Close Up

“I have you beat,” Sean said. “I’m wearing a dress shirt, tie and cuff links, but no pants.” He turned sideways and took a Roman pose. “GQ will be calling, I have no doubt.”

For a second, Kristine’s heart squeezed, and she allowed herself to remember what it felt like when she and Sean were together, and the casual fun and intimacy marriage had allowed. That had been the plus side of commitment. She knew every gesture he made, every inch of his body, right down to the scar on his chin, which he’d gotten jumping off his parents’ bed as a toddler.

Yet there was still so much she didn’t know about him, not the least of which was why he had been attracted to her, of all women.

“Rawr,” she said in reaction to his pose, then immediately regretted it. That sounded too personal, too familiar.

But Sean didn’t react like he thought it was strange. He just told her, “Thanks. Now climb that wall and liberate us.”

He didn’t bother to squat this time. He just came up behind her and gripped her around the waist.

“Sean!” Good grief, that was a whole lot of Sean all up in her business. Thighs, hands, pecs and another part that started with p were getting very close and personal with her.

She jerked forward so far she almost smacked her nose on the wall when his penis snuggled up into her backside.

“What? I’m lifting you up. Stop wiggling.”

“You can’t lift me—”

He lifted her.

Okay, she stood corrected. Dangling in the air, Kristine grabbed for the ledge, and pulled herself up onto it. She got her upper half where it needed to be, but then her efforts came to a grinding halt. Uh-oh. Thanks, puberty. “Sean, my boobs are stuck.”

He gave a crack of laughter. “What? What do you mean?”

“I mean, they’re caught beneath me. I need you to lift me up so I can spring them. I can’t go forward until they’re free.” At that moment, she was actually grateful it was Sean she was trapped with, because she didn’t think she could say those words out loud to any other man. A woman? Sure. Her own gender understood the complications of cleavage, but men didn’t understand that what they considered to be their personal playground came with its own setbacks.

“I’m not exactly sure I know what that means, but wrap your legs around my head so you can get a better angle.”

Wrap her legs around his head. Now that brought a pleasant memory or two to mind. “Um...”

“Like this.”

Suddenly, Sean’s head and shoulders nudged their way between her legs. She gripped the ledge harder, palms sweaty from stress and arousal. How could he sound so normal and unaffected? She was splayed across a window ledge, breasts being squeezed against the ledge, booty back in the air, Sean between her legs. It was like performance art or yoga for perverts, and she was enjoying it far too much.

He stood up again, so that she rested on his shoulders, his head bent forward. “Okay, sit up before you snap my neck.”

Kristine sat up, freeing her chest, and clamping her thighs onto the sides of his head to give her a sense of stability. “Is this doomed to failure?” she asked, eyeing the window and doubting her ability to haul herself through it without injury or death. It was possibly the only thing that could distract her from the fact she perched on Sean’s shoulders with his hair tickling her bare midriff.

“Don’t be so quick to throw in the towel,” he said, turning them both sideways so she could access the ledge without him in the way.

Something about his tone made her realize he was not just talking about the window. It made her determined to show Sean she wasn’t a quitter, that for once she could follow up and do something right, that she wasn’t like her mother, with a new project to back and then abandon every other week.

So she got a better grip and hauled herself the rest of the way up onto the ledge, the window frame cutting into her gut. When her head was completely out of the window and she was staring down at concrete, she let out a squawk. “I’m going to fall!”

Sean’s hands firmly gripped her thighs. “Pull your head back! You have to get your leg over the ledge. You can’t go headfirst.”

Good point. She pulled herself back and tried to sit up. This was a lot of work and she didn’t have the core strength to do it. Maybe she should start Pilates. Then again, why would she ever need to climb through a window again? She had a record of not setting foot in a gym in five years; it would be a shame to break that impressive streak.

But with Sean shoving and her hauling, she managed to get her leg up and over the frame so she was straddling the ledge, one leg inside, one outside. Good thing the window was full sized or this would have never worked. Even so, she was hunched over, and her perch wasn’t exactly comfortable. She rocked back and forth. “I think I’m breaking vital parts.”

“Well, we definitely don’t want that.” Without warning, Sean’s hand slid between her legs and under her booty, while his thumb rested quite comfortably on her clitoris.

Kristine screamed and almost fell out the window.

4 (#ulink_4898278d-d1fb-5e1e-a8b5-175f41ed949c)

SEAN WASN’T ABOUT to let Kristine get hurt trying to crawl out of the window. Or injure any particularly soft spots on her body. So while maybe he didn’t need to grip her precisely where he was, he had her best interests in mind.

And he was nothing if not an opportunist.

“Whoa,” he told her, moving right up against the wall so he could ensure that, if necessary, he could yank her back toward him. He didn’t want her spilling out the window.

“I think I’m okay,” she said, but her voice was shaky. She glanced down at him with limpid eyes. “Though I’m afraid if I shift I might have an orgasm. Could you move your thumb, please?”

Sean laughed. Leave it to Kristine to tell it like it was. “I don’t want you to fall.”

“Your thumb isn’t holding me up. And you’re not playing fair.”

That gave him immense satisfaction. “I wasn’t aware we were playing. I thought we were trying to get out of this room so this photography event can happen and we can get divorced.”

Her eyes narrowed. “You’re definitely playing a game. Only I don’t know what it is. You know I suck at strategizing. I would be the first person off Survivor because I don’t understand scheming.”

“I’m not scheming.” Not much, anyway. “I am legitimately trying to keep you from falling. And I am legitimately using it as a reason to touch your body.” He stroked his thumb up and down, slowly. “It doesn’t seem like you mind.”

“Just because my body responds to you in some sort of sexual recognition doesn’t mean it makes sense for us to do this. We should talk.”

They could talk. And then he could make love to her. Worked for him. “Right now? My hand is going numb and I imagine your ass is doing the same.”

Kristine frowned, but she shook her head. “This isn’t over.”

He’d never thought it was. What should have been a fight and reconciliation had just ended with the fight, and he’d spent years wondering why. Did she even realize how loaded that sounded? “Agreed.” Slowly, he withdrew his hand. “Now just swing your other leg over and ease down. Don’t let go of the window until you’ve slid as far down the wall as you can, okay?”

“Got it, coach.” She drew up her other leg. “I would say this is inspiration for me starting an exercise regime, but that would be a total lie. I hate working out and that is never going to change.”

Frankly, Sean couldn’t imagine what hard-core athletic ventures would do to Kristine’s body. It would take away all those curves he loved so much, tone away the soft angles and make it not nearly as much fun to touch her. “You certainly get a workout talking,” he teased her. “You could have jumped out this window three times by now.”

She made a face at him. Then she slid down the wall, making tiny little exclamations of distress the whole time. Sean jumped up to grab the ledge so he could watch her and make sure she was okay. She landed on her feet and turned around and gave him a thumbs-up.

“Awesome job,” he told her sincerely. “I knew you could do it.”

She adjusted his pants on her hips and grinned up at him. “You know, it occurs to me that I am in a power position here. I’m free, but you’re still locked up. What if I just walk away?”

He snorted. He didn’t believe for one minute she would leave him there. “Bullshit, Kristy. You wouldn’t do that and you know it.”

But then he realized she had actually done that very thing. She had left town and changed her number. For the first year, he’d had no idea where she was or what she’d been doing until he had hounded her mother to tell him. But he hadn’t done anything with that information because, at that point, what was there to say? His frustration resurfaced and without another word, he dropped back down onto the floor.

What the hell had he been expecting? That he would show up at the gallery and somehow the past would all make sense?