Page 63 of Wylder Ranch
I’m so distracted I don’t think about what I’m doing until I’ve bitten down on the spatula with a half-cooked pancake, and the scalding batter sticks to my tongue.
“Holy. . . argh.. . fuck.” I spit out along with the dough, and what I assume is most of the skin from the roof of my mouth.
I stick my tongue out, wafting my hand over it as quickly as I can. But it’s fucking useless. Ice. I need ice.
It’s not ice that comes to my rescue, however. One big hand grips my shoulder, the other grips my chin to hold me still, and cool, minty breath blows into my mouth.
Now it’s not just my tongue burning up.
Alex and his naked chest and his low-slung fucking plaid pajama pants are less than six inches from me, so close I can feel the heat of him. I can see the crystal-clear blue of his eyes boring into mine. He’s hot, but my whole body may as well be on fire.
Because Alex blowing into my mouth is far sexier than it has any right to be. In fact, it doesn’t have any right to be sexy, at all. It shouldn’t be.
But it is. Itsois.
And based on the solid nudging of his growing erection against my hip, Alex thinks so too. Which I guess is why he jumps back.
“Sorry. That was. . .” His eyes trace over me, taking in my old threadbare Wylder Ranch tee that used to belong to my dad, while all I do is gawp with my mouth hanging open.
Alex is so fucking delicious. There’s literally no other way to put it.
He’s a walking, talking fucking sex dream. He was the first time I saw him, he is now.
The soft downlighters cast a shadow across the hard plane of his chest, and the abs upon absupon absstacked below. It’s like he’s been chiseled out of marble, bare and golden.
It’s obscene.
I swear I don’t remember him being quite this impressive last year, or maybe the brain fog has wiped more memories than I thought, because I don’t know how I would have forgotten it.
I want to reach out and touch him, check he’s real. But I don’t because he’s still glaring at me, or maybe it’s a snarl.
Without a word, he disappears into the laundry while I’m still in the spot he found me in, because my legs seem too heavy to move. Something to do with the throbbing that’s squeezing my thighs together.
He returns thirty seconds later, stops in the doorway and tosses me a pair of sweatpants, which I only catch at the last minute.
“Put them on.”
“What?”
“I can’t talk to you when you’re half naked. Put them on.”
I don’t see why I have to get dressed when he isn’t, but I pull them on one leg at a time. I’mthisclose to cracking a joke about double standards, but I’m clever enough to know he’s not in the joking mood.
The joke’s in these sweatpants because they’re Alex’s, so they’re way too long, and frankly, I look ridiculous.
But I don’t wisecrack on them either. Instead, I wait for him to say something.
“Why didn’t you call me back?”
Okay, that’s not what I was expecting. “What?”
The way Alex steps forward reminds me of one of those nature shows in that it’s less of a walk and more of a prowl. When he perches on the edge of the kitchen table, it’s with a hard-set jaw and arms crossed over his chest. His lips purse tight, and the way his eyes are narrowed gives the impression he wants to kill me, but from the obvious semi in his pajamas, he’s undecided.
“Why didn’t you call me back?”
I swallow. His tone is different from the first time he asked me weeks ago. Then the hurt in his voice was palpable. Now he almost spits it out, abrupt and stern,and I’m slightly taken aback. Also, here I was thinking he was mad I’d kissed him.
But I don’t want to go down that path right now, so I do the mature thing and pretend I have no idea what he’s talking about.
