Page 24 of Nothing to Tell

The windows were inky black, filled by the mystery of night.What lay beyond?Wasn’t that the question of the moment?Hardly fair he could ask her personal questions and she couldn’t ask about the yard.Did he have a pool?Was there a patio?Did he own or rent?

Her questions stayed unanswered.Bastian took her into an enclosed, ascending stairway.

At the top, he gestured at the door straight ahead.“That’s the bathroom.”

“Bathroom, got it.”

“I’ll sleep in here,” he said, touching the door to the left.“Room on the right is yours.”

Room on the right was so big, she’d guess it was the size of the garage beneath.A bed in the center of the room took up most of the area.

“This is a big room,” she said admiring the solid oak furniture while he closed the curtains.

Shedding her shoes, she curled her toes into the thick carpet, opening and closing, squishing the pile that could almost be liquid, gobbling her up.

Bastian put her purse on the bottom corner of the bed.“I’ll get you something to sleep in, and a toothbrush.”

A toothbrush?Like a spare toothbrush?He must entertain a lot.Thinking about it, and his irrefutable hotness, it wasn’t a leap to assume he entertained women a lot.Like a lot.There wouldn’t be many immune to the dimple.

She stayed put, toe squishing the carpet.It kept her entertained.Though it was taking a lot of effort not to drop down there and bury her hands in it too.

That would be wrong.

What would be right?

Etiquette for these situations was not in any dating guide.

Not that they were dating.

As promised, he came back with a tee-shirt, a pair of shorts, and a toothbrush still in its pack.

“Bastian,” she said, taking the items.“Why are you being nice to me?”

In one backward stride, he put more than physical space between them.

“Trying to seduce you,” he muttered without an ounce of sincerity.

They both relaxed when she laughed.

Hugging the clothes to her chest, she exhaled.“You didn’t sign up for this.”

“Get changed,” he said.“I’ll get you a glass of water.”

When he left the room, she stripped off and pulled his tee-shirt on over her head.The shorts wouldn’t stay up.Letting them fall to her ankles would be more embarrassing than going without.The tee-shirt fell to her thighs, keeping her decent, so the shorts got folded away with the rest of her clothes.

Bastian knocked.At least, she assumed it was him.He wouldn’t want to walk in and see her naked.

“You’re good,” she called out.

Crawling onto the bed, she kneeled in the middle as he entered with a glass of water that he set on the nightstand.

The only thing left was to say goodnight.For some reason, that wasn’t appealing.

“You never told me why you were in the Grand the night we met,” she said.“We can’t be more than an hour from there now.Why would you be in a hotel if you live so close?”

“Back-to-back meetings,” he said.“I had a dinner appointment and a pre-breakfast meeting in one of their conference suites.It made sense to spend the night.”

Made sense, but the Grand wasn’t cheap.Her immediate family considered spending the night of the engagement party too.Until they calculated how much that would cost.With that, Adara also crossed it off her possible wedding venue list.Their father made good money, but not good enough money that they could afford to blow the entire wedding budget on one ballroom and some champagne.