As they stood on the porch, he released her fingers.
“Let’s walk,” he told Sylvie, keeping a good two feet from her. No way could he link hands with her now… not in his condition. No way could he return to the close confines of the houseboat with her and not jump her bones like a raving lunatic.
She gazed at him questioningly through eyes that were big and blue and sexy as hell. When she blinked… once, twice, three times… he felt blood rush to his heart. Or was it to another organ? Hard to tell. Luc was so aroused he felt disoriented. Without thinking, he groaned.
“Luc?” Sylvie inquired with concern, putting a hand on his arm. “Is something wrong? Your teeth are clenched.”
He shrugged off her hand, which felt hot on his fevered flesh… even through the sleeve of his shirt. Words failed him.
“Are you suffering from the effects of that one oyster shooter, like I am… though of course I had two… but then two for me is probably comparable to six for you, right?” She was blathering aimlessly. Clueless… the woman was clueless as to her effect on him. “I have to admit, Luc, I feel really, really strange.”
“Strange doesn’t begin to express how I feel, babe.” He emphasized his words with a short, strained laugh. “And if you’re feeling the same way I am, fasten your seat belt, because we’re both in a hell of a lot of trouble.”
“Hmmm,” she said. “Would you wait here a minute? I want to go get my notebook and pen.”
“No!”
“No?” She was gazing at him as if he’d flipped his lid… which he had, of course. “There are a million questions I want to ask you, and I need to start taking notes or else I’ll…” Her words trailed off as her eyes drifted over his body, did a double take back to his crotch, then widened.
It was probably the first time any woman had ever reacted with saucer-wide eyes to his “virility,” even when he’d gone full monty with them for the first time. Oh, he had more going for him in that department than the average guy, in his not-so-humble opinion… but he couldn’t remember one single time that a woman had gone wide-eyed on him.
But wait, his own personal testosterone booster was chatting away blithely. “… and if we’re going to be away for more than two days, I really must insist on getting a supply of graph paper. A laptop would be great, too, but I can make do with a half-dozen more notebooks. The most important thing is that I absolutely need a thermometer, a blood pressure gauge, and a tape measure.”
“A tape measure?” he choked out.
Her only answer was a deep, deep blush.
“Unbelievable,” he commented, and stomped off ahead of her, down the steps of the tavern porch, and over toward a path that ran beside the meandering bayou.
“There you go… overreacting again,” she called after him.
I’d like to show you overreaction, chère. And maybe I will… if I’m as dumb as I seem to be… and as reckless… and as turned on. Aaarrqh! As he walked briskly away from her, the neon glow of the tavern was soon left behind, but there was a full moon, which illuminated his way with pools of light. He sensed Sylvie’s presence just behind him as she half-skipped to keep up with his much longer strides. Fortunately, she’d opted for silence, having no doubt realized how foolishly she was pushing him.
Finally, he stopped just around a bend, leaned back against the ample trunk of a live oak tree whose vast limbs were draped with Spanish moss, and closed his eyes. Inhaling and exhaling repeatedly, he tried to calm his nerves. When that didn’t work, he lifted his head, raised his eyelids, and slowly scanned his surroundings, hoping that the bayou setting would seep into his soul and give him respite… as it had so many times as a child when he’d fled his turbulent home, or as an adult when people and life in general seemed to demand too much of him.