Page 21 of The Irishman's Christmas Gamble
She was about to say that she could handle her own clothes. But something stopped her. Something that whispered it would be nice to let another person take care of her for a moment. He wasn’t cold—he’d said so—so why be bullheaded about pulling her weight? “See you inside!”
She bolted for the French doors, the soles of her bare feet burning with cold by the time she’d gotten across the frigid tiles of the terrace floor. Slipping inside, she went straight to the fireplace to hold her feet out one at a time to the flames.
Liam burst through the door, his arms full of quilts, clothes, and boots. “Jaysus, it’d freeze the bollocks off a polar bear out there.”
He dumped his burdens, including the quilt that had been draped over his shoulders, on a chair and strode toward Frankie and the fire, in all his naked, muscle-rippling glory. She didn’t pretend not to ogle him every step of the way, and once again she caught the flash of a green tattoo on his hip.
“You have to pay for looking.” He grinned as he took one corner of her quilt out of her hand, and wrapped it around his big body.
As he huddled in beside her, his chilled skin grazed hers. She yelped. “‘Tis like diving into the bloody Irish Sea in January.”
“You’ll warm me up fast.” He snaked his arm around her waist to pull her into him. She let her eyes close as their skin pressed together, savoring the contrast of his hard contours against her softer curves, the delight of it quickly warding off the shock of that first contact.
“Liam, what’s the tattoo on your hip?”
