Page 83 of Body Check

At Jackson’s slow, husky murmur, I glance his way and wish I hadn’t.

Without the high-energy thrum of lust in my veins, I take a moment to appreciate Jackson’s naked body in a way that I haven’t in so long. His arms are powerful ropes of muscle, big and bulging as opposed to lean and sinuous—he’s a Tom Hardy on theHow Muscular Is He?scale, and not a Tom Hiddleston. Though I’d have to be dead to find fault with either. (And I’m definitely not dead.)

With every breath, his abdominal muscles flex, the obliques tightening and releasing. His thighs . . . I never really thought it was normal to fantasize about a man’s thighs, butJackson’sthighs are utter perfection.

Particularly when he’s holding me between them, my back to his hard front.

After a sharp breath of my own, I smooth my hands over the fabric of my dress. “I wasn’t sure what the code was.”

His brows furrow together. “Code?”

“Yeah, you know—” I wave one hand in the air, flicking it between us. “Thecode. Do I go upstairs to my room? Do I stay down here in yours? I mean, you’d think there’d be some sort of advice on the internet for this sort of thing, but I looked after the last time we were together, and for once the internet has failed me.”

Jackson doesn’t seem to care that he’s not wearing a single stitch of clothing as he pushes away from the doorframe and ambles toward me, all loose limbs and long strides. “You know what I think?” His tone is sinful, a low rumble. “I think that you should do whateveryouwant to do, not what society thinks is healthy for you.”

I laugh awkwardly at that, aha-ha-hathat sounds stilted to even my own ears. “I think that ship has sailed. The internet has a firm stance on divorced couples hooking up again.”

“Oh, yeah?” He slips behind me, his big hands going to my shoulders. I moan out loud when his thumbs dig into the tense muscles there, circling and circling and circling over the deep tissue. “What’s the consensus?”

He asks the question near my ear, and I fight off a shiver. Everything Jackson does is sensual, a fact that he proves by gliding his hands down my spine and taking the zipper of my dress right along with them.

The dress parts, cool air hitting my skin. It feels heavenly, if heaven came in the form of a six-foot-four hockey player with magical hands and a smooth, honeyed drawl.

“Holls?”

“Generally frowned upon,” I manage on a shuddered breath, “a big no-no.”

“But not illegal?”

“What?” My brain empties when all that cool air hits my bare backside. “No, not illegal—”

“For the record, I’d sacrifice myself to a lifetime of bending over for soap if I got a little more time with you.”

I’m not given any time to processthatcrazy statement before I’m flying—literally,flying—through the air and landing with a massive bounce on the mattress.

The coils shriek in protest.

“Jackson!”

In that moment, I’m a naked acrobat who should have been fired on my first day on the job.

My limbs flail this way and that, and really, I should have been less concerned about landing face-first on the floor and more worried about what my hundred-and-ten-pound frame has done to the bed frame.

On the second bounce, the bedcracks!

And on the third, it quite literally goes concave with me in the middle of the cavern.

Butt cheeks burning from the abrupt crash landing, I swing my gaze toward Jackson and glare accusingly. “You broke the bed!”

Only, the damn man is on his knees, hands on the ground, doubled over in laughter at my expense. “I can’t—” His handsome head falls forward, his laughter eating away at any leftover awkwardness infiltrating the room. “Oh, God, Holls. I’m so sorry, but your face when you went down . . .”

“Jerk.” I huff out a breath, but it lacks any true heat. Already I feel laughter bubbling to the surface. “I can’t believe that just happened.” I flap my arms at my side, tightening my core muscles as the mattress wobbles over the broken slats. So much for beautiful (and sturdy) antique furniture.

“It’s a conspiracy,” I mutter glumly. “We literally had hardcore sex on this thing and not even a whine! Then you throwme on it and it decides to break? How screwed up is that? If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you were pranking me.”

“Not a prank.” He gasps out the words between fits of laugher, still on his hands and knees like he’s praying to the Almighty Shitty Bed for making his night.

Newsflash,Imade his night.

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