.”

He’s adjusting the towel around his hips, making it a little hard for me to focus on what he’s saying. I swear I’m not usually this much of an idiot around hot men, but they’re not usually wet and naked in front of me, I haven’t usually just finished a long, stressful drive, and franklythey’re not usually this hot.

“I wasn’t about to miss this for anything!” I say, willing myself to meet his eyes. “I can’t wait to get to work.”

Before answering, Dalton bends over, the towel secure around his hips, and yanks his swim trunks off beneath the towel. They land in a wet pile on the concrete floor of the pool area, and he steps out of them neatly.

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