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She shielded her eyes to look up at him. Way, way up. A trickle of anticipation worked its way down her spinal column, releasing refreshing bursts of sensation en route. Was Mr Perfecto going to disrobe right in front of her? Would she be able to stand the suspense? ‘Yes, fine. You go ahead.’
And feel free to strip down to your trunks and make me even more grateful I’m not a ten-year-old boy.
She propped herself on her elbows, smiling when Trey turned his back on her, probably to keep an eye on Aldo and—joy of joys—give her the opportunity to appreciate his striptease unobserved. He toed off the Nike high-tops, balanced steadily on each leg to pull off his socks and then tuck them into the trainers. After unhooking his jeans, he bent over to take them off.
Black stretchy Lycra trunks. Thank you, God.
Lizzie almost whooped like Aldo at Trey’s excellent choice of swimwear: simple, functional, not budgie-smuggler gross but clingy enough to reveal the awesome contours of his bum, bunching and flexing splendidly as he lifted each leg to strip off his jeans. Crossing his arms, he grasped the hem of his polo shirt and pulled it over his head, then folded it and dropped it on top of the rest of his clothes.
Lizzie swallowed, drool collecting under her tongue at an alarming rate. His back was beautiful, as smoothly muscled as his arse, the wide shoulder blades tapering to the indentation of his ribs and bisected by the perfect line of his spine. Her gaze skated over his delicious bum to examine long legs dusted with curls of dark hair. He had the same olive-toned skin as Aldo. Maybe his dad had been Italian, too. Although his body was nothing like Aldo’s—Trey was a man, not a boy. She breathed through her nose. The whole of his body was beautiful. A work of art. Like that famous statue in Florence with the minuscule willy.
The blush burned her nape as she remembered Carly’s constant teasing about the size of Trey’s meat. Did she want him to turn around so she could make a considered assessment? Would her lungs continue to function if he did? Dying of asphyxiation would probably not be cool. Although she was beginning to see the appeal now for those people who liked to strangle themselves during sex, because just the sight of Trey’s awesomeness was making her light-headed enough to feel euphoric.
The breath she’d been holding burst out when, instead of turning, he ran his thumbs round the waistband of his trunks and dropped his head to concentrate on retying the strings at the front. And she spotted the tattoo.
The red and black ink was faded, but the shape suggested some kind of mythic bird, its wingspan spread across the width of his back, hovering above his coccyx and the slope of his backside, nestled in the demarcation line of white flesh that would usually be covered by his pants.
Lizzie blinked a couple of times, gobsmacked. Mr Perfecto had inked his arse. He’d hinted at his misspent youth earlier, but seriously? What the fuck?
Then again, tattoos were hardly bad-boy insignia these days. She folded her lolling tongue back into her mouth. In fact, tattoos were more like fashion statements; every one of her friends had one, ranging from elaborate cartoon characters and geometric designs to sage Sanskrit sayings that no doubt translated as ‘Confucius says I’m a pretentious twat’. She even had a tattoo, despite her near-phobia of needles. A constellation of tiny stars that ran along the line of her instep and then curled round her ankle—and
had looked cheesy and crap almost as soon as she’d survived the horror of having it etched into her foot two summers ago.
But Trey wasn’t a follower of fashion, if his wardrobe was anything to go by. And surely that would include body art trends. So why had he laid himself out in a tattoo parlour with his pants off and gotten his arse inked? There had to be a story there. A story she was suddenly very curious to hear.
‘I’ll see you in a bit.’
She glanced up, past Trey’s fascinating arse, to find him watching her from over his shoulder.
‘You OK?’ he said. ‘Your face is kind of red.’
You don’t know the half of it. ‘I’ll put some sunscreen on.’
‘You sure you don’t want to come in for a swim? Might help you to cool off,’ he said, turning to face her.
She kept her eyes firmly on his upper body so as not to overheat completely. Checking out his other assets would have to wait for another day. ‘What about our picnic stuff?’
‘I can keep an eye on it from the water,’ he added, ever practical and helpful.
She debated joining him. Warmed by the offer. And the thought of getting the chance to see all those muscles in sinuous motion, up close and dripping wet. But was forced to discard the idea.
Aldo would be there to play gooseberry like an eager puppy. And there was no point in risking death by drowning in duck-poo-infested water when she had to start working on a strategy to discover all Trey’s secrets in under two weeks.
But it wasn’t until he strolled away and then executed a perfect dive from the end of the dock—fearlessly arrowing that long body under the murky surface of the lake—that she realised this was the first time she’d been curious about another human being and their backstory for, well, like, forever.
And that the rush of enthusiasm and expectation felt more fabulous than a spot-free T-zone.
‘Trey, did you see me do a somersault?’
Trey peeled his attention from the bank, where Lizzie Best lay on their picnic blanket, the bikini she had stripped down to a lurid red against her pale skin. ‘Sorry, buddy, I missed it.’ Because I was far too busy checking out your sister. The guilty thought had him focusing on Aldo, or trying to.
He still hadn’t quite figured out why Lizzie had mellowed so much this morning. But he’d decided to stop asking the question when he’d spotted the stunned expression on her face after he’d stripped down to his trunks.
He’d seen that expression before from women, especially when he was without a shirt. He knew it meant they liked what they saw. Ever since he’d joined the local rugby club at sixteen, in an attempt to handle the loneliness and work off the frustration of being his mum’s sole carer, he’d gotten those flattering appraisals from women with increasing frequency. Because a handy by-product of the training was the muscle bulk he’d acquired in all the right places. Usually he appreciated that look. Even if he wasn’t able to act on it. But seeing that dazed, unfocused look in Lizzie’s cornflower blue eyes had made him instantly wary and yet uncomfortably warm.
Which was totally wrong.
Lizzie was three years younger than him, he wasn’t sure she even liked him much and Lizzie’s mum had told him all about how vulnerable her daughter was on Thursday night before she’d left. Lizzie having any kind of crush on him would be extremely bad. So how did he account for the tightening in his crotch her look had triggered?
