Mr. Right Now Read Free Page B

the console to her and back again. “They must think it’s broken.” He flashed a wry smile. “I guess we’ll have to continue this somewhere else.” He flicked his index finger against the hold button, effectively shutting off the breeping light and sending the elevator into motion.
    Continue, definitely. But first she needed an inch of breathing room. This was going too fast. She ran a hand through her hair, wondering just what she would look like when she stepped off the elevator. She needed a moment. Just one.
    Maybe two.
    Picking up her bag from the floor, she straightened her skirt, wondering how it had become twisted around her waist. His hands had stayed above that area. Hadn’t they? The thought had her sneaking a look at his package. It bulged against the zipper of his jeans. So she wasn’t the only one turned on. Not that she needed to see his arousal to know how she affected him. She could feel it in his touch.
    The elevator slowed, a tinny pinging noise announcing their arrival at her floor.
    He pulled her into his arms, hugged her close, and then released her only long enough to take her hand in his.
    “Should we continue this in my room or yours?”
    Space. Just a little space. Her cell phone rang and she quickly wrestled it out of her bag. She made an apologetic face and shrugged one shoulder.
    “Six o’clock. Upper deck.” The words sounded husky to her ears.
    Mason raised one eyebrow, and then released her hand. “That’s a long time to wait.” When she stepped from the elevator, he stepped to the back of the car.
    The elevator doors closed. Why had space seemed so important just a few moments ago?
     

 

     
    “No. No, nononono. I’m not spending the next week in a stateroom with...him,” Casey said to the room at large. The last reminders of the elevator kiss and Mason evaporated like dew on the honeysuckle at her parents’ Charleston home.
    Him was the nicest word Casey could think of to describe the man laid out across her bed, a trail of tissue leading from his inert body to the nightstand and a hunk of the stuff affixed to his nose. The bleeding had started about ten minutes before when Casey entered the room and told the bellhop she definitely would not be cohabiting with Tyler Cash, if that was his real name.
    His name evoked a cowboy type: lean muscles, tanned skin and maybe even a mustache. Of course, the Tyler Cash lying across her bed was nothing like that. As far as Casey could tell, Tyler didn’t even have muscles underneath his pasty-white skin and as smooth as his cheeks looked, she wasn’t certain he was capable of growing facial hair. He had nice hair. Nicely brown, no hints of gray, and it didn’t look to be receding. He kept it a little long, but then Casey wasn’t all that crazy about those military styled cuts. Come to think of it, he kind of looked like a weaker, less colorful version of Mason.
    This was getting out of control. First, Jane hired Mason to be her Mr. Right Now man. Now, a nerd was bleeding all over her bed, and they were apparently supposed to spend the next week together. Her life was slipping from her grasp as quickly as the cruise ship would cut across the Caribbean.
    She didn’t want to hurt his feelings, but there was no way she wanted a roommate. No. No. No. Casey considered herself a nice girl. She tried not to hurt people’s feelings and she knew from the amount of blood coming from Tyler’s nose that she’d hurt his feelings. Stress-induced nosebleeds were the worst. She would apologize later, but she wasn’t giving in on this. She wasn’t spending the next week with a nose-bleeding nerd when she could have seven beautiful nights with Mason.
    Now, if they wanted to move the nerd into another room, Mason Drury could bunk with her. As long as he wasn’t prone to nosebleeds.
    The bellboy raised his hands. “But, Mrs. Cash, the ship is full and—”
    “And that’s the problem. I’m not ‘Mrs. Cash.’ I am Ms. Cash.” Casey held