After pulling her dress off and removing her bra, he lowered her into the tub. She seemed reluctant to let go of him.
“Aren’t you coming in, too?”
He didn’t say anything at first, just let himself drink her in. He loved the way she’d held onto him. Being with her like this was so natural, so right. Chase knew he could never be with a woman who spent her life worrying about what she ate, about whether or not she had cellulite or a little extra flesh on her stomach. He spent all day with women—and men—who were obsessed with what was on the outside.
Chloe’s natural self-confidence, which he was watching return by leaps and bounds with every hour that passed, along with her very real beauty, was the perfect antidote to all of that self-conscious preening. He loved the fact that her nails weren’t painted, that she wasn’t waxed bald between her thighs, that she hadn’t dyed her hair or whitened her teeth. She looked like a woman should.
“You’re staring at me.”
“Yes, I am. And you’re so lovely I’m going to be staring a whole lot more.”
She blushed. “Come join me in the tub.”
But even though he was desperate to get in the water with her, all day he’d been thinking about the conversation they’d had that morning.
“Remember that first night I found you in the tub?”
“I honestly don’t think I’ll ever be able to forget.”
“You’re in the bathtub again.” He paused. “And we know each other better now.”
“We certainly do,” she said softly.
The question hung silently between them: What would have happened that night if she’d trusted him? And was there any chance that she trusted him enough now for what he was asking her to do?
There was only one way to find out.
“I’ve wondered a thousand times how that night could have played out differently,” he told her in a low voice.
And then he saw it—renewed excitement and arousal moving across her beautiful face. Looking down at the water, she licked her lips and took a deep breath. When she looked back up at him, she was transformed: A sensuous creature from head to toe.
“Why don’t we find out?” She didn’t give him any time to catch his breath before she said, “I think I’m going to soap up now.” Her voice was husky, and almost enough to have him forgetting about the whole thing and just diving in there to pull her down over him again.
Instead, he made himself take one step back, and then another, until he was backed up against the sink. He yanked off his T-shirt and stood there naked, his erection throbbing hard against his stomach as he watched her reach for the soap.
That first night when he’d walked in on her in the tub, he should have left the room immediately. But wild horses couldn’t have dragged him away. Hell, the entire house could have been falling down around them and he still would have stood there, unable to do anything but stare at Chloe in awe.
Tonight, he was standing again in the bathroom, watching her slowly, sensuously, begin to run a bar of soap down her outstretched legs. She had such smooth skin, such pretty thigh and calf muscles, such lovely toes.
Slowly, she lowered her leg back into the water, then lifted the other.
His erection was a living thing against his lower stomach, a heartbeat away from dragging the rest of him across the room and into the tub to get at her. Knowing he had to hold onto something to keep from reaching for her, he grabbed a towel off the rack beside him and gripped it tight enough to tear it in two.
* * *
Chloe didn’t need to look at Chase to feel the heady strength of his desire from across the room. She loved how powerful she felt, teasing him this way. And she loved the fact that he wanted it just as much as she did.
God, she thought with a barely repressed moan, it was going to be good when he finally joined her in the tub.
It was so tempting just to give in to that need, to throw the soap down and reach out for the gorgeous man standing on the other side of the bathroom watching her with utter lust.
But the anticipation of that moment would only make it sweeter when it finally came.
Still, she had to work really, really hard to keep her voice steady as she continued to play their sexy game. “Just give me a sec, okay? And then you can hand me that towel.” She couldn’t repress a small smile as she looked at him and said, “You don’t mind waiting, do you?”
“No.”
Not bothering to hide her grin at how strangled the one short word had sounded, she dipped the lavender scented bar of soap back into the water. Once wet, she began the slow process of running it over her collarbones, and then lower, and lower still.
The tips of her br**sts had already beaded tightly beneath the heat of his gaze, but as she came closer and closer to them with the suds, she couldn’t believe how much more sensitive her skin felt. Almost as if one touch from her soapy fingers—combined with the devastating desire in Chase’s eyes—would be enough to have her crying out his name.
The soap slipped from her fingers and water splashed up onto her face.
Chase’s voice came from across the room, low and borderline desperate. “I think the bar of soap slipped between your legs.”
She had no idea what came over her then, how on earth a wanton seductress could have taken her over so quickly. If ever there was a time and place for reticence—for fear—to lift their ugly heads, it was here. It was now. And the truth was, a large part of her was shocked by how her hidden desires were bubbling up one after the other with Chase...and that she was actually letting them out.
The smart, rational thing would be to end the game right away, before it went any further. She should be doing everything she could to keep the truth of who she really was from Chase, should be making sure that he could never come back one day in the future and hurt her with it.
But when she looked up at him, she simply couldn’t find a way to reconcile all of those fears with the beautiful man clutching the towel for dear life. And, ultimately, her body didn’t really care about her latent fears at present. Not when such beautiful satisfaction awaited her in his arms.
Which was why she found herself saying, “Maybe I would have better luck looking for it on my hands and knees.”
Chase blew out a pained breath. “I’m not sure I’m going to survive this.”
Moving slowly, carefully, in the slick and soapy tub, she sat up until she was kneeling. Water streamed off her br**sts. Reaching into the water for the soap, she said, “Ah, there it is, slippery little sucker.”