Page 14 of Shamelessly Loyal
Staring at the magazine page, the words blurred out even as I mentally retraced the path of the water droplets sliding over his bare chest. A drawer opened, and the rasp of fabric sliding on fabric sent other images to dance in my head.
I flipped the page a moment before the smell of his shampoo and body wash enveloped me. No matter how I might feign indifference, there was no ignoring his presence. He filled the room, the weight of him pressing down against me.
“I brought the food for you to eat,” he said as if I were a child who needed that explained. “The magazine will be there.”
Now, I was curious. “So the food won’t be?” It came out a great deal huskier than I intended. It didn’t help that I was still mentally road-mapping those water droplets. Keeping it cool, I twisted to meet his gaze.
Thankfully, he’d gotten dressed. The t-shirt looked like it had been spray painted on. Mainly since he had his arms folded. He was also wearing a pair of jeans, although I didn’t look any lower than that, nope, I turned myself around and faced the bag again.
Magazine.
Right.
I glanced back at the page I hadn’t been reading. He leaned over the sofa and my nerves sizzled in awareness. The whisper of his breath brushed my cheek. It took discipline to not flinch. However, revealing personal feelings in public had been conditioned out of me for years.
He plucked the magazine from my lap before he whispered, “You need to eat, Miss Benedict. Ivy would be upset if I weren’t taking care of you.”
Ivy? The desire to be obstinate melted at the information. Or maybe the fact he withdrew from my space let me catch my breath. It could be both.
“Her birth name is Ivy?” She’d told me the story, but I didn’t think she’d told me her birth name. Maybe she did. The moment the message had come through from her had pretty much turned my world upside down in the best way.
“Ivy Hardigan,” Pretty Boy offered up. “That was her name when she was born. It’s still her name, even if the Sharpes changed it.”
Emersyn was a classier name, sure. But it was also her mother’s maiden name. Emersyn Sharpe. A product of her family. The first time she told me that, she’d rolled her eyes.
“Family names can be currency.” My name, Elaine, was for my grandmother. I was pretty sure my mother had chosen it to keep my grandfather from tossing her out on her ass. Not that he would have. Sure, he threatened and he blustered…
This wasn’t about my family or me. I twisted off the bottle cap and took a long drink of the water.
“Well, I wouldn’t know. I put value in people, not names.” The reprimand seemed to hang there like a gauntlet he’d thrown down for me to pick up.
“It’s sad that you have to explain that,” I told him as I stood. Sitting there much longer with him hovering behind me was grating on my nerves. “Though, we most often attack in others what we dislike in ourselves.”
Crossing to where he’d dropped my bag, I reclaimed it and carried it to the bed where I set it down to go through.
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” He returned the magazine to the stack I’d taken it from and prowled toward me. “You think I put more value in names than I do people?”
“Interesting question.” I checked just what I had packed. The speed with which I’d left hadn’t given me much time. But I had at least a week’s worth of clothes in here if I were careful. Not that I planned to dress up for much. “Do you?”
“Do I what?” He was practically standing on top of me.
“Value names and positions more than people?” I raised my brows as I returned to perusing the contents of my bag. I didn’t really need to go through it all, but he didn’t like it when I stopped focusing on him. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of. Most people do. Society’s rules and all that.”
It was the world I’d been born into. The world I navigated daily. The world I planned to take over someday, if I didn’t just dump it all to go live like some bohemian in the Caribbean.
“I just told you I valued people more than names.” He sounded almost incensed.
“Huh.” I pulled out clean clothes to change into and pivoted to face him. “Here I thought you were trying to make a point.”
I made it all of one step before he caught my arm and tugged me back. A truly troubled frown tightened his forehead as he stared at me.
“I don’t give a damn about anyone’s name…” He glared at me. No, he wasn’t glaring. He was staring at me, studying me. Maybe trying to predict me? “Why would you think I do?”
“Because you do…your sister is Ivy. That name is important, yet she’s never gone by that name.” That much I knew for a fact. “To me, she is Emersyn. That’s her name. So yes, the name is important to you.”
He opened his mouth then closed it again, and I began to smile.
“I believe that’s one point for me, Pretty Boy.” I have no idea what possessed me to tap him on the nose with one finger. Nor what it ignited in him because one moment he was just staring daggers at me, and the next he’d dragged me into him and sealed his mouth to mine.