“That’s a lot,” she murmured.
He smiled, nodded, and said, “Now let’s see what we can do to get you taken care of.” They quickly closed the connecting door, and there was her bedroom. She looked around and said, “I don’t even know what happened to my overnight bag.”
“It’s probably still in the house on fire,” he said cheerfully.
She groaned. “So far I haven’t had a whole lot of luck keeping things safe around you.”
“Well, if you would listen to my instructions every once in a while,” he said.
“That won’t happen,” she replied, then walked into the bathroom. Grinning at the size of the bathtub, she said, “I’ll have a bath. I feel smoky, dirty, and incredibly tired.”
“What about food?” he asked.
“Food would be good, but I’m not up for anything big.”
“That’s fine. I’ll go see what we can get.”
She stopped, looking scared for a moment, and asked, “Where are you and Diesel staying?”
“We’re right across the hallway.”
“Good,” she said, “I don’t even know if I’ll sleep tonight. Everything’s been so messed up for so long.”
“You’ll sleep,” he promised.
She rolled her eyes and said, “Says you.” Walking to the bathtub, she put the plug in, turned on the water, dropped in some bath salts she found on the corner of the tub, and said, “If you happen to find a change of clothes, that would be lovely too.”
“That might take a little longer, but I can do it,” he said, outside the bathroom door, not quite shut between them.
“Aleah’ll need something too, plus the baby.”
“She’s taken care of,” he said. “I honestly didn’t think about you needing clothes.”
She snorted at that. “Right. What would I do? Walk around naked all the time?” When Shane went silent on the other side, she smiled. “Not happening.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’m sure,” she said. “It’ll be too damn cold.”
“Oh, I don’t think you’ll be cold anytime soon.” Something in his voice had her peeking out of the bathroom and looking at him. “What do you mean?”
“We’ll be too busy.”
“Busy doing what?” she asked suspiciously.
But his expression was unreadable. He motioned at the hotel door and said, “I’ll be back in a few.”
The moment he walked out, she sank into the hot bath, moaning, as her multiple scrapes and bruises hit the hot water. But it felt so damn good. She closed her eyes and let her head sink under the water and then used the shampoo to soak and scrub her head several times—gently—but her head had stopped pounding thankfully. By the time she was done, she just lay in the heated, warm, secure blanket of a hot bath and enjoyed it.
When a knock came at the door, and it opened a crack, she said, “I sure hope that’s Shane.”
“It’s me,” he said.
“Good,” she said in a sleepy voice. “Were you able to find me some clothes?”
“Some,” he said. “I also found food.”
“Does that mean I have to get out?”
Poking his head around the door, looking at her buried in the water, he smiled. “Doesn’t look like you want to go anywhere just yet.”
“I don’t. I really don’t,” she said.
“I’m not sure you want to eat this in there though,” he murmured.
“Is it pasta?”
He stared at her for a moment, then grinned and said, “What do you think?”
Her eyes popped open. “Okay, I’m getting out.” Pulling the plug, she got out, dried off, wrapped herself in a towel, and stepped out into the room. “What did you get me for clothes?” she asked.
“Well,” he said, “I found a few things.” He pointed at a long robe, with a zipper in the front.
She quickly pulled that over her head, tugging the towel out from underneath, as he watched with interest. She just rolled her eyes at him. “Come on. Be a gentleman and don’t look,” she murmured.
“Well, if you won’t change, why should I?” Then he sat down at the table and said, “Come and eat.”
She walked over, inhaled the aroma, and smiled. “Now this,” she said, “this is lovely.”
“Exactly.” She ate half of her dinner and then shook her head. “I’m too tired to eat it all.”
“Then you can rest,” he said. “Go to bed and just sleep. Unwind.”
“I don’t know,” she said. “So many horrible things are in my mind right now that I don’t even want to close my eyes, in case they take over.”
“That’s to be expected, considering all you’ve been through.” He stood and picked her up in one quick move, making her shriek, then walked to the window, where a big armchair was. He sat down with her in it. She curled up in his arms and whispered, “This is much better.”
“It is,” he said. “You know what? Ever since Diesel met you, he’s been bugging me about why we weren’t together.”
“What did you tell him?”
“I said that we were good friends, and that it wasn’t part of who we were.”
“Interesting,” she muttered, not liking the direction of the conversation.
“He told me that I was a fool and that I wasn’t seeing what was right in front of me.”
“Well, that’s quite true,” she said. “You are a fool.”
He burst out laughing. “Maybe,” he said, “but I’m a fast learner. One of the things that I’ve learned is that, when somebody tells me something, I need to pay attention.”
“Yeah, and what did you need to pay attention to?” she murmured.
“You,” he said, reaching up and tapping her nose. “And I realized that the reason we’ve been such good friends is because we really care about each other. We care at a level that most relationships never even get to. We’ve been friends for so long that we’ve seen the ins, the outs—the good, the bad, and the ugly. We’ve seen each other with relationships and breakups. We both came close to getting married to someone else at one point in time,” he said. “And yet we didn’t.”
“Nope,” she said, “it wasn’t right.”
“So how do you feel about things now?” he asked. “Does this feel right?”
She pushed herself up from his chest, looked at him quietly, and said, “You mean, being in your arms?”
He nodded.
“Yeah,” she said, “it feels very right.”
“And we’ve never really been the kind of people to worry so much about tomorrow,” he said. “So, are you interested in seeing where this goes?”
“Yes,” she said, and then she hesitated. “But I’ll be pissed if it doesn’t go where I want it to because then I’ll have lost my best friend,” she murmured.
His gaze deepened, and he said, “I don’t see that happening.” And he looked at her. “Unless you do.”