A Mate For Seth Page 15

  “I guess,” she called back. A fruity scent made its way out of the shower on a curl of steam. Before that moment, Seth couldn’t have said he knew what Sarah’s hair smelled like, but smelling that warm, floral perfume, he sure as hell recognized it. “We ran into each other at breakfast on Sunday. With Nat and Kaya. And he told me to call him if I wanted to run the trail. I wanted to run the trail, so I called him.”

  “Oh.” He was at a loss for words. Especially because his brain was very much busy picturing Sarah in the shower right now. Glossy, curvaceous, toned, wet hair down her back, the soles of her pink feet pressed flat against the tile.

  She turned the water off and Seth jumped like he’d been caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

  “You take a quick shower.”

  “Always have,” she called through the door. He heard some small noises and knew she was scuffing her hair with the towel. Now she was wrapping the towel around herself.

  A second later the door opened all the way. He jumped back but she didn’t come out into the hallway.

  “Just letting the steam out.”

  As casually as he could, he went and stood in the doorway, knowing that if she didn’t want him there, she’d have no problem booting him out. She was in the towel, just as he’d known she’d be, and was leaning over the sink, combing the knots out of her hair. He was fascinated. He’d never seen hair that long be brushed before. Except in movies where girls sat in front of gilded, heart-shaped mirrors and romantically, gently, brushed their hair 100 strokes before bed.

  Seth chuckled as he watched her aggressively wrestle with a knot and win.

  “What?” Her eyes caught his in the mirror.

  “I just never realized before that you have princess hair.”

  She scoffed.

  “You have princess hair,” he continued. “Yet you treat it like you’re yanking crabgrass out of your herb garden.” He winced as she ripped through another knot and tossed a hank of her hair over her shoulder.

  She shrugged and kept grooming herself. “He’s a funny guy.”

  “Who?”

  “Your brother.”

  Oh. They were still talking about Jackson, apparently. “I guess.”

  She smoothed lotion onto her face and rubbed the excess onto her hands vigorously. “He seems all mean and reserved, but I have my suspicions.”

  “Suspicions?” It was all Seth could do to even remotely keep up his half of this conversation. She was brushing her teeth now and for some reason, the little peeks of her pink tongue that she was giving to Seth were rooting him to the floor, making him dizzy.

  She spat out her toothpaste and rinsed her mouth before she caught his eye again in the mirror. “Yeah. I think that Jackson is actually a complete softy on the inside.”

  “Maybe so. Pretty much everything he does is for the people he loves. He can be gruff, but he’s the most thoughtful person I know.”

  She raised her eyebrows at Seth before she started to braid her hair. “Present company excluded.”

  “Me?”

  “You. You have to know how generous you are, Seth. Everything you do is for others.”

  He grunted in response as he watched her separate her hair into three sections and start braiding it into a long, honey tail down her back. He had no idea why this whole situation was so wildly erotic to him. To watch her tend to herself. Besides the obvious, of course, that she was half naked. Maybe it was the fact that standing in the bathroom door while a woman in a towel braided her wet hair wasn’t really something that friends did. It was something that lovers did.

  Seth knew that if he really were as committed to them being just friends as much as he said he was, he’d turn around and go downstairs, wait for her to finish up on her own.

  Right. Friends waited downstairs.

  His thoughts were jumbled and twisting as he watched her lean over the sink and stare at herself an inch from the mirror, her mouth pulling into a serious expression as she turned her head from one side to another. He couldn’t help but let his eyes trip down the slope of her back and straight to that ass of hers. The one that made him sweat standing still. Her ass was a thing of beauty. High and strong and looking pretty voluptuous draped in that towel. It usually was more compressed in a pair of athletic leggings, but right now? Right now it was completely unhindered and practically calling Seth’s name. Her braid trailed down her spine, stopping three quarters of the way down her back and that called Seth’s name, too. He imagined wrapping a hand around that braid, burying his face in the curve of her neck and burying his dick in the curve of her ass.

  “Seth.”

  He jumped again, like he’d been caught in the Playboy section of a gas station. She was looking at him over her shoulder, a funny expression on her face, and he knew just how lustful he must look. He was sure that if he turned and looked in that mirror, his eyes would be fuzzy and dark, his color high, his lips parted with his breath.

  “Yeah?”

  “I was asking you if Raphael is the same way? If the selflessness thing is a trait that runs in your family but you all show it in different ways.”

  “Sarah,” he said in a gruff voice, his hand clamping down on the doorframe of the bathroom to keep himself from going in.

  “Yeah?”

  “I don’t want to talk about my brothers anymore.”

  “What do you want to talk about, then?” She was still talking to him over her shoulder, her back to him.

  He sighed, tore his eyes from hers and rested his forehead against the doorjamb. “Things I can’t have.”

  “That’s your desired topic of conversation?” She laughed a little and then she turned back to the sink, pulling out a drawer and fishing in it for some other product. She pulled out a little vial and pumped a clear liquid underneath her eyes. She patted it on with her pinky finger.

  He watched this with the rigid fascination of a man observing witchcraft for the first time.

  “Seth,” she said, recapping the vial and catching his eye in the mirror again. “Come in here.”

  His body had him taking an immediate step forward before his brain caught him and he froze. “Why?”

  She laughed, dropped her head back and rolled her eyes at the ceiling. “Come in here.”

  He took one step and then two and then there he was, standing at her back, not touching, just standing behind her, eyeing their reflections in the mirror. He stood a head taller than she did, and was significantly broader.

  He could feel her shower-heated skin even though he wasn’t touching her. She was warming the air between them.

  “Lean down,” she commanded him, a frown on her face and her hands on her hips.

  “What?”

  “You’re too tall. You’re looming. Lean down.”

  Careful still not to touch her, Seth leaned forward, placing a hand on the counter on either side of her hips. He fit his face above her shoulder, so they stood at the same height, but still, he didn’t touch her.

  She opened her mouth to say something, their eye contact zinging with an almost unbearable energy, but then she seemed to change her mind and clapped her mouth back shut. She dropped her eyes and Seth felt released from some cosmic, tensile force. Like she’d been leashing him, just with those wide eyes of hers.

  He bent forward, his hands closing into fists on the countertop, and dropped his head down so that his forehead rested against her warm, scented shoulder blade. He smelled soap. He took deep, long drags of breaths, trying to both calm himself down and imprint this moment into his body, into his DNA.

  How had this happened? He’d only brought over pasta.

  Not good for her. Bad for her. Dangerous. She’ll hate you in the end.

  “Friends don’t do this,” he said suddenly, lifting his head back up and trying to make himself step away from her. But he didn’t succeed. His hands gripped the countertop, keeping her in the circle of his arms. “Friends wait downstairs and chat benignly about things that barely matte
r. Friends don’t make things this messy or complicated.”

  He was unsure if he was talking to her or to himself, but suddenly she was turning in his arms, bumping against him, soft into his hipbone, smooth skin against his jaw.

  Bent over as he was, when she stopped turning, they were eye to eye. Her hair, even pulled back, was just beginning to wave a little bit at her temples as it started to dry, her face was scrubbed clean, her features strong, her eyes dark. He was dying for her.

  “Seth, how about instead of talking about all the things you can’t have,” she said, her voice dropping low, “we talk about all the things you can have.”

  He watched her lips form those words and couldn’t help but feel pulled forward.

  Dangerous. Not good for her. She’ll hate you in the end.

  “You don’t know what you’re offering me, Sarah.” His voice was gruff and low. She was looking at his eyes but he still couldn’t tear his eyes away from her lush mouth.

  “It’s not rocket science, Seth.”

  “This isn’t a joke. You could get hurt.”

  “I can take care of myself.”

  “I want to take care of you.”

  She stiffened a touch, her eyes bouncing back and forth between his. “What?”

  He knew he ran the risk of seeming like a total freak, but whatever cork he usually used as a filter had been thoroughly popped the second he’d stepped foot in that bathroom. “I can’t help it. It’s the way I was born. I love taking care of people. Making their lives better. But with you, it’s even worse. I have to force myself not to cook for you every single night. Not to pick up things for you at the grocery store. The other night I was researching snow tires for your car, for God’s sake. I—”

  She clapped a hand over his mouth. Her posture had gone from stiff and surprised to loose and fluid again, and there was a sparkle in her eye.

  “Seth, you might just be the most sexually frustrated person I’ve ever met.”

  He tried to speak but her hand clamped down harder and muffled his words.

  Bad for her. Dangerous. She’ll hate you in the end.

  “This doesn’t have to be so hard,” she whispered, leaning into him.

  She finally dropped her hand and he took the first opportunity he could to say the words that were bubbling up inside of him. “Sarah. Don’t ask me to do this. I want to be good for you. I want to be good for you so badly.”

  She was a centimeter away now, nothing between him and her body but a thin, terry cloth towel. “So, make it good,” she whispered.

  And then her lips were on his and all reason was lost to Seth. There was no tender beginning to this kiss, no sampling, no preamble. Immediately, these were deep, swimming kisses that attempted to get to the bottom of this mystery between them. Without even opening his eyes, Seth knew that Sarah was as lost to this as he was. He could feel her axis tipping just as he could feel his own. His hands left the countertop and anchored at her hips. He lifted, she jumped, and her legs went high around his waist. He pushed forward and they were sandwiched together in a way that felt permanent, irrevocable, almost harsh. His hands raced up her back, searching for the line where cloth became skin. He found it startlingly quickly. He knew that her towel was crumpled, falling away, but the kiss was so potent he couldn’t force his eyes open. He was lost in her, spinning.

  One of his hands stroked over her hip and down her bare thigh, all the way to the toned calf she had pinned halfway around his back. They were slammed together, but still, Seth needed more.

  He leaned forward against her and she let him. Her back landed on the counter, toppling things to the floor that neither of them noticed. And then, finally, there it was, he let the weight of his upper body rest on top of her and he finally felt a measure of his franticness fade away. This was how they were supposed to be. This level of pound for pound pressure against one another. This was how close they were meant to be.

  He made himself crack his eyes open, look at her. He tore his mouth from hers to kiss along her jaw. There was very little finesse, only hunger. “Too much?” he asked her gruffly.

  “Quiet,” she immediately responded. “More. More.”

  She arched her neck for his exploration and all the voices in Seth’s head officially quieted. It was a peaceful moment, filled with clarity. He was completely in the present and there was no room for worries here. Here was simply Seth and Sarah, trying to get as close to one another as possible.

  It was an insane feeling, pressing her into the counter, sucking at her pulse point. His circumstances hadn’t changed, not one bit. But he’d never felt more free in his life. Somehow, being with her like this made him feel as if handcuffs he’d been wearing his entire life had suddenly sprung loose.

  She was both liquid and unyielding in his arms. Soft and strong at the same time. The combination was intoxicating and so very, very Sarah.

  He felt it the instant she stiffened up. He froze, only then realizing that one hand was grabbing a handful of towel-covered ass and the other had a hold of her braid. Oh shit. Had he pushed this too far, too fast?

  “Seth,” she whispered, wiggling underneath him. “I… I have to get that.”

  That’s when he finally heard it. Her cell phone, sitting on the far end of the counter, was ringing. And a strange ring it was. It wasn’t a song or a normal, chirping tone. It was just a rhythmic, constant bang of a gong. Something about it seemed ominous.

  “Oh,” he shook his head and picked his weight up off of her.

  “I have to get that,” she whispered again. “Or else he’s just going to keep calling. I don’t know why he’s calling. Why now?”

  Seth was barely cogent, but he knew enough to know that she was talking to herself more than she was talking to him. She scrambled up, straightening the towel and covering herself. The flush of desire was still high in her cheeks, her lips were smudged and a deep, kissed pink, but her eyes were cinched in a strained, trepidatious expression.

  She almost looked… scared.

  Maybe it was all the sex hormones zipping through his blood stream, or maybe he really was just that concerned with her welfare, but Seth had to resist the urge to slap the phone out of Sarah’s hand as she picked it up.

  Who the hell was calling her and making her look like this? He’d never seen Sarah shrink from anything since he’d known her, but here she was, shoulders tucked inwards like she was attempting to shield her heart from the world. Her head was bent over the phone, and as he watched, she undid the tie at the end of her braid and combed out her hair with her fingers, creating a damp curtain of waves that hid her face from him.

  “Dad,” she answered the phone in a quiet, numb sort of voice.

  Seth stiffened. Her father was the one who was making her shrink into herself? She tapped on Seth’s chest and he realized that he was still standing too close to her for her to slide off the counter.

  He reluctantly took a step back and she slid down, immediately padding out of the bathroom, one of her hands in a death-grip with the towel.

  He watched her go and then adjusted himself in his pants. He caught his own eyes in the mirror and barely recognized himself. He looked insane. Feral. Wild. Wolfish.

  “Fuck.” Seth dropped his hands back to the counter and let his head sag. What the hell was he doing? “You’re dangerous for her, you prick.”

  He picked his head back up and strode back down the stairs, reheating the pasta, setting the salad in a bowl, and warming up the garlic bread.

  A few minutes later, Sarah came back downstairs in a humongous sweatshirt, baggy sweatpants, and large, bunchy socks. Her hair was caught under the collar of her sweatshirt and as she wordlessly slid into her seat at the dinner table, she pulled her hood back up.

  Seth knew instinctively that these oversized clothes were a sort of personal armor she was donning. He also knew that the armor wasn’t to protect herself from him, it was to protect herself from her father.

  “I wasn’t sure you’d
still be here,” she said, watching him spoon pasta onto her plate. He put an extra scoop of the meat sauce onto her dish. She needed the protein.

  “You thought I’d bail?”

  “I mean, that seems to be your m.o. after we swap spit.”

  He smiled. “Technically, the second time we kissed, I didn’t leave, you closed the door in my face.”

  “Ah,” she smiled faintly. “Right.”

  “Sarah,” he said after a quiet minute. “Is everything all right? You seem really… deflated.”

  If it was possible, she deflated even more, her shoulders falling even further. Seth frowned and put some salad on her plate before he reached over and landed a palm on her back, rubbing her in a small circle.

  He was relieved when she pushed into his touch a little bit, like she was welcoming it. “Things with my dad are really complicated. He’s not a great, um, influence on me? I guess?”

  “What do you mean?”

  She sighed and finally lifted her head, shoving her hood back. She pushed the food on her plate around and around. “I mean that he’s really charismatic and he can talk anybody into anything. He has this way of making bad things sound good. And before you know it you’ve been living a shitty life for years.”

  “He’s manipulative.”

  “Bingo.”

  Seth paused, unsure of how far he was allowed to push this. “Wasn’t he your Olympic coach?”

  Sarah sighed again. “Yeah, and manager. He’s a damn good archer. Just a shitty person.”

  “Who made you live a shitty life.”

  “Yup,” she popped the p and frowned down at her food.

  “What was so bad about it?” he asked tentatively.

  She was quiet for a long time, pushing her food around. Then, to Seth’s immense relief, she took a huge Sarah-bite of her pasta and spoke with her mouth full. “Have you ever seen my Instagram page?”

  He shook his head.

  “Bring it up on your phone,” she told him.

  While he fiddled around on his phone, he was happy to see that she polished off her plate of food and took seconds.

  A minute later, he had her page brought up on his phone. “Um. Wow.”