Truth or Dare (9 page)

“But it’s not
my
cat.”

Turned out the conversational disconnect Maggie had noticed from the start was a bigger problem than she’d anticipated.

“It lives in your apartment,” she’d gasped.

With her cat allergies, she always checked. And this was the reason.

Neil nodded, smiling in a way that suggested he didn’t get how precarious his situation was. “Uh-huh, but it’s not mine.”

The guy had been lucky she hadn’t had time to maim him.

Another block and, miracle of miracles, she scored a parking spot right in front. Maybe things were looking up.

Hands shaking, she jerked the keys from the ignition and sucked a too-thin breath into her lungs, already getting the skimp on oxygen. This was the worst of it. As bad as it was going to get.

Another minute and she’d be snacking on Benadryl, hopping into a steamy shower, and then scrubbing every inch of herself. She’d be able to breathe. But until then…
Don’t touch anything!

Elbowing her way out of the car, she abandoned her scarf and coat within, knowing they’d have to be cleaned. Hell, the whole car was going to need a detail.

But now, the only thing that mattered was getting inside.

She hit the lock and—stepped straight into a pothole, stumbling as the keys flew past her fingers.

Damn it!
Blinking back her tears, she searched the cold ground around her. Got on her hands and knees, trying to see under the car. Nothing.

More tears she couldn’t afford pushed at her eyelids, welling fast as they tightened her throat. Desperately, she swiped at them with her sleeve, realizing too late what she’d just done.

Oh. Shit. Dander!

She’d been able to drive only because she hadn’t touched her eyes. But now…

The corners went first. And then—

“Apartment Two?”

Maggie had called him her hero.

And sure, he’d happened along at the right time. Carried her practically blind ass upstairs when she kept tripping. And then made an emergency run for Benadryl, or whatever this off-brand stuff was she’d shotgunned like Red Bull when he passed it through the shower curtain to her…

But as far as white-knight moments went, staring down at his jock, trying to will it into submission, Tyler was fairly confident this wasn’t one of them.

Stuck outside his bathroom door, he watched the wisps of steam curl between the gaps, listening to the shower run and Maggie alternately groan in misery…and then seconds later when she’d finally succumbed to the itch…moan in ecstasy.

The latter? She needed to knock it the hell off, and fast.

“No scratching!” he barked, ready to walk in there and tie up her hands to the shower rod to keep from having to hear that deep pleasured sound echoing out of his bathroom.

Except,
perfect,
then he had the wet-slicked image of Maggie, miraculously hive free and sans nasty swelling except for maybe her mouth—because,
damn
—dripping wet, water sluicing down the peaks and valleys of a body he’d never been able to ignore, arms overhead—
shit
—with him holding them there.

Cue the sultry moan.

Nice.
And this one capped with some kind of gaspy squeak.

“I said stop scratching!”

“I can’t. I’m one…giant hive. They’re all connected now. And…
they itch.
”

At least the wheezing wasn’t quite so bad, but the agonized groan that followed had his head slamming back to the land of guilt and empathy. Only as he probably had less than fifteen seconds before the pendulum swung the other way and Maggie gave in to the itch and inadvertently fired up half a dozen shower-soaked scenarios he didn’t want his head playing with, it was time to put his foot down.

“Shower’s over, Maggie. Finish up and hop out.”

After what sounded like some clumsy fumbling, followed by the contents of his shower shelf hitting the tub, the water cut off.

Leaning into the wall, he closed his eyes and tried not to laugh. But at the quiet “motherfucker” hissed from within, he couldn’t help it.

“Uhh, Apartment Two? Need some help?”

Another thud, slip, and fumble, and then a feeble yet pissed, “I can’t see enough to…get the towel and get out…everything in here’s white.”

He could still hear shades of Vader in the pauses between her words, but the shower and drug chug seemed to have improved it significantly.

Chin to chest, he walked into the steamy space, resolved not to look.

Strike that. He had to look if he was going to help. What he wasn’t going to do was leer. He wasn’t going to splash around in the deep end of Salacious Lake just because his favorite flavor of smack-talking good girl happened to be standing naked at the shores. They’d decided to be friends. And for some reason, out of the whole group—hell, the whole city—Maggie was the only one he’d really clicked with. She was the one who got what he was saying. The one who made him laugh first. She made him feel something other than shitty, and after the way he’d pushed everyone else away for so long, the last thing he wanted to do was screw things up with her.

Keeping his eyes on the opposite wall and his thoughts to the clinical, he grabbed a towel and stuck his hand past the shower curtain. “Here. Wrap it around you and then I’ll help you out.”

“Okay, I’m ready—no, wait…take your shirt off first. It’s contaminated from when you carried me. And wash your hands.”

“Right.” He grabbed a handful of the back of his oxford and pulled it over his head. Did a quick hand wash and turned back to the shower, where Maggie had wrapped the towel around her and pulled open the curtain.

Even without looking directly at her, his damned peripheral vision was doing a bang-up job offering details he didn’t want to have. And it only got worse when he pulled her in tight to lift her out of the tub, because the smell of his soap on her skin, coupled with the soft press of her breasts against his chest, was the last thing he needed.

Make that the last thing right after the little bite of her fingers gripping his shoulders as the warm puffs of her breath washed over his neck.

He should let her go, step back. Only it had been so long since he’d had anyone in his arms that way. Since he felt the light brush of a woman’s hands on his bare skin. Add to that the woman was Maggie…and she hadn’t let go of him either?

Not. Good. At. All.

A desperate-times, drastic-measures moment if ever there was one.

Bracing, he looked into her face. And yeah, that did it with the down-boy. Because she was a mess. The girl looked like she’d just gone a few rounds in the Octagon.

“I thought the shower was going to—” He waved an open hand around in front of his face, then wondered if she could even see that far. Figured he’d test it out.

“What, are you giving me…the finger?”

Check that.
She could see, at least a little. “No. How long before your eyes look normal again?”

Her free hand came halfway up to her face, then stalled out and reversed its path until it fisted at her side. “Day or so, maybe. Depends if I touch them.”

“For God’s sake, don’t touch them, then.”

She let out one of her soft laughs, and he wondered how it was possible that sound still hit him in the chest like a blow he hadn’t seen coming. “That good, huh?”

The laugh? Yeah. But he rubbed at the spot, trying to erase the feel of it, because he knew better. All he had to do was think about the way he’d woken the night before. Two a.m., Charlie’s lost cries echoing through the silent apartment. Frustration clawing at his gut.

“Turn around, Two.” Hands on her shoulders, he held her a stiff arm’s-length ahead of him as he pushed her out the bathroom door into his bedroom and sat her at the edge of his bed.

“I’ve got a T-shirt and some sweats you can wear,” he said, setting them beside her. “You get dressed while I go down to look for your keys.”

Twenty-five minutes later Ty walked back into the apartment, swinging Maggie’s key ring around his index finger.

“You found them!” Maggie called from the couch, swimming in his borrowed clothes as she struggled to get up.

And struggled some more.

A low giggle had his focus snapping to the bottle of allergy stuff he’d left on the counter in the kitchen—a bottle now located on the coffee table in front of the couch and looking significantly lighter than it had last he’d seen it.

He gaped. “How much did you drink?”

Maggie shrugged, waving his question away like an annoying gnat.

“I needed more. But it’s working now. I can feel it.”

And yeah, the way that hive-riddled face pulled back in a swerve said she was feeling it a lot. There was no way he could drop her back in her apartment like this. Not alone.

“Maggie? Any idea what Ava and the guys are up to tonight?” And what his chances were of getting through to them, or when they’d be home.

She raised a brow. Then switched to the other. “Movie.”

And that would explain the radio silence after his text.

“Oohh, ’n’ you got my purse, too,” she sighed, and he had to admit her lungs sounded about a thousand times better.

He carried it over to her and she slung the short stiff strap over her shoulder, taking her keys in one hand as she reached out to—
holy hell!

Ty’s hips shot back as Maggie’s fingers snared the front pocket of his jeans.

“Hey, stand still,” she snapped. “I wanna get up.”

And playing pocket soccer was her plan to do it? This was bad.

Taking her wrist, Tyler gently but firmly extracted her hand from his pants and helped her back onto the couch. Looked her square in the swollen slits of her eyes and grimaced. “So Maggie, I’m thinking maybe we hang awhile. Talk.”

A delighted smile. “Really?”

No. “Sure.”

She shuffled around on the couch, settling back in. “Okay, let’s play a game.”

Great,
she was going to owe him for this. “What do you want to play? Poker? Gin?”

Thank God her face was swollen the way it was, because the look in her eyes when she answered might have been a real problem otherwise. “Truth or dare.”

Tyler leaned close, smiling his most patient smile. “Not a chance.”

Head foggy, tongue thick, Maggie came to beneath the gentle rubbing of a hand—big and warm—at her shoulder. Opening her eyes as far as they would go, all she could see was gray. Voices sounded in the distance, but it was the one at her ear—

“Time to get up, Maggie.”

—that had her snapping to attention.

This couldn’t be—

She hadn’t—

Horrified, she planted a hand, struggling to sit up, then froze at the harsh grunt confirming her situation was every bit as bad as she suspected.

She’d been sleeping with her head in Apartment Three’s lap. Her cheek pressed against his abdomen, her arm tucked up against the side of his chest.

“Tyler?” she asked in a whisper, afraid to meet his eyes.

“Hey, you okay?” he asked, brushing the hair from her face with a gentle stroke.

She took a bracing breath, relieved when the air moved through her lungs without resistance. “I can’t believe I fell asleep on you!”

“Took me by surprise, too,” he said with a gruff laugh she could feel rumbling from deep in his chest, right through her own. “Especially considering you were mid-sentence when you knocked out.”

Looking up at him, their eyes met, and she saw something in Tyler’s expression she didn’t know how to read. Something tender, which made her feel shy. Nervous.

Aware. Of him. Of her. Of them together on his couch. Of the press of their bodies and the comforting weight of his arm resting over her hip.

Of how good it felt being this close to him. How for the first time in too long to think about, she maybe wanted to get closer.

“I should get up. Get off you, at least.”

The corner of his mouth twitched, but neither of them moved. And then slowly, his brows drew forward, darkening the eyes still holding with hers. “Maggie?”

Her hand inched higher over his chest and, God, his body was amazing. The muscles beneath her palm, firm. Defined.

“Your friends are here.”

She froze, her hazy thoughts sharpening fast.

“I left the door unlocked for them and—”

“Hives, huh?”

Maggie jumped at the sound of Sam’s voice, then twisted around to see her friends piled up at Tyler’s front door, their expressions guaranteeing she’d be hearing about this for weeks.

Perfect.

Slinging an arm around Ava’s shoulders, Sam grinned. “Looks like Apartment Three scratched Maggie’s itch for her after all.”

Unenthused about the prospect of the day ahead, Maggie lay in bed, willing the sleep that had abandoned her to return. She didn’t want to get up because as far as she was concerned, there was only one thing worse than waking up with a hangover she hadn’t earned the fun way, and that was waking up with an all-too-clear recollection of what had transpired between her and Three.

The guy had saved her bacon in no small way.

He’d carried her up two flights of stairs. Princess style.

Bought her medicine. Let her use his shower. And found her keys.

But after he’d gotten her drunk on allergy medicine—that was her story, and pride demanded she stick to it—things started getting a little fuzzy around the point when he’d given her a change of clothes.

And now that she was thinking about clothes, holy cow, was his T-shirt
soft.
And the
smell—

An indelicate grunt sounded from the space immediately behind her and a pointy elbow caught her in the spine.

Ouch.

The elbow was followed by the thwack of a limp hand across her face and the icy press of size-seven toes at the inside of her knee. Rolling onto her back, she nudged Ava’s sprawl of limbs out of her way, mentally amending her previous thought. So there where
two
things worse, and sharing a bed with her flail-acious friend was the other.

Ava cracked an eyelid. “God, you’re hideous.”

Maggie sighed. Her eyes were still uncomfortably swollen, and her lips felt like they’d just had a bead of repurposed fat injected into them—she was probably looking at another few days before her face hit normal.