On it, Sabrina stood at the foot of her bed with a smile, but it wasn’t her I was looking at. It was the guy behind her, standing beside the bed, a couple feet from her with his shirt off.
I turned to the bed, staring at the rumpled tangle of sheets, then back to the screen.
She was editing a video. A video of her with a shirtless guy in her bedroom.
My blood pressure spiked, racing through my veins, screaming through my cells.
The front door opened quietly. The latch caught, and even footsteps padded down the hallway.
I tore my gaze from the computer and rushed from the room just as Sabrina rounded the corner.
Her arms full of groceries, she yelped when she spotted me in the doorway to her room. Her hands clenched, crushing her coffee cup and spraying hot coffee all over her hand and arm. Steam rose from the spilled liquid.
Shit, I hadn’t meant to scare her. I was still in shock, stunned.
She screamed. The bags dropped to the floor. Cartons and a bag of oranges rolled through the doorway.
Rushing into the kitchen, I jumped over the spilled groceries. The spray of water and her hiss of pain ripped me out of my shell-shocked state.
“I’ll get some ice.” I yanked open the freezer door and grabbed a kitchen towel.
“What the hell were you doing in my room?” She glared at me with eyes filled with suspicion and under the glower was a hint of pain.
I bit back a wince. “Looking for you.”
“From inside my room.” She ran her hand under the steady stream of cold water.
“There was a noise. A thump. I thought you fell.” That was me floundering and flapping around like a fish flung onto a dock.
Her eyes cut to mine.
Divert! “I’ll make a paste out of baking soda and water. It’ll keep it from blistering.” Rummaging through the cabinets, I found the baking soda and stole some water, mixing it together to form a paste. “Here, let me put this on it.”
Her gaze narrowed, wary, but the pain overshadowed most of it. “Why are you helping me?”
My shoulders sagged, and I shook my head. We’d not gotten off on the right foot. Hell, at this point both feet had been amputated. I was the helpful guy. When in crisis, I was the one everyone turned to, but she met any offer with suspicion. I couldn’t even blame her. “I don’t want to fight with you right now, Sabrina. That’s part of the reason I came to your room.”
“To snoop.”
“Not to snoop. To talk.” The paste thickened. I held out my hand for hers. “It’s ready.”
She turned off the water with her non-burned hand and moved closer to me, guarded like she expected me to fling the mixture in her face and run away.
But all the commotion hadn’t wiped away the flood of feelings about what Sabrina was doing doors down from me. Equal parts furious and fascinated. Possessive and pained. Intrigued and irate.
She placed her hand into mine. Her warm, smooth skin slid against my fingers.
A pulse rushed down my arm. Shaking my head, I focused on her red skin, tender and close to blistering. I scooped the mixture from the cup and smoothed it over the inflamed spot. A glimmer of relief followed that I’d be able to help mend a little of what I’d done.
She hissed and her muscles tightened under my grip.
“Sorry,” I mumbled and continued applying the salve until every spot of red had been smothered. “I’ll get some gauze. I can tape it together to keep the paste from falling off until it’s dry.”
“It feels better already. How’d you learn this?” Her head tilted, and she peered up at me.
Without answering, I grabbed the first-aid kit from the far cabinet and wrapped up her arm. Tearing the last bit of tape, I pressed it against her skin, letting my fingers linger longer than I should have.
As much as I’d tried to blot out the images in my head of her on her bed, I couldn’t get them out. What I did want to block out was the idea of her with another guy. The setup in her room didn’t seem like it was for her own personal consumption unless she was into high-definition at-home viewing.
Did she need the money? Was that why she was here?
“Shit,” she cursed under her breath before leaving the kitchen.
Rustling and banging came from the hallway.
She walked back in with some of the bags in her good hand. Goop dripped from one of the bags.
“That would be my eggs.”
“I’ll help.” I rushed forward to grab the rest of the bags and put some distance between us.
She called out after me. “One of them has ice cream in it.”
I grabbed the squishy pint of cookie dough ice cream. “Is this the only one?”
She hurried over with hands outstretched, totally forgetting about the cracked-egg mess.
Her sneakers slipped on the runny puddle, and she slammed into me. Her arms and legs went flying and her face smashed into my stomach.
I dropped the ice cream and shot my hands out to steady her, but my shift sent my foot into the slick mess. Contact with the tiles was a distant memory and I went reeling backward.
We both pitched toward the floor.
I wrapped my arm around Sabrina, and my back slammed into the tile, pain radiating out from all the vertebrae of my spine.
But none of that compared to her body pressed against mine. Her hips were flush against mine, and the instant shift in blood flow from my extremities that having her on top of me brought on was the worst possible thing if I didn’t want to add perv to the list of her strikes against me.
Our eyes shot open, and we spoke at the same time. “Are you okay?”
“No, are you okay?”
Her lips twitched before turning to a wince. She pushed herself up from between my legs, jerking her arm away and half falling back onto me.
“Oof.”
Her elbow landed precariously close to my balls.
“Shit, sorry.” She rolled off to the side, cradling her arm, which she’d only had out of a brace for a week or so, against her chest. Scooting away, she rested against the bottom cabinets.
The backs of my legs and fronts of hers were coated in eggs. “How many eggs did you buy?” I pushed myself up into a seated position.
“Two dozen.”
“Are you prepping for an Iron Man triathlon?” I leaned against the dishwasher.
She was disheveled, arms and legs glistening with runny yolks and whites. Her hair had slid part of the way out of her ponytail, and she dropped her head back and smiled. “Maybe.”
A thump of need slammed into me. To touch her again, run my fingers through her hair, and taste the lips that had been less than an inch from mine only a few minutes ago.
“None of this”—she waved her hands toward the coated floors, her bandaged arm, and our wet, stained clothes—“would be a problem if you hadn’t been snooping in my room and scared the shit out of me.”
“I wasn’t snooping.” I was totally snooping, but she didn’t sound as angry as before. Maybe we were turning a corner.
She cocked her head and raised her eyebrows. Maybe not. “Let’s have that boundaries conversation you were talking about. No stealing my food.”
Of all the things, that was first on her list? One or two cupcakes when I needed an extra boost so I didn’t get caffeine jittery. Okay, maybe more than a couple. My grocery list had always been only the basics, but hers were filled with temptations I hadn’t faced before. A lot like her. But admitting it would make me a liar, and she’d never believe my lie about being in her room. Not that she believed it at all, but I’d try to ride this out to not double down on the dick moves. “I’m not stealing anything.”