Page 88 of Hold Me Today

“Can I try?” The question leaves me before I can talk myself out of it. Nerves flare in the pit of my belly, making my fingers dig into the cardboard popcorn container.The worst he can say is no.Don’t freak out. Flexing my fingers to keep them from tapping, I tack on, “I mean, not onthatone. The church spire. You’ve been working on it for years and God knows I’ll—”

“Éla édo,” comes his low command. “I’ll guide you.”

Oh.Oh.

I practically throw the popcorn onto the desk in my excitement. “Wait, hold on—don’t go anywhere!” Darting from the room, I head straight to the tiny bathroom tucked between Nick’s office and the conference room at the far end of the hall. I don’t bother to lock the door as I wash the butter and salt from my fingers, giving them a good scrub before I dry off and hurry back to where he’s waiting. “Sorry,” I tell him when I return, “I didn’t want to ruin the wood with AMC’s delicious butter.”

Nick’s mouth twitches. “Get over here, butter fingers. Let me show you how this is done.”

He doesn’t have to tell me twice, though I do roll my eyes at the silly nickname.

Spotting an extra footstool, I pull it over to where Nick sits. With the heels of his heavy boots, he scrapes his stool back, leaving me room to place mine closest to the spire. Threads of anticipation circle my heart, quickening its rhythm as I sit down and keep my knees wide to avoid touching the wood.

“Is this okay?” I ask.

Nick hums his approval, a throaty, masculine sound that twines the thread just a little tighter. “Perfect. Here, let me show you exactly what we’re doing.”

“You aren’t worried I’ll mess it up?”

“If you do, I’ll fix it. The key is to make sure that you don’t hack into the wood—that’s an irreversible mistake.” His bulky arms fold around me, and his chest gently collides with my back. I watch as he maneuvers the blade of the knife over the straight edge of the bell tower. “You always want to go with the grain of the wood,” he husks out, his warm breath against my neck as he whittles the wood. “Go against it and the wood will peel or splinter. I don’t work with an image. Never really have, which means it all comes down to instinct. A lot like when you work on a client’s hair.”

The comparison between our chosen mediums has never been lost on me. We work with our hands, day-in and day-out. We create beauty out of nothing, testing the boundaries, relying on the basics to guide our way: the grain of the wood or the texture of the hair, the softness or coarseness of them both.

I find myself leaning back into his chest, absorbing his warmth, my forearms resting on his muscular thighs as he shows me the correct technique to use. “The sharper the blade, the more the wood feels like butter,” he tells me. “Here, want to try the detail work? I’ll help you.”

He hands me the knife, wood-handle first. It’s light in my grip, lighter than I expected, to be honest. I eye the detail work he’s already begun, along with the shallow groove that sits a few centimeters from the edge. Angling the blade as he showed me, I scoot forward on the stool and try to recreate the gentle motions he executed so naturally.

“A little harder,” Nick encourages.

I try again, deepening the way I angle the blade down through the grain. The thinnest slice of wood curls free.

Excitement cuts right through me. “Look!”

“Ómorfi.”Beautiful. Full lips find the space behind my ear, over my soaring wings. “Now let me show you how to make it look more Gothic.”

We work together in companionable silence.The Two Towersexists as pure background noise as I carve the tiniest circles into the wood, using another one of Nick’s whittling knives, this one for curves and rounded edges. He never moves from behind me, but his hands, when they aren’t guiding mine, touch me instead.

His palm settles in the curve of my waist.

The other splays flat over my thigh, his fingers inches from my sex.

He holds me more possessively than he ever has, touching me like we’re in this together. Likewe’retogether. And I can’t deny that every time his chest lifts with an in-drawn breath, I feel myself breathe in time with him too.

Meanwhile, warm encouragements slip off his tongue.

“Yeah, just like that,koukla.”

“Go a little deeper there, but otherwise it’s perfect.”

“Slowly . . . don’t rush it.”

Everything he says sounds downright sexual.

I refrain from squirming, even though the pressure between my legs is at an all-time high, and oh, God, how does he do this to me?Focus, girl. Focus on the wood!

Except that I want to be focusing onhiswood. Pun so very much intended. Is he hard right now? Is he fighting the good fight, too, trying to keep the moment light and not steaming withsex now pleasevibes? I can’t be the only one on the verge of losing the battle.

His palm, the one resting on my thigh, skims higher as he readjusts himself behind me.

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