“What’re you up to tonight, Charlie?” Reece watched her reflection in the mirror again.
“Eyes on the road, Krueger,” she commanded, and he smirked but obliged. “There’s a pregame in Nina’s room. She’s somewhere on the second floor. I’m sure you’re all welcome if you want to drop by. She’s making funfetti-tinis.”
“What’s a funfetti-tini?” Liam enunciated every syllable with relish.
Charlotte smiled—the third bro in Reece’s trio was quite fun when he was conscious. “Cream soda mixed with cupcake-flavored vodka.”
Garrett gagged in the front seat.
“It’s gross,” she granted. “We’ll probably have a sip for nostalgia’s sake, wonder out loud how we ever drank such garbage, and then go back to beer.”
Reece palmed the steering wheel as he turned into the campus parking lot. “You have arrived at your final destination. Please remember to take all personal belongings with you.”
Charlotte made sure Misty was safely installed in Liam’s arms before she opened the door. Reece fell into step beside her on the long flight of stairs to the rear entrance of Randall. He pressed his hand to the small of her back as she climbed the crumbling stone steps. The chivalrous gesture must have been automatic for him, but even the suggestion of his fingers against her body made her wish they were alone. It would be hours before she could revel in his touch again.
“I still can’t believe you drove all the way from Missouri,” she said, shaking off her horniness. “How long did it take?”
“I think like twenty hours on the road, with a stopover at my aunt’s place in Philly.” Reece shrugged. “It was nice. I love road trips. They give you time to think, time to listen to podcasts…” His thumb rubbed at the small of her back. “Time to mentally prepare yourself to see your ex.”
“Touché,” Charlotte said, a little embarrassed.
“I’m just teasing you.” Reece slid his hand into her back pocket. The gesture was wonderfully possessive, and it drew her hip closer to his. His lowered his voice and asked, “What are you up to now?”
Before she could read his face, he stepped back to hold the door open. She let Liam and Garrett pass by as she considered her answer. The boys continued into the stairwell and up to the third floor where they were staying, leaving them alone.
Reece was staring at her mouth. It took a great deal of concentration to remember he’d asked her a direct question.
“Jackie hasn’t texted me back. She must be asleep.” Reece nodded at the underlying message of her words: My room is occupied. “And I need to get the pond scum out of my hair.” She smelled more like Misty than was typically considered attractive by polite society.
“A shower sounds amazing.” Reece ran a hand through his own hair. A disloyal cowlick sprang up at the back of his skull. “We have spare towels if you don’t want to wake her up.”
Charlotte’s skin warmed as she picked up on the subtext of Reece’s offer. “Are you suggesting what I think you’re suggesting?”
Reece studied the pink glow spreading across her chest. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Charlie.”
“Yeah, sure you don’t.” She rolled her eyes, her face hot. “Lead the way, Krueger.”
Reece and Garrett’s room was just as chaotic as the Jeep. What looked like an entire Target men’s section had exploded on Reece’s side. Misty curled up on a foam pad under Garrett’s lofted bed, chewing a bully stick.
Liam and Garrett were in the middle of a heated debate about a playlist. They didn’t look up from Garrett’s computer when the door opened. Reece grabbed two towels from a huge pile on the bookshelf as Charlotte hesitated in the doorway.
“How did you guys get so many towels?” she asked.
“Garrett has an in on the R&C committee,” Reece explained. She gave him a disapproving look, and he laughed. “Nothing creepy. His sister is a junior.”
“Oh awesome, I didn’t know.”
“Gov major,” Garrett supplied without looking up from the laptop. “Imani’s going to be a senator someday.”
“Right on,” Charlotte said.
Reece picked up a hairbrush and a travel kit of toiletries. He tossed her the brush and folded the towels under his arm.
She began the arduous process of brushing out her wet snarls as she followed him down the hallway.
The third floor had a communal bathroom that served the entire hall. She looked around at the floor-to-ceiling brown tile and thought longingly of her shower shoes downstairs.
Reece staked out the last stall. He lined up his products on the shelf and shucked off his shorts. After he turned the water on, he peered back at her from behind the plastic curtain. “Come on in, Charlie. Water’s warm.”
Well, when at Hein.
Charlotte kicked off her loafers and put them on a bench outside the stall. Then she wriggled out of her clothes, the denim of her jeans sticking to her legs. They were the only people in the bathroom, so she peeled off her underwear and sports bra before hopping into the stall behind him.
The sight of Reece standing in the shower killed any hesitation she felt about bathing with someone else in public. The water ran down his body like a blessing. It slid in tendrils from his hair and along the back of his neck. Droplets arced between his shoulder blades and down to the ripe swell of his ass.
Charlotte had to admit it: She was an ass woman. She wanted to bite down on his firm cheek.
Reece made room for her under the showerhead. She shivered with delight as the hot water kissed her face. He handed her a little bottle of hotel shampoo. “You go first, you’ll take longer.”
She squirted a splatter onto her palm and rubbed it across her scalp, staying under the water to let it foam. Then she stepped back and let him wash and rinse. The soapy water trailed down his chest and caught in the thicket of hair beneath the V of his hips.
“See something you like?” Reece licked water from his lips as he smiled.
“No comment.”
“Your turn, rinse.”
The water felt divine on the knots in her shoulders. She coaxed the shampoo out of her hair and rolled her head from side to side on her neck. “You sore?” Reece asked, his face pink. From the hot water, of course.
