Page 23 of Mensa's Match

“Don’t hate your guts. You were wriggling around non-stop until I put an arm around you. Once you started breathing Darth Vader-style, I rolled away.”

“But—”

“Then you rolled into me,” he murmured.

Embarrassment flooded my system. “Still, I can let you—”

His tone sounded defeated. “Just stay where you are. It’s three-thirty. We only gotta make it three more hours. Go to sleep.”

Another three hours? Shoot me now.

I took a deep breath. My breasts tingled at the thought of how solid his body felt against mine. He really was different from any other man I’d shared a bed with. Dark hair, even more tattoos than I’d ever imagined, and I’d spent some time imagining.

I told myself to stop thinking this way. It felt good that he didn’t hate me, but we were still wrong for each other.

“You aren’t sleeping,” he muttered.

“Neither are you,” I whispered.

“Keeping a lock on my control is what matters right now. You go to sleep, I might be able to do the same.”

Control?I moved my arm a little and his hold tightened.

“Blume, I mean it. Stay still.”

“Did it occur to you that I’m in the same boat?”

His voice became husky. “You’re not. You’re just in the same bed.”

He let go of my wrist, and I skated my hand along his abs. They weren’t quite as ripped and muscular as his chest. His abdomen clenched.

“Sorry,” I whispered.

“Are you?” he asked in a velvet murmur.

That gave me pause. “Yes.”

He slid his hand down and over mine. “I don’t hate your guts. I just don’t like… what you stand for.”

“What I stand for? You hardly know me.”

“Law and righteousness.” He made a low hum as he paused. “And pop music.”

“Pop music? You are not to be believed!”

“Raise your voice a little more, Whit, and the whole floor will hear you.”

I yanked against his hold.

He moved my hand lower. “You don’t like me either. Admit it.”

I sighed. “Idolike you… I don’t want to like you so much.”

“Same,” he grunted.

“You don’twantto like me? Why?”

“Could ask you the same thing. We aren’t compatible.”

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