Page 33 of Rafferty's Rules
Yep, you can see it even in the dark, and it’s magnificent.
Rafferty then shows me how to use the front-loading washing machine, indoors this time, not that it takes any great figuring out. I choose a short cycle and wait around in the kitchen for the twenty minutes it takes until I can pull out my clothes and hang them to dry, because this T-shirt paired with his oversized shorts is not going to cut it tomorrow for my trip to Target.
As Rafferty still hasn’t appeared downstairs, I check the back and front doors—all locked up for the night—and walk upstairs, past the empty living room and the darkened deck, and up the next flight of stairs to the bedroom I’d awoken in this morning. Was it really only this morning? It feels like I’ve lived a whole other life since then.
As I approach, the light in the bedroom is on, the low glimmer casting an arc across the hallway floor. My heart beats wildly as I push the open door wider, finding the room empty. My shoulders sag as I release a deep breath. The bed is still unmade from this morning, the duvet crumpled and lying at the end of the bed, but instead of my clothes hanging over the chair, Rafferty’s shorts and T-shirt have been casually discarded instead.
My heart begins to pound, though thrilled or terrified, I can’t decide, especially as something begins drumming low inside. Beyond another half open door, the shower switches on.
Ohmygodohmygod.
He’s in the shower. Naked. Between us is just a door that’s not exactly closed. If I were another type of woman, an audacious woman, a knowledgeable woman, I’d push the door wide, maybe ask him if he needs me to scrub his back. Or even strip naked and slide in behind him without a word. Instead, shock has me picking up his clothes and dropping my butt to the chair. It’s just coincidence that I can almost see him from here.
Almost. Not quite.
It’s all good, I silently intone. You’re just sitting in a chair, minding your own business. You’re not perched on the bed all come hither and presumptuous. Except, maybe I shouldn’t be here—maybe this is the master bedroom. But in this case, I owe it to my etiquette classes to find out where my host would like me to sleep.
Ha!
So that’s how I justify it to myself, sitting there in the Louis style chair, folding his laundry and popping it in a neat pile on my knee as I imagine him walking to the bathroom in his underwear.Or maybe he’s a fan of going commando?
Yep, nothing to worry about, it’s just little ol’ me, sitting in a chair, waiting for my host. Sitting here with nothing else to do but stare into the space the open bathroom door affords.
The sound of the cascading water dissipates, the shower door sliding open, followed by the sound of wet feet padding on a tiled floor.Or maybe I just have a very furtive imagination—fertile, I mean fertile!My heart jumps as he steps into my field of vision, you know, not like I’m craning my neck or anything. He stands at the basin, the mirror fogged—thankyouLord—his towel in his hand, one-half of his naked body in view.
And what a view it is.
If I strain a little harder, and I do, I can stare at the curve of his bicep as he rubs a snowy towel across his damp hair. See the length of tanned muscle in his thigh, and the hard, taut roundness of his backside. And Lord ha’ mercy, he has back dimples.Made for the lick of a tongue.I almost will him to turn around so I can get a good look at the front, but I know that would mean he’d see me staring at him.Maybe he’d even spot a little drool, too.
A moment later, he wraps the towel low on his waist and steps out into the bedroom with a casual smile.
Maybe he wanted me to see?
Maybe that’s just what I want to think.
‘I didn’t know where you’d want me,’ I begin. ‘W-where you’d want me to sleep, I mean.’ Not for the first time today, I thank God for this sunburn. I might not be thanking him tomorrow, but for today, it totally works.
‘What do you mean?’ he asks, clearly confused, throwing his hand in the direction of the unmade bed. ‘We’ll sleep like we did last night.’
‘Weeee?’ Man, that word has too many vowels to sound anything else other than crazy.
‘Yeah. You and me.’ He tilts his head. ‘You do know we slept together last night, don’t you?’
‘I...’Ai, ai, aiii!‘I had no idea. I woke alone, and all evidence suggested I’d been so all night.’
‘All evidence?’ He quirks a brow, and I rapidly run through a list of the things he might mean. And come up blank.
‘The pillow—the pillow next to me. It hadn’t been slept on.’
‘I know. I propped all of the pillows under your head. Is this why you’re panicking?’
‘Who’s panicking? I’m not panicking. Nope, not me,’ I say, jumping from the chair as I begin to pace the room. ‘I just had no idea that we’d... ’
Evidence, evidence, evidence—condom?
The scattering of clothes?
Bodily clues?
