He’d circle back to that later—because there were many reasons to spend more than eight hours in bed, especially with a woman like Dani. Right now, he had to bite on something else she said. Lifting a brow, he asked, “Key . . . strokes?”
A chuckle bubbled up in her throat, and she sighed. “Seriously?”
He took her hand in his again, lacing their fingers together, tracing light patterns on the inside of her wrist. She shivered as he touched that sensitive skin, but she didn’t pull away. In fact, she shifted a little closer. He sidled closer himself, until his body was a hairsbreadth from hers. Her skin smelled like strawberries, and he found himself drifting closer, wanting to taste it on his tongue.
Patience.
“So, you never laze in bed?”
She swallowed, and he traced the lines of her throat with his gaze. “No,” she said. “I don’t have any patience for it. Too much to do. Too many things in my brain that . . .” She trailed off.
“That what?”
“Too many things that only seem to come to the forefront of my mind when it’s too quiet, when dark has taken over the world.” She shook her head. “That sounds ridiculous, I know.” A smile that didn’t look right in the least. “Come on,” she said, turning for the front door, “let’s go get food.”
“Sure,” he said, keeping his tone deliberately light, wanting to tug her out of whatever had made her sad. He could tell she didn’t trust him enough yet to share what had wounded her so deeply. Instead, he teased, “I’d be happy to go on a date with you.”
She sputtered, spun back. “I—uh—”
“What’s the matter? I’ll be a cheap date when you’re paying, I promise.” His lips curved. “Most of the time, I’m only allowed to eat vegetables.”
Dani shook her head, eyes wide, and arms stuck straight out at her sides.
He walked to her, not stopping until his toes were millimeters from hers. “Dani?”
There was a bead of perspiration on her throat, sliding down beneath the neckline of her dress, down between a pair of some of the most gorgeous breasts he’d ever laid eyes on. He could see her pulse thrumming, just above her collarbone, a tiny fluttering of butterfly wings.
“I wasn’t asking you out,” she whispered.
“I know.” He took a chance, bypassing the miniscule touches, the barely there brushes, and cupped her cheek. “I am,” he said. “Asking you out. At some point in the future, when you’re guaranteed to say, yes,” he added when he saw the protest begin to gather on her face.
Her sigh coated his skin, and for a moment, she leaned into his hand, her body drifting close enough that the tips of her breasts whispered across his chest. “I don’t know that I will,” she breathed.
His hand flexed on her cheek. “I do,” he said.
There was something between them. He felt it. She felt it.
The same thing that had prompted him to invade her car and go grocery shopping together. The same that had her lingering near him, her body leaning toward his. It was an invisible thread, slender and reedy, but it was the promise of something different than he’d ever experienced.
Something that had him pushing forward when he would have normally backed off.
Because Dani was different.
She drifted a little closer, her chest brushing his, those glorious breasts barely making contact. It was a fucking tease, that light contact, and the urge to yank her close was intense.
But instead of giving in to her, he shoved that down, stepped back, and asked, “Groceries?”
Her chest rose and fell, her cheek slipped from his hand, and . . . a trickle of ice slid down his spine.
Because eclipsing that thread was the refusal he saw in her eyes.
Fuck.
“Or if not groceries,” he said quickly. “Then maybe—”
He froze when she touched him, her fingers combing lightly through his beard, sending prickles of sensation down his throat, his torso, unseen fingers wrapping around his cock and squeezing tight.
“It’s soft,” she whispered. “I expected it to be rough.”
Ethan didn’t dare move, not when she was touching him with such feather-like strokes, not when it felt so fucking good. Not when—
She stepped back.
“Groceries,” she murmured.
He wanted to wind his fingers into those sleek brown curls, to haul her flush against him, and to kiss her until they were both reduced to ashes. To forget all about the need for oxygen and food and . . . whatever other things humans needed to survive.
But . . . groceries.
So, he stuck the bags under his arms and let Dani lead the way out the front door.
Chapter Seven
Dani
She stared at the bags of groceries on Ethan’s arms, one after another hooked on his big arms like giant bracelets hanging from wrist to elbow.
“Mandy”—one of the Gold’s trainers—“is going to kill me if you get hurt because you were carrying my groceries,” she murmured.
“Mandy,” he said, smiling up at her with that fucking gorgeous grin that never failed to turn her insides to jelly, “will understand that sometimes a man needs to take care of a woman—”
“How incredibly sexist of you,” she said dryly.
And who knew that she could be dry? Well, not in the non-wet sense, because she spent the majority of her time in that non-wet manner (aside from Ethan’s effects on her pussy . . . ha), but rather in a witty, sarcastic way. She was usually so worried about all the jumbled thoughts in her head getting mixed up and tangled, those lame, mismatched bits trying to escape and rendering her unable to form a sentence, let alone any banter or a droll comeback.
But with Ethan, it was different.
Somehow, all the voices in her head expounding on everything
