Elizabeth Bevarly - Indecent Suggestion

And what the hell was she thinking? Turner was her friend, she reminded herself ruthlessly. He was her bestest buddy in the whole wide world. You weren’t supposed to suck the, um, lower lip of your best friend, not even for a minute. Everybody knew that. It was like rule number two of friendship, right after “You should never fool around with your best friend’s boyfriend.” Which actually didn’t even apply with Turner, so the, um, lower-lip-sucking rule would be numero uno for them. She’d told Turner things she’d never tell someone whose, um, lower lip she wanted to suck. So why would she even be thinking about sucking his, um, lower lip? And why would thinking about that make her feel so freaking hot?

Man, she needed a cigarette. Bad. But how unfair would that be, to smoke in front of Turner, when he had to go the whole day without? Then again, why did she care? He wasn’t exactly being fair, either, looming over her looking all sexy and sounding all sexy and smelling all sexy and being all sexy and making her want to suck his, um, lower lip.

She expelled a long, unsteady breath she hadn’t even been aware of holding, and took a minute to let her heart stop racing. But when she realized it was going to be awhile before her heart stopped doing that, she gave up. Trying not to sound as breathless as she felt, she replied, “Sure, I’d love some coffee.”

He smiled in a way that made her think he knew what she really wanted—and it wasn’t coffee—and she couldn’t help wondering if he suspected her of that, um, lower-lip-sucking business. Nah, she immediately reassured herself. Turner only thought of her as a friend. As his bestest buddy in the whole wide world. Dammit. He couldn’t possibly suspect her of wanting to suck his, um, lower lip.

And she didn’t want to suck his, um, lower lip, anyway, she reminded herself. She didn’t. She’d just woken up feeling horny, like ninety percent of women in her demographic—that demographic being single, twentysomething, professional females who had gone date-free for way too long. And since Turner was the only human being in the vicinity with a Y chromosome, it was only natural she’d want his, um, lower lip. Simple chemistry. No, she quickly corrected herself. Simple biology. She and Turner didn’t have any chemistry together. Well, not since their junior year in high school. And the kind of chemistry she was talking about now didn’t involve beakers and Bunsen burners. Well, not in the way they were supposed to be used, anyway.

Oh, stop it, she told herself. Thinking that way was only going to make this day longer than it already promised to be. Turner was her friend. Period. And she wasn’t about to let anything change that. Friends, good friends, the kind you could trust no matter what happened, were too hard to come by in this life. What she and Turner had was too special to mess with. She needed to wake up a little more, that was all. The day was going to be just fine.

But when she inhaled another breath to steady herself, Becca pulled the musky, masculine scent of Turner—mixed with the aroma of forbidden tar and nicotine—deep into her body with it. And even as he leaned away from her and rose from the bed, she noted again how his T-shirt stretched taut across his brawny chest and muscular arms, and how his rough, dark jaw gave him a feral look, and how his blue eyes seemed to be sizing her up for…something.

And she started thinking that maybe, just maybe, the temptation offered by cigarettes wasn’t going to be the biggest obstacle she faced today. Maybe, just maybe, the toughest thing she was going to have to battle would be her own wayward thoughts.

BECCA HAD JUST FINISHED making Turner’s bed when she heard the water shut off in the bathroom. He’d magnanimously offered to let her shower and dress first, so she’d figured the least she could do was change his sheets for him—especially since she’d probably drooled all over them during that odd little morning interlude that had so confused her at the time.

Of course, now that she was dressed in a fresh pair of jeans and a cropped red sweater, and now that she was fortified by coffee and Cap’n Crunch—honestly, did men ever eat anything healthy for breakfast?—she was confident she knew exactly what had been behind that odd little… That unusual little… That strange little… That weird little… That mysterious little… That bizarre little…thing. Now she was confident that what had passed between the two of them earlier had simply resulted from a lack of sleep and nothing more.

There was a reason why some governments used sleep deprivation as a form of torture. It made a person crazy. Crazy enough to do and say things they would normally never say or do. Like drool on their best friend’s pillow because their best friend suddenly seemed kind of sexy, where he would never seem sexy if one had gotten enough sleep and was in one’s right mind.

That was her story, and she was sticking to it.

Unfortunately, her adhesive must have collected some lint or something while she was changing the bed, because Becca became decidedly less stuck to that story when the door to the bathroom just outside the bedroom flew open, and Turner emerged in a puff of steam, completely naked, and she found herself wanting to be stuck to him in the most basic, most wanton way two people could be stuck together.

Oh, no, wait, he wasn’t quite naked, Becca was relieved—sort of—to realize. He had a towel slung around his midsection—sort of. So he was decent—sort of. Of course, the thoughts that popped into her head just then, not to mention the feelings that went zinging through her bloodstream, were anything but decent. Because as sexy as Turner had been that morning all rough-jawed and sleep-rumpled, he was ten times more so all wet-skinned and steamy.

Lack of sleep, she reminded herself, closing her eyes against the sight. Note to self: Must be in bed at a decent hour tonight so Turner will get laid. Ah, that is to say, so that all errant thoughts of Turner will be laid to rest.

Right.

“Oh, sorry,” he muttered as he backed into the bathroom and pushed the door half-closed in front of himself. “I didn’t realize you were in here.”

“No, I’m sorry,” she hastily told him, heading for the bedroom door. Which meant she also was headed toward the bathroom door. And Turner. And Turner’s towel. Among Turner’s other things.

“I thought you’d be longer in the shower,” she added as she made herself race through the bedroom door and into the living room.

“Longer?” he echoed as he poked his head back out to look at her. “All I had to do was get clean. What else would I be doing in here?”

Don’t answer, she told herself. Don’t even think about an answer.

Oh, damn. Too late…

“Uh…” she began as she turned her back on Turner to give him some privacy and herself some sanity. “I’ll just be out here in the living room, ’kay?”

Out in the living room trying not to think about you all naked and steamy, with water streaming down over your skin, and you pushing the soap across your chest and over your abs and stomach, the frothy foam oozing between your fingers and over taut muscle, and then your hand moving lower, over your lean thighs and toward your, um, uh…lower lip?

She cleared her throat indelicately. “I’ll be out here in the living room,” she repeated, striving for lightness in her tone, but thinking she probably only succeeded with lewdness instead.

She wasn’t sure, but she thought Turner mumbled something in response. She was too busy not thinking about him to ask him to repeat himself. Though she was pretty sure she heard the words crazy lunatic female somewhere in the mix. She also thought she heard the sound of a towel being whipped from a wet, steamy, hard body, but that could have just been her imagination. Wishful thinking. Whatever.