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Authors: Serena Bell
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recognized him.
Kincaid. Up a tree, not a hundred yards from her house.
She looked away. It was one thing to idly admire a random, well-muscled arborist, another thing to deliberately ogle a man she knew while he worked.
A man who had made her come, standing up, in an alley, through some combination of the skill in his fingers, the taunt in his voice as he’d counted, and the way he’d confined her.
What a bizarre coincidence. As if the universe were trying to tell her something. And maybe it was. The universe had, after all, brought him to the diner where she worked and bade him sit, idle, in a back booth. It had dictated that he would be in the diner on a night when she cooked, that she would cook
his
meal, that Markos would castigate her, and that Kincaid would stand up for her.
He pushed himself up out of the notch where he’d been working and stepped onto a higher branch. She watched his calf bulge, saw the ink on his back ripple with the surge of energy under his skin. Sunlight played off the sweat on his neck, caught the blond hair on his forearm as he raised the pole to clip another branch.
More.
It wasn’t even a word, really. More a sensation, a sinking heat, a spreading warmth. She’d never been someone who responded to visual stimulation. Sure, she could appreciate a photo of a hot, mostly naked guy, sure, she could admire a well-sculpted male form, but she didn’t troll the internet for video or anything. She didn’t linger and stare.
Or if she did, she wasn’t so conscious of herself. She didn’t feel so out of control of her body, like there was a trip wire between the two of them, so that when he raised his arm to show her the twist of muscle that defined his shoulder, when he displayed that tuft of darker hair like some primitive mating call, her body shot to awareness without her brain even having a say in it.
I’d do it again.
What we did in the alley.
Her brain might be arguing for sticking to the plan and prioritizing compatibility, but her body was full-speed-ahead for
More
.
I could go talk to him.
Damn,
she was weak. She’d driven two thousand miles in a broken-down beater to escape her own mistakes,
sworn
she wouldn’t make the same ones again, and the shine of sweat on well-defined muscle was doing her in.
Come on, Lily.
If he’d wanted to see her, if
he’d
wanted to do it again, he’d known perfectly well where to find her. The fact that he hadn’t found her, hadn’t come to see her, spoke loudly of his intentions. He’d had what he wanted from her, and he was done.
If she went to talk to him now, she’d just be pathetic.
She washed the orange off her hands, then began straightening the kitchen. Avoiding looking at him as best she could. Just—just checking from time to time to see if he was still there. Like poking a bruise to see if it was still sore.
It was still sore.
She was still on high alert for the motion of that trip wire.
And then, as she watched, the branch he was standing on split and he tumbled out of the tree and out of her sight.
Chapter 8
“Oh, my
God,
are you okay?”
A female voice, aflutter with concern. The smell of an orange. Cool, soft hands on his arm.
He’d been taking a slow inventory of his body parts, not quite willing yet to open his eyes. He hadn’t struck his head or lost consciousness, so that was good. He seemed to have feeling in all his limbs, so he probably hadn’t broken his neck or spine. There was no intense pain radiating from legs or arms, so apparently he’d gotten insanely lucky and not broken a bone.
“Kincaid, are you
okay
?”
The female voice knew his name, and now her small hands were beginning to prod him all over, as if she were doing an inventory of her own, which was delight and agony, particularly the one that was moving over his calf and up to his thigh, sending
wake up! wake up!
messages to the one part of his body whose good function he obviously did not need to worry about at all. The other
Kincaid. Up a tree, not a hundred yards from her house.
She looked away. It was one thing to idly admire a random, well-muscled arborist, another thing to deliberately ogle a man she knew while he worked.
A man who had made her come, standing up, in an alley, through some combination of the skill in his fingers, the taunt in his voice as he’d counted, and the way he’d confined her.
What a bizarre coincidence. As if the universe were trying to tell her something. And maybe it was. The universe had, after all, brought him to the diner where she worked and bade him sit, idle, in a back booth. It had dictated that he would be in the diner on a night when she cooked, that she would cook
his
meal, that Markos would castigate her, and that Kincaid would stand up for her.
He pushed himself up out of the notch where he’d been working and stepped onto a higher branch. She watched his calf bulge, saw the ink on his back ripple with the surge of energy under his skin. Sunlight played off the sweat on his neck, caught the blond hair on his forearm as he raised the pole to clip another branch.
More.
It wasn’t even a word, really. More a sensation, a sinking heat, a spreading warmth. She’d never been someone who responded to visual stimulation. Sure, she could appreciate a photo of a hot, mostly naked guy, sure, she could admire a well-sculpted male form, but she didn’t troll the internet for video or anything. She didn’t linger and stare.
Or if she did, she wasn’t so conscious of herself. She didn’t feel so out of control of her body, like there was a trip wire between the two of them, so that when he raised his arm to show her the twist of muscle that defined his shoulder, when he displayed that tuft of darker hair like some primitive mating call, her body shot to awareness without her brain even having a say in it.
I’d do it again.
What we did in the alley.
Her brain might be arguing for sticking to the plan and prioritizing compatibility, but her body was full-speed-ahead for
More
.
I could go talk to him.
Damn,
she was weak. She’d driven two thousand miles in a broken-down beater to escape her own mistakes,
sworn
she wouldn’t make the same ones again, and the shine of sweat on well-defined muscle was doing her in.
Come on, Lily.
If he’d wanted to see her, if
he’d
wanted to do it again, he’d known perfectly well where to find her. The fact that he hadn’t found her, hadn’t come to see her, spoke loudly of his intentions. He’d had what he wanted from her, and he was done.
If she went to talk to him now, she’d just be pathetic.
She washed the orange off her hands, then began straightening the kitchen. Avoiding looking at him as best she could. Just—just checking from time to time to see if he was still there. Like poking a bruise to see if it was still sore.
It was still sore.
She was still on high alert for the motion of that trip wire.
And then, as she watched, the branch he was standing on split and he tumbled out of the tree and out of her sight.
Chapter 8
“Oh, my
God,
are you okay?”
A female voice, aflutter with concern. The smell of an orange. Cool, soft hands on his arm.
He’d been taking a slow inventory of his body parts, not quite willing yet to open his eyes. He hadn’t struck his head or lost consciousness, so that was good. He seemed to have feeling in all his limbs, so he probably hadn’t broken his neck or spine. There was no intense pain radiating from legs or arms, so apparently he’d gotten insanely lucky and not broken a bone.
“Kincaid, are you
okay
?”
The female voice knew his name, and now her small hands were beginning to prod him all over, as if she were doing an inventory of her own, which was delight and agony, particularly the one that was moving over his calf and up to his thigh, sending
wake up! wake up!
messages to the one part of his body whose good function he obviously did not need to worry about at all. The other
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