Read Online Fairest by Beth Bishop - Free Book Online

quietly. His fingers traced lightly around my belly button. “You feel nice.”
    â€œLet go of me,” I said.
    He loosened his hold and mumbled, “Sorry.”
    I pulled back the covers and removed his arm from around me. Once free, I got out of bed, grabbed my overnight bag from the luggage caddy, and carried it into the bathroom. After setting the bag on the counter, I locked the door. A quick peek into the adjoined room showed me it was vacant, so I elected to go in there after getting a quick shower.
    I hadn’t slept enough, but I figured I could do that on the plane. The shower was the first walk-in shower I had ever seen in a private home. The dark blue of the glass, block wall insured no one could see into it from either room or the mirror. Warming towel bars hung at the ends of the wall, and the showerhead was in the center. Jets shot water from the wall. Once I got the water the right temperature and the jets at the right pressure, I decided I could take a little more time to enjoy it.
    I shampooed and rinsed, conditioned and rinsed. The water pounded the tension from my shoulders and back. I hummed and then laughed softly at how six people could’ve fit in the shower with me.
    When I started on my legs, someone came from the vacant room into the bathroom. The toilet was in an actual water closet, and whoever it was went in there. After a few seconds, I heard peeing.
    â€œMike, is that you?” Linc asked me. “Dude, I had the craziest dream about Skye, and when I woke up just now, I swear the bed smells like her.” The toilet flushed. “Mike? Are you okay? You puked a lot last night, or was it this morning?” He chuckled.
    I moved down to the end of the shower wall and stuck my head around it. When Linc registered who I was, he flinched. Then, he winced and pressed the heel of his hand to the side of his head.
    â€œNot Mike,” I said as I glared. “Mind much?”
    â€œOh.” He squinted and then looked at me. “Oh, ah—” Mouth open, he hooked a thumb over his shoulder. “That’s
your
room.”
    â€œYeah. You passed out on my bed.”
    â€œI didn’t…I mean,
we
didn’t
do
—”
    â€œNo!” I pinched my eyebrows and stomped back over to the jet area and out of sight. “I told you to get out of my bed and shoved you, and you said, ‘No, Mom. Sleepy.’ After that, you did a very good impression of Sleeping Beauty.”
    â€œSleeping Beauty?” He sounded offended.
    â€œOkay, a dead man. Is that better?”
    â€œNo. Well, I’m glad we didn’t really, because…hmmm. I don’t remember much after about 3:00 a.m. I’d hate to have done something with you and have no memory of it.”
    â€œSure.” I snapped off the water. I moved to the entrance to the shower and jerked the towel off the warming bar. “Because it’s not having the memory that would upset you, not that you did something with someone your friend likes.”
    â€œCut the bullshit, Skye. You act like you don’t even like him. Anyway, he said you shot him down.”
    â€œShot him down,” I muttered as I dried myself. I wrung out my hair, rubbed the towel over it briskly, and then wrapped the towel around my body. “Yeah, I didn’t want to make out with a drunk person who smelled like cigarette smoke.”
    â€œWould you have if he wasn’t drunk?”
    My cheek and eye twitched, and I shook my head. “I’m not talking to you about him.” After double-checking that my towel was secure and covered me well, I walked out of the shower. Linc was sitting on the counter beside my bag, holding my phone in his hand and looking through my things. “Get outta my stuff,” I barked and snatched the bag and phone away from him. After moving my belongings to the other end of the counter, I took out my comb.
    â€œYou’re wearing panties with little blue