o 35b0a02a46796a4f by deba schrott Page A

what he was doing until he saw his hand reaching out
    touch—
    -
    “Don’t,” she said. “Just . . . don’t.”
    Her voice was full of disgust and because of that, when she muttered, “Fuck me,” he dropped his hand and said, “I did.”
    She punched him. He couldn’t say that he blamed her.
    Alex didn’t realize she’d rounded on Barlow until her fist connected with his face.
    He could have stopped her. That he didn’t confused her, and when she was confused, she lashed out. A lot of people did.
    “What did you do to me?”
    He rubbed his jaw as he looked her up’ and down. “Isn’t that obvious?”
    She’d been shaking her hand, trying to make the numbness fade. He had a hard head, no shock there. But his words made her fingers curl inward once again.
    He noticed and lifted a brow. “I gave you a shot,” he said. I deserved it. But one’s all you get?’
    She rolled her eyes. If she wanted to punch him again, she would. Alex let her fingers go limp. Right now she didn’t want to.
    Just to be pissy, Alex yanked the blanket off Barlow and around her. Unfortunately that left him naked when he sat up, resting a wrist on his knee, open to her gaze.
    She yanked her eyes from what lay below his waist and focused on an area just below his face. She’d left a mark on his neck.
    “God,” she muttered, and ran a hand through her tangled hair. What the hell had happened?
    Suddenly everything came back—the bear, the fight, then. . . everything went fuzzy.
    Alex glanced down. The only remnants of the attack were some dried blood, a few bruises, and several scabbed-over claw marks. “What the—?” She ran her fingers over the wounds, wincing. They might be nearly healed but they still hurt.
    Alex glanced up, but he was staring out the opening of the cave and not at her. “How?” she murmured.
    He lifted one shoulder, lowered it. Alex had a flash of
    those muscles bunching beneath her palm as he thrust into tier so deeply—
    “Magic?’
    She blinked, and the memory went away. “Magic,” she repeated. “Like shifting in the daytime.” He nodded. “Putting an invisibility cloak around us in LA.”
    “A what?” he asked.
    “Harry Potter.” She’d done a lot of reading in those hotel rooms. Alex waved her hand. “Never mind. You know what I mean.”
    “Yes,” he agreed. “Like that.”
    “You healed me by magic,” she said slowly. “Then you made me do you?’
    “You think I used magic to make you—” His cool blue eyes blazed hot with fury. “I don’t need sex that bad.”
    “Could have fooled me,” she muttered.
    Was she imagining things or did his cheeks flush just little?
    “Glass houses,” he said.
    “Huh?”
    “From the way you were writhing and moaning and coming, you needed it, too.”
    She had. But she wasn’t going to tell him that.
    “What kind of man climbs into bed with an injured woman—”
    “According to you, I’m not a man,” he snapped: “~ because of me, you weren’t exactly injured. You were, however, blue with cold.”
    Alex glanced at the still-swirling snowstorm outside cave. “You were just keeping me warm?”
    “Someone had to.”
    Alex narrowed her eyes. “You didn’t have to seduce m
    “Are you so sure it was me who seduced you?”
    Alex opened her mouth, then shut it again. He was She wasn’t sure.
    “How about we just forget it ever happened?” Alex a~
    “If you can, I can.” He lay down and yanked the qui her and onto him with one sharp tug.
    “Hey!” She yanked it back.
    He shrugged and let her, placing his arms behind head and crossing his ankles. Unfortunately the sight of] long and bronzed, legs and arms thick with muscle— Alex consider throwing the quilt back over him again. Because for every inch of his skin she appeared to have a memory of touching, tasting—
    “Stop it,” she muttered.
    He opened one eye. “Stop what?”
    “Your hoodoo, voodoo, witchy crap.”
    “I didn’t do anything.”
    “You made me want