Page 34 of A Reclusive Heart

“All set,” Bret announced.

Jamie cracked one eye open. “Are you sure?”

“Yup.”

With that, Jamie was off the table and righting her clothes even as she walked stiff-legged to the front of the store to pay.

“Don’t you want to look at it?” Nick asked, frowning when the stubborn woman shook her head and kept moving.

With a sigh, he followed after her, making a mental note to pick up chocolate on the way to the hotel since there was no doubt in his mind that she was going to need it.

“What now?”Nick asked on a heavy sigh as he opened his door and found his little recluse shifting nervously in front of him, wearing a baby blue tee-shirt and another pair of those damn flannel pants that he shouldn’t find sexy, but did.

“I can’t get the bandage off. It’s been more than two hours and I’m supposed to wash it now with a little bit of antibacterial soap,” Jamie said, holding up the small bottle of liquid hand soap, “and gently wipe it, but I can’t reach the top corners of the bandage.”

Pinching the bridge of his nose as he wondered when this horrible day would end, Nick stepped to the side and allowed her to come in. The sooner he got this over with, the sooner she’d leave and he could return to staring at the television as he tried not to think of all the bullshit that waited for him tomorrow.

“Where do you want to do this?” she asked, looking around the small hotel room.

“Get on the bed, Jamie,” Nick said, gesturing lazily towards the double bed.

“Okay,” Jamie mumbled nervously as she put the soap and tube of ointment she’d been carrying on the edge of the bed and carefully laid down on her stomach.

When she didn’t move her shirt and pants out of the way so that he could get to the tattoo, Nick resigned himself to the task.He paused by the bed and pulled his shirt off before it got ruined by the ointment.

“I have to move your clothes out of the way,” Nick explained even as he reached for her tee-shirt. Thankfully, she had enough sense not to argue and even raised herself up a bit to help him with the task. He pushed her shirt up until it reached her underarms and then reached for her flannel pajama pants, careful not to touch the bandage and hurt her.

When his fingers brushed against her surprisingly firm ass, he had to take a deep breath to get his breathing under control. He was supposed to be doing her a favor, not ogling her ass, Nick reminded himself as he pulled her pants and panties down, revealing more of her ass.

“Mercy,” he hissed softly at the sight.

“What?” Jamie asked, moving to turn over, but he stopped her by placing a hand on her back to keep her right where she was.

“Nothing. I’m going to take the bandage off now. Try not to move,” Nick said, reaching for the corner of the large, white gauze pad as he prepared himself for the splash of cold water that her tattoo would have on him.

Five minutes later, the bandage was removed and his damn cock was straining in his pants to get to her. Of course, a tattoo would turn him on if it was on his little recluse, Nick thought dryly as he gently cleaned the black tattoo that he couldn’t help but imagine tracing with his tongue. As soon as it was clean, he applied the ointment that would protect it and washed his hands.

By the time Nick stepped out of his bathroom, he’d expected to find Jamie dressed and scrambling for the door, but instead, he found her right where he’d left her. Wondering what was wrong since his little recluse, by all rights, should have made a run for it as soon as he was done, Nick walked over to the bedand couldn’t help but smile when her cute little snores reached his ears.

He considered waking her up and sending her to her room but then decided against it. The poor thing was exhausted and probably wouldn’t have the energy to walk back to her room. At least, that’s what he told himself as he gripped the bottom of her pant legs and carefully pulled them off her. Then he readjusted her pale green panties so that they covered her bottom and frowned down at her shirt.

With the ointment on her back, her shirt would stick to her new tattoo and he wasn’t sure if that would damage the tattoo. Plus, the guy told her to leave it exposed to air whenever she could. Not knowing what else to do, he reached down and worked her shirt off, careful not to wake her or roll her onto her back. When that was done, he turned up the heat, dropped his pants and joined her on the bed, preparing himself for a long night of torture as the object of his desire lay less than six inches away.

As he started to doze off with a rather painful erection, Nick couldn’t help but wonder if this was hell.

CHAPTER 18

As she slowly opened her eyes, Jamie couldn’t help but wonder why she was naked. Then Bret’s instructions from the night before ran through her head and she remembered that she’d planned on sleeping in the buff for the first time in her life to save her tattoo from being ruined. It had also been on her list, well, the mental portion of her list, to try and she had to admit that it wasn’t all that bad. She could see why people liked sleeping like this.

When she moved to turn over, all rational thought left her brain as her eyes landed on Nick, no, correction, a half-naked Nick. She felt her eyes widen in appreciation at the sight before her. When her eyes landed on his normally styled and neatly combed blond hair, she couldn’t help but smile. The mussed look looked really good on him. It gave him that sexy bad boy look with a touch of sweetness that she found endearing.

She ran her eyes over his handsome face, down his neck, over his well-defined biceps, chest, and abs only to land on gray boxer briefs and stayed there. As much as she’d love to look away at the moment, she couldn’t. This was her first up-close look of that area. Granted, it was covered by his underwear, but that wasn’t stopping her from getting an eyeful at the moment.

Wow...

Were all men that big? Jamie wondered as she watched in utter fascination as the large thing in his underwear started to get bigger until it strained against the material and a large pink tip pushed itself out from beneath the waistband of his boxer briefs. For a moment, she lay there, helpless to move or even breathe.

Actually, now that she saw one, well, part of one up close, she was a little frightened. There was no way that something that big was going to fit inside of her. It was physically impossible and it helped her realize that she really wasn’t ready for sex. Correction, she was pretty sure she was ready for all the other stuff, just not the actual sex part. She didn’t want to do that yet. Not until she was comfortable about being intimate with a man and if she had to look forward to being split in two by a monster like that the first time, it would be a long time before she had sex.

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