Total pages in book: 74
Estimated words: 68743 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 344(@200wpm)___ 275(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68743 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 344(@200wpm)___ 275(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
Corey lifted both arms, palms out, in a sign of hands-off. He obviously got the message.
Knowing that the pain of a sting could be excruciating, Asher made a beeline for his bathroom, where he had a kit beneath the vanity.
Chapter Four
Asher didn’t pause until he reached the bathroom. He lowered Nikki to her feet, pulled a decorative stool from the corner and settled her on it. “Let me see.”
She raised her leg. Large red welts marred her flesh, and it looked like there were tentacles still embedded in the skin.
He winced but didn’t say a word. He opened the door to the vanity and pulled out his first-aid kit, which included tweezers for just this purpose, along with a bottle of alcohol and one of vinegar, also kept here for this kind of emergency.
“You’re prepared.”
“You have to be around here. Stings are fairly common.”
He unscrewed the top of the alcohol bottle and ran some over the tweezers to sterilize them before coming back to her. “Let’s move the chair closer to the tub so your leg hangs into it. I want to run vinegar over the stingers before I pull them out.”
She grimaced but did as he asked, draping her leg over the ledge. He soaked her skin in the vinegar, doing his best to focus on her injury and not her coconut-scented smell, delicious despite the horrible stench of the vinegar. Not to mention the amount of bare flesh revealed thanks to the skimpy, wet bikini she wore.
Once he finished, she rose and he pulled the chair closer to the toilet. He sat on the seat cover and patted his thighs.
She lowered herself onto the stool and stretched her leg across his lap. He picked up the tweezer, meeting her gaze before he got to work. Her fear was palpable, and he was determined to do this fast.
“Ready?” he asked.
She bit down on her lower lip and nodded.
Pulling out the stingers wasn’t fun. He felt her stiffen, noted the tightening of her muscles and the occasional sniffle. But he managed to finish. “All done. And you should know, you’re braver than Harrison. He cried like a baby.”
She laughed as he’d intended, the sound hitting him in the chest in an unfamiliar way.
“Thank you,” she murmured and slid her leg off his thighs, and he felt the loss of her body heat.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
She nodded. “Yeah. It hurts but I know it’ll pass.”
He rose and put everything on the counter back into the cabinet before handing her a tube of cortisone cream. “Why don’t you shower, let the warm water rinse over your leg, and put this on after? I’ll leave some Benadryl and ibuprofen in your room for you to take, too.”
“Asher?”
He turned just as she stepped up to him, way too close for comfort, her tanned skin glowing and that exotic coconut scent that was beyond arousing wrapping around him. She looked up, those eyes liquid pools of green pulling him in.
“I just wanted to say thank you. I know you didn’t want to bring me here and now I’ve already been trouble–”
He couldn’t tear his gaze from her lips, lush and wet from the swipe of her tongue. One second he was staring and the next he’d dipped his head and covered her mouth with his. At the first touch of his lips, she stilled, her surprise evident, but she immediately wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him back.
With her on board, he swept his tongue inside. He tasted her, salty from the ocean with a hint of sweetness that was all Nikki. The woman he’d been keeping at a distance when he wanted nothing more than to lose himself inside her.
She was everything he wasn’t. Fun, sweet, happy, young. His friend’s sister. The friend who trusted him. And as she rubbed herself against his hard erection, her tight nipples grazing his chest, he knew he had to stop before things went any further.
He raised his head. With the counter behind him, he couldn’t step back, but he’d ended the kiss and made his point.
She moaned at the loss of his mouth and did what he couldn’t. Moved away and put distance between them. But her eyes were glazed with need, and she had a dreamy expression on her face only a young woman could manage.
“Don’t look at me like that,” he said in a gruff voice.
She breathed heavily, her breasts rising and falling, her cleavage beckoning for him to lick. And there was that tiny bathing suit he’d be jerking off to tonight.
He needed to adjust his cock but refrained. “This can’t happen again.” He had to say it out loud. For his own sake as well as for hers.
His words cleared the lust-filled fog from her eyes and she widened her gaze. “I see. Okay, then. Umm, I’ll just be going now.” Cheeks flushed red in embarrassment, she grabbed the cortisone and fled, giving him a perfect view of her ass cheeks peeking out from the sides of her bathing suit bottoms.