Now that her head was pounding a little less, the guilt was increasing. What kind of person gets bombed at her best friend’s wedding, then is too hungover to get to a wedding brunch on time? One that sucked, that’s who.
Diesel shrugged. “It happens. You had a good reason to tie one on last night. You were both celebrating and grieving.”
She swallowed, gripping her coffee and her blanket, appreciating his matter-of-fact attitude. “You’re right. I don’t think I was too embarrassing last night.” She remembered everything. She’d danced a lot but that was about it for the general crowd. She’d saved most of her outrageousness for Diesel. Lolling across his lap in the car was not something she normally did with men she barely knew. “Sorry I hit on you.”
He grinned. “Are you taking it back? You were just beergoggling with me?” He put his hand on his heart. “You’re shattering my ego, you know.”
“That’s your heart, not your ego, and I sincerely doubt I’m shattering either one.” Tuesday set her coffee down. “I’m just saying thank you for being decent and not taking advantage of the drunk girl and having sex with me.”
Though as she eyed those biceps peeking out from his T-shirt and remembered his erection pressed against her, she wasn’t sure she would have regretted it.
His eyebrow shot up. “You’re welcome.” He moved farther into her apartment, setting his own coffee down on the end table. Diesel moved past her, his arm brushing hers, and as he went for the couch, he met her stare head-on. “If I have sex with you, I want you fully aware of everything you’re doing. And everything I’m doing.”
Despite her aching muscles and her pounding head and her stuffed up nose, Tuesday felt that proclamation shoot straight into her vagina. She had not been expecting him to say that. “Is that a hypothetical?” she said, her voice a little breathier than she would have liked.
He flopped on her couch. “That’s up to you.”
She wasn’t sure how to answer that. Her brain wasn’t working at full capacity at the moment and she couldn’t think of a single clever thing to say. “Well, right now is out of the question.”
He laughed. “Probably. Since you have that brunch to go to.”
“Yeah, and the fact that I look like ass and smell like someone’s grandpa. Which I have to say I appreciate you not mentioning.”
“You don’t smell like old man, don’t be ridiculous.” Diesel put his feet on her coffee table and settled back into the couch.
Tuesday waited, but he didn’t add anything else. Feeling annoyed, even though she knew it was irrational, she said, “But I do look like ass?” She knew she did. She looked beyond bad. She looked like sewage, like the witches in Macbeth , like she’d been in a battle with a monkey and lost. But he could at least lie about it.
“You don’t look like ass. You’ll always be a beautiful woman. But I have to say I prefer your hair the way it was last night over this look.”
It was sweet. Fair. Truthful. But she was still put out. She wanted him to think she was hot. She gave a grudging, “Thank you.” Then she dropped the blanket she’d been clutching. “I’m taking a five-minute shower.”
His mouth fell open.
Which served him right.
Tuesday figured a bra and panties were no different than a bathing suit, and she was happy with her body. Maybe that view would wipe out the hot mess her hair was. She was playing with fire, but hell, you never got anything if you didn’t ask for it. She figured this was the visual equivalent of requesting his erection.
If she wasn’t feeling like shit, she wasn’t sure she would have taken such a brazen approach, but the alcohol seeping out her pores and wafting around her in a noxious cloud made her self-conscious. This leveled the playing field in some strange way.
Turning on her heel, she headed for the bathroom, swiping her coffee off the table on her way.
Diesel was well aware of the fact that he was speechless, but he couldn’t force anything out of his mouth. All of his blood and concentration had rushed south to his cock. Tuesday was . . . naked. Virtually. He had figured there wasn’t a whole lot on her body under that blanket, but he had never expected that he’d be given the privilege of seeing it. Today, anyway.
It was a hell of a view. She was a hell of a woman.
With very long legs. A tight backside. And a flat stomach that made him want to lick from her br**sts to her navel and right on down to the promised land.
Her skin was creamy and fair, her br**sts small but perky, her arms long and elegant.
Yes, her hair looked like she’d jammed her finger into an electrical socket, and it looked like a five-year-old had made free with her makeup, but that was to be expected after a night of overconsumption of alcohol. There had been a lot of hair spray in that twist thing she’d had going on with her hair, so he could imagine this would be the end result even if she had been sober.
She was beautiful; he had been telling the straight-up God’s honest truth. And now he knew for certain she had a banging body, and he had the hard-on to prove it. Damn. He hadn’t seen that one coming—the dropping the blanket, not the hard-on. He was starting to think that was going to be a perpetual problem around Tuesday.
When he stopped choking on his own drool he managed to call out, “Am I driving you to your car, is that what we’re doing here? Or am I just hanging out on your couch for no reason?”
“Yes, you’re driving me to my car,” she said, her voice grumpy. “How else am I supposed to get to the brunch?”
“Float there with your angel wings?” he asked, a little heavy on the sarcasm.
She popped her head back out of the bathroom. “Don’t be a hater. I’m not at my best this morning. I’m hungover. I’m embarrassed. I’m late. I appreciate a ride, seriously. And I appreciate you bringing me home last night.”
Wow. That was a refreshing display of honesty. “You’re welcome. And you have no reason to be embarrassed. It was a wedding. Everyone was getting their drink on.”
Her answer was the shower turning on. Her head had disappeared but she hadn’t closed the bathroom door. Which meant she was probably stripping off her bra and panties and stepping into that shower totally naked. Where hot water would bounce off her bare body and trickle down over every inch of her.
Diesel shifted on her couch. He was starting to get more than a little uncomfortable. For a guy who was leery of having sex, he was starting to think that given the option, he’d dive in face-first with Tuesday, bum knee or not.