Page 73 of The Troublemaker

His reaction came slamming back into her like a freight train.

Thiswas why. This was why he had reacted that way. Because he had been thinking about her...

She leaned against the shower wall. He had been thinking about her body. In that way. Again, she wasn’t stupid. She knew what the female body did to ready itself for intercourse.

It was just dealing with the fact that a kiss from Lachlan had made her body prepare forthat.

She wanted to cry. She wanted to curl up under a blanket and cry.

She suddenly felt desperately, utterly alone. Because Lachlan was the person she talked to. About everything. Everything that she hadn’t talked to him about, she had talked to her dad about, but they hadn’t talked about this.

He hadn’t been comfortable with it as a topic. He had been a veterinarian. He had been able to speak about things in clinical terms. He had handled her getting her period better than she had. She had felt embarrassed, and he had said it was simply a biological function and there was nothing to worry about. But he had talked about sex as if it were simply a biological function as well. He had never acted like there was any more to it. Anything more to consider.

Right now she felt buried by themore. All that she didn’t understand. All that she had never fully allowed herself to comprehend. She felt undone by that.

And if there was one thing Charity wasn’t used to, it was feeling undone. Because she had been taught to be practically minded about things. And there was no way that she could outthink this. There was no way that she could make this...practical.

Byron was here visiting, and she had just kissed another man.

She had just kissed Lachlan.

She shivered, because even though she was upset about it, her body still craved more.

Bodies were apparently very stupid. That wasn’t really all that surprising. She felt like most of human history seemed to back that up. She had just assumed that she was exempt from it.

That made her want to laugh. Because it was pretty much ridiculous.

Except, she didn’t think she could laugh. She wasn’t sure she would ever laugh again.

Maybe that was a touch overdramatic, but maybe not.

How had she found herself in this position?

She had been unfaithful to Byron. Because knowing she had kissed someone else would hurt him. It would probably be a deal breaker.

She shut the water off and wrapped her towel around herself, looking in the mirror. Trying to figure out who that girl was standing there.

Then her phone started buzzing.

It was Lachlan. Which enraged her, but she answered it all the same.

“What?” she grumped.

“You said you would text me when you got home. I wanted to make sure you made it there okay.”

“I’m fine. I’m sorry that you weren’t my priority the minute that I walked through the door.”

“You don’t sound sorry,” he growled.

“I just got out of the shower. I was cold.”

There was a heavy pause on the other end. And it made her feel flushed that she was standing there, naked except for her towel. Talking on the phone to him suddenly felt intimate in a way that it wouldn’t have... Well, a while ago. There had been things that were shifting between them, and she did know that. It had been snarling and tangling and complicating for a little while now. But the kiss had blown it to pieces.

“I was thinking,” he said.

“I don’t know that I like the sound of that.”

“I know I don’t like the sound of it,” he said. “I want to come over.”

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