Total pages in book: 125
Estimated words: 117201 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 586(@200wpm)___ 469(@250wpm)___ 391(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 117201 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 586(@200wpm)___ 469(@250wpm)___ 391(@300wpm)
“Myrtle?” Tallulah could hear the smile in his voice.
“Yes, Myrtle. She’s kind of a big deal around here.” She guided Burgess all the way to the glass, not giving the slightest resistance when he came up behind her, wrapping his arms around her shoulders and settling her back against his chest. “Um . . .” Oh lord, she was startling to become a little aroused. All the touching, the way they gravitated together every chance they got, the proximity becoming more and more intimate, made her panties feel . . .
Like a hindrance.
They were wet already, simply from holding his hand, knowing how his palms felt molding her breasts, stroking her hair encouragingly while she knelt in front of him. Now instead of looking into the glass and seeing beautiful Myrtle, she saw only the way her boss towered over her protectively, his athletic frame dwarfing her.
“You were saying, Tallulah?”
Stop thinking about sex. “Oh. Yes. Myrtle has been at this aquarium for fifty years, isn’t that wild? A green sea turtle might weight three hundred pounds on average, but Myrtle weighs in at an impressive five hundred and fifty pounds.” A laugh tripped over her lips. “She’s, like, the Sir Savage of the New England Aquarium.”
Burgess’s big chest rumbled behind her, the bristles of his beard finding the curve of her neck and rubbing there. “I wouldn’t want to square off against her.”
“Smart man,” she managed, tilting her neck even further and going up on her toes, sighing when he sucked on a patch of skin. “Good man. Very, very good . . . man.”
“As far as tour guides go, Tallulah, you’re very easy to distract.”
“Maybe we should skip to the penguins,” she blurted, tearing herself away while fanning her face, much to Burgess’s visible enjoyment. Pursing her lips, she took him by the wrist and continued to pull him along, knowing the route to the penguin colony by heart. It lay in the direction they’d come from, near the giant ocean tank, but up a winding concrete ramp where they could look down into the rocky habitat from above. As soon as she looked over the railing, nostalgia and a sense of connection cranked a handle in her chest. “Oh,” she whispered. “There they are.”
As if Burgess realized this was an emotional moment for her, he didn’t make contact, leaning beside her on the rail, instead. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah.” She pressed three fingers to the space beneath her collarbone where the burden had concentrated itself. “Sometimes on a research project, you get really connected to individual animals. We can’t touch or interact with them directly or we could upset the balance of the colony, but I did watch a penguin named Kirk extra carefully.” She pointed. “He was an Adelie, like that little guy down there.”
“I don’t call things cute, but if I did . . .” He shrugged. “I’d say he’s cute.”
Tallulah laughed. “Kirk used to play pranks on the other penguins. At first, I thought I was imagining it, but there were too many coincidences. Skidding in behind his friend on a glacier and knocking him off. Or, there was an Adelie who had a more exaggerated waddle than the others and Kirk imitated him behind his back. I’ve never seen scientists laugh so hard.” She let out a wistful breath. “It’s hard not knowing what will happen to him.”
“I’m sure he’s got some good prank playing years left in him.”
“I hope so.” She studied Burgess’s profile. “Did you have pets growing up?”
“Sure.” His expression warmed. “I had a husky named Dunk.”
“You did?” Tallulah furiously tried to picture a serious giant teenager with his trusty dog and found it made her pulse go out of whack. “Why did you name him Dunk?”
“We gave him a treat the day he came home from the shelter and he dunked it in some water. He was an older dog. Think he’d figured out the water made the treat easier on his teeth.”
“Smart boy,” crooned Tallulah.
“Yeah. He was. Couldn’t bring him to my league games, though. He wouldn’t stop barking because he thought everyone was trying to attack me.”
“He should have been worried about everyone else.”
“That’s what I told him. He wouldn’t listen.”
A smile spread across Tallulah’s face and she found herself missing his touch, the curves of his muscles against her softness, his breath on her skin. And so she eased in between him and the concrete wall, savoring the reunion of her breasts on his abdomen, the drag of her hips on his meaty upper thighs, the wind of her arms around his neck. “You have no idea how happy this made me. Bringing me here.” She sank her fingers into the back of his hair, razing his scalp with her nails, and just like last night, his eyes glazed over at the treatment.