Her eyes shoot open as soon as my fingers wrap around her hips. In one fell swoop, I turn her back to the counter and lift her until her ass slides across the smooth surface next to the sink. Her burned hand is closed in a fist against her chest, but her free hand is now clutching my forearm for balance.
“Show off,” she deadpans. To my delight, there’s a teasing smile on her face and a new blush covering her cheeks.
I smirk, standing between her legs. There’s an urge sitting in the center of my chest to tease back. But I keep my mouth shut, still paying close attention to the way she holds her breath and the hair stands up on her arm as I spread the burn cream over her fingers.
It’s not hard to apply an ointment, and it certainly shouldn’t last this long. But I take my time anyway. It’s neurotic how badly I don’t want to stop.
When I think I’ve probably reached my time limit, I reach for the bandages. I place a small strip on each pad of her fingers so that she can still spread them and use them for . . . whatever she might need them for before they aren’t hurting anymore.
We’re close, as I lean forward to inspect my work. I can feel her breath, and to my surprise, her free hand reaches up to the soft stretchy collar of my shirt, tugging it gently to the side.
“Okay, I thought it was a sideways mountain or something because only half of it was showing,” she jokes.
I tuck my chin toward my chest, looking down to the tattoo on my collarbone that I think she’s referring to. Her burned hand is still in mine, for no particular reason.
“Paper airplane?”
I nod, flexing my jaw. “My brother has the same one. He’s deployed right now, so?—”
She tears her gaze away from the base on my neck and meets my eyes. I’m more proud than I am sad about my brother being so far away. So hopefully she doesn’t read too far into my expression and decides to leave the room and go back to the couch where she’s a lot farther away from me.
“What does it mean?”
It’s not a real deep story. “Just something we liked to do as kids. We’d make them out of anything we could find and throw them out of the hay loft. Our sister made them with us sometimes too.”
She squeezes my hand and smiles so big, I bet it makes her cheeks sting. I hate that she hurt her hand, so seeing her flash a grin makes the surface of my skin feel warm again.
“Why do you have so many tattoos?”
I shrug. “I’m sentimental.”
“They’re all beautiful,” she says.
My thumb traces down away from her burn and mindlessly smooths over the pulse point on her inner wrist. She looks down, but I don’t stop.
“I thinkyou’rebeautiful.”
Chapter Twelve
Izzy
Metaphorical confetti burstsfrom a cannon in my brain.
Not even the slight sting of the burn on my hand can distract me enough to pretend he didn’t just say that. I’m holding my breath, willing myself to stay calm before I run out of the room and start doodling his name with hearts around it in a journal like a love-struck middle schooler.
He thinks I’m beautiful.
He said so.
I lean in close, studying the intricate shading on the wings of the paper airplane tattoo. It’s astonishing how the artist was able to put so much detail into such a tiny design. Without saying anything back from fear of coming on a little too strong, I bring my hand up and trail a finger across the spot. The pad of my finger trails over the tattoo and then, as if it has a mind of its own, continues over the length of his collarbone.
Other than the rise and fall of his chest, he’s still. The pulse point near my finger begins to flutter furiously, though, and I can’t bring myself to pull away and end the skin-to-skin contact. I don’t want to stop touching him. I want to touch himmore.
While I smooth my finger back toward the tattoo, he drops his hands so that both arms are at his sides. He’s silent as I slowly circle the design, but I don’t miss his hard swallow out of the corner of my eye. Then his jaw clenches, and I finally stop shutting down the urges that my body has been begging me to give in to.
I may never see this man again.
But one taste of him is worth it, I decide. One tiny, little taste.
