My fingers tingle slightly, and I clench my hands into fists so I’m not tempted to reach for his fly.
His hand has reached my sleeve, and he slides two fingers beneath the fabric. He’s only touching my shoulder, hardly anything scandalous, and yet somehow it feels inappropriate.
“What would you do,” he murmurs, “if I picked up where we left off? If I flipped you over and took you right here? Right on top of this table?” He shifts his hips forward slightly, pressing them against mine. “Or is it different, now that you know my name?”
His fingers still caress my shoulder, but now he lifts his other hand to my hair. Just as before, he wastes no time in tangling his fingers in the strands. And then he grabs a handful, not quite enough to hurt, and pulls my head back so I can’t look down again, even if I wanted to. His eyes flash.
“Does this still excite you?” he asks.
I try to lie and shake my head, but it’s hard with my hair in his grip. Harder still when my whole body feels like jelly. His fingers slip out of my sleeve and grab the collar of my shirt, pulling it aside and exposing my shoulder. His thumb grazes the bare skin, but his eyes never leave mine.
“You’re awfully quiet,” he says, “for someone who was so forward the other day.”
I finally find my voice. “Maybe it’s better that way. I liked you a lot better before you opened your mouth.”
My comment catches him by surprise, but then humor floods his eyes. He throws back his head and laughs, releasing me.
I let out a breath as he moves away from me, but I still have to grip the table a moment longer while the feeling rushes back into my limbs.
This is dangerous. This is very, very dangerous. I don’t like the effect this guy has on me. I’m supposed to be staying away from situations like this. Not melting beneath the touch of the first guy to offer me a new distraction.
I turn around and bend down to grab the nearest pile of Huntington Manor T-shirts.
“For someone who’s so self-righteous about cheating,” I say, “you certainly don’t have a problem jumping between girls quickly.”
“Just to be clear,” Ward says, “nothing happened between me and Gracie until yesterday. And it won’t happen ever again. So that’s not really an issue here.” He’s returned to his work at the window, but I still don’t risk turning around.
I take several deep breaths, trying to get my heart rate back to normal. My body might be eager for a little fun, but I don’t want another complication in my life. Even one with amazing arms.
But Ward’s not about to let me ignore him.
“What about you?” he asks after a minute.
“What?”
“Have you ever cheated?”
I grab another handful of T-shirts. “That’s a little personal, isn’t it?”
“More personal than sticking your hand in a stranger’s pants?”
I’m not even going to respond to that.
“No,” I tell him simply. “No. I’ve never cheated.” But even as I say it, a knot forms in my stomach. No, I’ve never had sex with someone when I was committed to someone else. But the real crime here isn’t the sex—it’s the abuse of someone’s trust. I might not have strayed physically or emotionally, but that whole mess with Ian still feels like a betrayal.
My answer must satisfy Ward, though, because he drops the subject.
I look back down at the T-shirts. The colors are so bright that I’m afraid they’re going to burn my retinas, but it’s better than looking at the guy I almost-but-didn’t-quite make a very, very bad mistake with. I need to stop making new mistakes and start fixing the ones I’ve already made. No more excuses.
And if I’m going to be a better, stronger person, I can start by sucking it up and dealing with these T-shirts already. Even if every time I see that stupid embroidered “Huntington Manor” logo I feel like I’m being stabbed in the gut. I get to work, making my way through an entire pile of hot pink shirts and half a pile of the electric purple ones before I find my gaze drifting back over to Ward.
He’s leaning against the wall, scribbling on a little notepad. His brow is slightly wrinkled in concentration, and every once in a while, he sucks his bottom lip into his mouth, just a little, as his pencil moves across the page. Once, he stops to scratch his side. His shirt slides up just a little, and my eyes drop to the exposed skin before I can stop them.
Shame he turned out to be a jerk, I think, tearing my gaze away from his abs. Shame I’m not supposed to be thinking about men in the first place.
“Do you always stare at people when they’re working?” he says. He glances up. “Or did you change your mind about my earlier offer?”
“Are you going to be able to finish that window by tonight?” I ask, ignoring his question.
He laughs, allowing the dodge. “No way in hell. I’ll be lucky if I can get all the wood cut by tonight.” He turns and looks at the remains of the window again. “The upside to this is that it really needed the update. Look at this. The wood had started to rot. No wonder we went through. I wonder if the others are this bad.”
I glance down the room at the other windows.
“They’re pretty old,” I admit.
“It’s not the age that’s the problem with this place,” he replies. “It’s the lack of proper upkeep. You’d have been shocked if you’d seen the condition of this place when I started working here.”
I try unsuccessfully to ignore the prickle of annoyance in my chest. “Well, it was vacant for a few months after the sale, wasn’t it? That’s probably the problem.”
He snorts. “The problem is that those people didn’t take care of their house.”
Those people. My fist tightens around the T-shirt in my hand until my knuckles are white. By ‘those people,’ he means my family.
“Don’t get me wrong,” he says. “There are a lot of cool things about this place. It’s fascinating, really. The original architect was definitely going for something Gothic, and you don’t see that a lot on this side of the pond. Especially in a private home. It’s more of a work of art than an actual living space.” He shrugs. “But of course the Cunninghams needed all their modern amenities, so you end up with this weird mishmash of new and old.”
“You’d rather they hadn’t put in electricity?”
“I didn’t say that. I mean there are ways to incorporate technology into places like this while preserving the integrity of the original design. And throwing in computerized closets isn’t the way to do it.” He shakes his head. “But that’s not even what pisses me off. It’s that they threw all their money into shit like that and didn’t even do standard maintenance. They were letting this place slowly crumble into pieces. Don’t get me wrong—the foundation’s sound. But this house needed a lot of updates to meet code.”