When he shifted his weight off her, she rolled onto her side to face him. “I like being with you. A lot.”
Too much too soon? Maybe, but he cupped her cheek, his palm warm, while his steady gaze tried to convey a message she hoped she read correctly.
“Same here.” He hesitated, as if wanting to say more, before giving a little shake of his head. “I’ll be back in a sec.”
He pointed to the condom and dropped a lingering kiss on her lips before getting out of bed and striding into the bathroom. The sight of his taut, bare butt had her itching to crawl all over him again once he took care of practicalities.
She’d barely had time to snuggle under the sheets, close her eyes, and replay their last sensual encounter in every glorious detail when his loud “fuck” had her sitting bolt upright at the urgency in his tone.
“What’s wrong?”
She wrapped a sheet around her and followed him into the bathroom, grateful he’d turned on the muted mirror lights and not the all-too-illuminating fluorescents. She may be comfortable with him in bed, but she didn’t think either of them was quite ready for her thirty-seven-year-old body in the harshest unflattering light.
“Condom broke.” He pointed to the discarded rubber in the trash, panic paling his cheeks, accentuating his vulnerability, his age.
“Don’t worry.” It wasn’t like she could get pregnant or anything. “I’m clean and it’s not the right time of my cycle.”
She actually needed to have a cycle for that to happen.
“I’m clean too,” he said, his relief obvious by the return of his trademark smile, the one that made her realize he was naked, they were in a bathroom, and the marble-and-glass double shower stall was less than two feet away.
“We could get cleaner.” She sent a pointed look at the shower.
“Great idea.”
He whipped the sheet out of her hands before she could blink, bundled her into the shower, and turned the jets to warm.
Make that hot, very hot, as his hands and mouth played her body for all it was worth.
Nineteen
Expanding her physical therapy practice in LA to include alternative therapies had been a goal of Samira’s from day one. Her interest in dialect coaching had come from a conversation with Pia years ago, and she’d run with it. She’d had several clients over the last eighteen months, actors and actresses wanting an extra boost for competitive Hollywood roles.
She knew it was a fairly new field in Australia, one that physical therapists were rarely involved in, so when she spied a new referral for a client requiring dialect coaching first thing on Tuesday morning, she was ecstatic. Pity her first referral hadn’t worked out. Then again, she’d rather have Rory in her bed than in her office.
Until she glimpsed the name and realized the implications of helping this particular client.
Benedict Dixon.
Well-known host of reality TV shows.
And Rory’s biggest rival for the audition he wanted to nail to help those poor kids financially.
Crap.
However, she was a professional, and as she spent the next hour honing Benedict’s diaphragmatic breathing and demonstrating techniques using a strong core for voice projection, she focused solely on the job at hand. It wasn’t until he’d left her office with a sheet of exercises and another appointment that the guilt set in.
Stupid, because she had nothing to feel guilty about. He’d been referred to her; she had to do her job. Worse, she couldn’t tell Rory about it because of therapist-patient confidentiality, and she would never betray her code of ethics. Instead, she had an odd feeling she was betraying Rory.
Needing to off-load to Pia, she stepped out of her office and strode toward the foyer. Only to find Rory and Benedict in some weird standoff, their buffed bodies radiating tension as they acknowledged each other with a tense nod before shifting away.
Samira breathed a sigh of relief when Benedict left, short-lived relief when Rory fixed an accusing gaze on her.
He strode toward her, purpose in his step, thunder in his eyes. “You’re coaching that dickhead?”
Bristling, she nodded. “It’s my job.”
“But you know . . .” He trailed off, his lips compressing into a thin line.
“Know what?”
“He’s my rival, and I need to land that gig.”
Yeah, she knew, but she didn’t need him ramming it down her throat. “I’m a professional. So when a referral comes in, I do my job.”
He glared at her like he wanted to say more but couldn’t come up with a polite way to do it.
“Is he any good?”
“I can’t talk to you about this,” she said, shaking her head, hating that he was putting her in this position.
“I need to nail that audition,” he said, through gritted teeth, the muscles in his shoulders bunching with tension. “It’s vital.”
“So you do your best. What’s my working with Benedict got to do with it?”
“Benedict,” he mimicked, with a scowl.
For a moment, she thought he might be jealous, but that was plain crazy. She’d never sleep with a client, which was exactly why she’d referred him on to Pia in the first place.
“We need to stop discussing this.” She held up her hand. “It’s got nothing to do with us.”
“So there’s an us?”
He made it sound like the most outlandish thing in the world, and the tenuous grip she had on her temper snapped.
“Grow up.”
He gaped, and she spun on her heel and stalked back to her office, slamming the door for good measure.
Twenty
After his session with Pia, Rory had felt pretty bloody good about himself. He’d nailed every exercise she’d set as homework, and she’d praised him for his enunciation, which was clearer than last week’s. So it seemed surreal when he’d seen Benedict Dixon coming out of Samira’s office, all smiley and chummy. His momentary surge of jealousy had been stupid, though that hadn’t got him half as riled as the moron’s usual condescension. His good mood had been eradicated as soon as Benedict opened his mouth.
“What are you doing here, Radcliffe?”
Rory had resisted the urge to punch him in the mouth once before when the guy had made fun of his stutter, yet anytime their paths crossed, the urge returned. “Not much.”
The jerk hadn’t bought his blasé act for a second. “I’m getting dialect coaching for a big role.” He smirked. “Not that you’d know anything about big roles.”