Page 98 of The Ruse

“Uh, sure.”

She closed the closet door again, and I pulled out my phone to see who had texted me. It was Hunter.

Hunter:Theo just came to our room to make sure we were in bed. I told him you were having stomach issues from the fajitas tonight and were hanging out on the toilet. You’re welcome. ;)

You’re welcome?

Seriously? He couldn’t come up with a less embarrassing excuse than that?

I was going to have a fun time meeting Theo’s gaze tomorrow.

I texted him back.Thanks for all that. I’m just with Elyse right now. Be back later.

Another text from him came through.Good luck on asking her out.

Yeah, I’d definitely need a ton of luck there since right now, I wasn’t sure she even thought I was a decent human anymore.

Hopefully, once I explained everything we’d be on okay terms.

I slipped my phone back into my pocket, expecting to be stuck in the closet for another minute or two, but then Elyse slid the closet door open a few inches wide.

“That was fas—” I started to say before noticing that she was still wearing the same dress from her date.

So maybe she wasn’t changing after all?

“Hey, so this is probably going to sound really weird, but…um, I think my zipper is stuck and…well…” She looked down at the floor before meeting my gaze again. “And since Ava isn’t going to be coming back tonight, I was wondering if you could help me get it unstuck.”

“Oh,” I said, my hands suddenly going tingly. “Y-you want me to unzip your dress?”

“Just like halfway,” she said quickly, her cheeks noticeably pinker. “Just until it’s unstuck. I can take it from there, of course.”

“Of course.” I cleared my throat. “I can help you with that.”

She must have felt as awkward as I did because she didn’t say anything else, just immediately turned her back to me.

After running my gaze across the black fabric of her dress, I could see what she was talking about. She’d managed to pull it down a few inches but now it was snagged on the fabric behind the zipper.

I started to reach for the zipper, but since it was awkward having all of her coats and other clothes from her closet pressing against my shoulders, I stepped out of the closet.

“Okay, let me just see if I can do this.” I swallowed hard as I came closer, hoping I could stay professional. This was not the time to let the overwhelming attraction I had for her to come out.

But when I bent close to her neck to see what I was doing, her light perfume hit me. And man, she really did smell amazing.

Looked amazing, too. I couldn’t recall if I’d ever seen her bare shoulders before, since she usually wore her school uniform or T-shirts.

She had really nice shoulders. Slender but strong and a beautiful light tan color.

I tried to gently tug the zipper down, but it didn’t budge. So I braced one hand on her shoulder and tried to pull the zipper up first instead, thinking it would right itself that way. Still nothing.

“I think if you just, like, pull some of the fabric to the side, that might do it,” Elyse said, her voice breathier than usual.

“Okay…” And since I knew my own voice would probably sound off if I said anything more, I slipped my fingers beneath the fabric at her back, keeping my thumb on the top side, and gently pulled the fabric away from the zipper.

She shivered, like the graze of my fingers against her skin surprised her. I briefly wondered if she liked it, but then I made my mind focus back on the task at hand. I was able to get the zipper to finally move up before I slowly pulled it down a few inches past the trouble area.

I stopped unzipping once the back of her semi-sheer black bra came into view. And dang, I really didn’t need to know what kind of underthings Elyse wore.

Until now, I’d never even thought about it, but now that I knew what the black strip of fabric looked like against her satiny, smooth skin—

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