Free Chase You To The Sun by Jocelyn Han Page A

she unlocked it, though, someone simultaneously pulled it open from the other side. Stumbling back, Lana shot a mortified look at the door swinging open, sucking in her breath when Bruce calmly stepped inside.
    He was wearing nothing but a black towel around his hips. His entire upper body was gloriously naked and masculine, his tanned torso so tempting and terrifyingly broad and gracious at the same time that Lana felt her heart flutter with fear and lust.  Her eyes roved over the bunching muscles of his shoulders and his wide, hairless chest before darting down to the leanness of his flat abdomen. Her face grew so hot she swore the capillaries in her cheeks would burst.
    “Oh my God,” she squeaked, realizing too late she’d said the words out loud.
    “Good morning to you too,” Bruce replied deadpan.
    Lana shook herself out of her stupor. “I mean, I’m sorry. To bother you,” she stammered.
    His eyes bored into hers. “Looks like you’re more bothered than I am.”
    “I’m...” The words caught in her throat. She didn’t even know what words would come out if her tongue ever started working properly again.
    “Next time you should probably get dressed before leaving the bathroom, little girl,” he continued with a faint, belittling grin. “I don’t think you want to bump into John. Not if you’re wrapped in just that skimpy towel.” It sounded even more patronizing because he was absolutely right.
    Lana couldn’t stop herself from talking back, though. “Stop calling me that.”
    “What?”
    “I’m not a little girl,” she muttered as irritably as she dared, biting her lip in apprehension when Bruce cocked his head. He took a step closer, and another one. As he stood there towering over her, his eyes slowly drank in her body, lingering on her barely covered breasts for a few seconds too long.
    “No, you’re not,” he established quietly, subtly smiling in amusement when she turned red. “I think you’re old enough.”
    “For what?” she blurted out without thinking. Because obviously, standing this close to Bruce only wearing a towel slung around his hips had effectively destroyed any filter between her brain and her mouth.
    He cocked an eyebrow, his burning stare turning darker. “You need me to spell it out for you?” he said, his voice low.
    Lana swallowed hard, trying to push away a mental image of Bruce hooking his fingers into the towel covering her boobs to pull her in and breathe ‘H-O-T-S-E-X’ into her ear. “No, I, uhm, I get it,” she bumbled.
    “Do you?”
    “Yes.” She scuttled backward, feeling for the door handle with the hand she wasn’t using to hold up her towel dress.
    “Go on, out you go,” Bruce told her darkly. “Before I really embarrass you.”
    She gasped when he leisurely started to pull out the tightly tucked end of his towel to lower it, a hint of dark-blonde pubic hair peeping out over the edge. Lana blindly whipped around and stumbled out of the bathroom, her face flaming with incriminating heat.
    Oh God. She had to get dressed, get out of the house and take a long walk outside to cool off and get her mind off whatever the hell had just happened – or had almost happened, anyway. As she burst back into her room, Lana decided she’d ask Chester to accompany her in the garden. If Bruce was awake at this hour, the rest of the gang would most likely wake up soon, too. And after her walk she’d go back to her room and try to call Tori and Alen. Had her friends told her father about the phone she was secretly using?  She might pass on a message via Tori – and ask him to tell her friend the long story that would explain why Bruce wanted what he did from Ivanov Mining Industries. Last night’s talk had left her hanging, and if anything, she needed to know how trustworthy Bruce and his stories really were. For all she knew, he was trying to brainwash her, winning her over to his side by poisoning her mind with lies.
    By the time she got downstairs,