Page 56 of The Law of Attraction
Only when she heard the shower turn on did it occur to her that Adam was completely naked in the next room. Which of course caused her to imagine the water running in sheets over his smooth, muscled torso and down his legs. His hands lathering up the soap, and rubbing it over his body—
Nope. Stop.
She needed something else to focus on. Something to take her mind off the hot naked man on the other side of the bathroom door.
She got up and dug out her knitting. It wasn’t exactly bright in the room, but if she sat on the floor by the window, there was just enough light to knit by. Fortunately, she was far enough along on Penny’s shawl that she’d internalized the pattern and could practically do it with her eyes closed.
When Adam came out of the bathroom, all dewy-skinned and damp-haired, wearing jeans but no shirt, Olivia was grateful to have something to look at that wasn’t his glistening bare chest.
“Man, it’s dark in that bathroom with the door closed. And it gets hot in there fast.”
“Uh huh.” She breathed in the steamy, shampoo-scented air billowing out of the bathroom and tried not to imagine droplets of condensation collecting on Adam’s skin and trickling down the valley between his pecs. Instead, she repeated the shawl’s pattern in her head like a mantra: Knit three, knit two together, yarn over. Knit three, knit two together, yarn over.
He was walking back and forth across the room, from his suitcase to the bathroom and back again, and he still hadn’t put his shirt on. He must be trying to cool off first, but she wished he’d hurry up and do it. She caught a whiff of that spicy, woodsy scent she’d smelled on him before, and glanced up to see him rubbing product into his hair in front of the bathroom mirror.
She lowered her eyes again quickly, but the scent had filled up the small room, and she inhaled slowly through her nose, enjoying the comforting Adam-ness of it.
He came back out of the bathroom and paced to the window, standing beside her as he stared out at the rain. “This weather is bullshit.”
“Uh huh,” she said again.
His bare foot was next to her knee, his leg so close it was practically touching hers, and the scent of his hair product was making her dizzy. Also, he still hadn’t put his shirt on. He had it draped over his shoulder like a dish towel, and it required all her willpower not to gaze up at him wistfully.
“You really lived with storms like this all the time growing up?”
“Not like this.” Her knuckles were white as she gripped the knitting needles. Knit three, knit two together, yarn over. “A storm this bad used to be an every ten to twenty years kind of event. But with climate change they’re practically an annual occurrence these days.”
She could feel his eyes on her now. He was watching her knit, standing over her all bare-chested and hot in those jeans that hugged his thighs in a way she refused to let herself look at even though his thighs were at eye level and only inches away from her.
Knit three, knit two together, yarn over.
How much longer was he going to stand there watching her? And was he ever going to put his damn shirt on? Her fingers fumbled the yarn-over, and she nearly dropped a stitch.
Olivia gave up and set her knitting aside. “If you’re done in the bathroom, I’m going to shower.”
“Yeah, it’s all yours.” Adam stayed by the window while she dug through her suitcase for clean underwear. “Don’t forget to take your phone,” he added when she started for the bathroom, clutching her small bundle of intimate apparel to her chest—as if he hadn’t already gotten an eyeful of her underwear in the bathroom this morning.
“Thank you.” Grabbing her phone out of her purse, she escaped into the bathroom and blew out a relived breath as the door closed between them, plunging her into total darkness.
She used the light on her phone to start up the shower and undress, but turned it off before stepping under the water. Showering in the dark felt weird, but also oddly nice. It was a little like being in one of those sensory deprivation tanks, and it went a long way toward helping her relax.
Until it started to get too hot and stuffy. Adam was right—with the bathroom door closed, the steam combined with the lack of air-conditioning turned the small space into a sauna pretty fast. She decided against washing her hair, which she wouldn’t be able to blow dry anyway, and switched the water to cold for a minute to cool off before stepping out of the shower.
It was no fun pulling her clothes on over her damp, sweaty skin, but she didn’t have the option of walking around shirtless like Adam, so she sucked it up and got fully dressed. When she pulled open the door, sighing with relief at the influx of cooler air that hit her skin, she found Adam bent over examining her knitting.
He jolted upright, raising his hands like a criminal cornered by the police. “I wasn’t touching it, I swear.”
“Okay.” She carried her dirty clothes over to her suitcase and stuffed them deep inside.
“What are you making?” he asked, edging toward the bed.
“A shawl.”
“Is it for your grandmother?”
“No, it’s for my best friend for her birthday.”
He nodded and sank down on the foot of the bed.
