Free Flat-Out Sexy by Erin McCarthy Page B

years, that’s how it was.

CHAPTER FOUR
    ELEC dragged his dress pants on, watching Tamara bustle around Ryder’s bedroom. She had pulled on her panties and her dress in two seconds and was now stripping the bed.
    “What are you doing?” he asked, feeling lazy and content and in no way inclined to hurry, which was what he really needed to do.
    “Changing the sheets. Ryder knows what happened on them since he saw us in bed. It’s tacky to just leave them.” She dug through drawers until she found fresh sheets, and before Elec even had his T-shirt on, she had snapped open the fitted sheet and efficiently tucked it all around the bed.
    Damn, she was sexy. Her hair was tousled, her cheeks pink, her dress all rumpled, and she smoothed the sheet out with her hand, doing what needed to be done. While he just stood and stared at her. Elec got his head out of his ass and stepped forward to catch the bottom of the top sheet as she spread it out, and he tucked the bottom while she tucked the top. Together they threw the comforter and pillows back on, and Elec found himself grinning like a fool for no apparent reason.
    There was just something about Tamara that he really liked. She was the absolute opposite of the women he’d been dating, and he really appreciated her compassion, her sense of responsibility, hell, even the way she worried. She worried because she cared, and that was damn sexy to him.
    “So what are your plans for the day?” he asked, fishing his shirt off the floor and putting it on without buttoning it back up. It was safe to say that particular shirt was going into the trash when he got home.
    “I have to meet my in-laws at the race. They’re bringing my kids.”
    Elec eyed her outfit. “You’re going to the track in a cocktail dress?”
    “I don’t have a choice. I left my bag at Geoffrey’s and I lost my purse, remember?”
    There was no way she could show up at a race wearing a black dress and heels. Somehow he knew Tamara didn’t covet the spotlight any more than he did, and wearing that sort of getup was bound to get her all sorts of unwanted attention. “You don’t want to do that. Just come back to my coach and we’ll find you something else to wear. I have to go get my bag anyway.”
    She was biting her fingernail. “Nothing you wear is going to fit me.”
    “Probably not, but a baggy T-shirt is better than a wrinkled cocktail dress. Think of all the media scrutiny you’ll get strolling around in last night’s clothes.”
    Tamara blanched. “You’re right. Okay, thanks.”
    “We’d better get a move on.” Elec scooped up his shoes in his hand. He was not stuffing his feet back into those things. He’d rather walk across glass.
    Tamara actually put her heels back on and headed for the front door. Elec put his hand on the small of her back. “Third coach to the left.”
    She glanced back at him. “You’re that close? Yet we stayed here?”
    He grinned. “Well, I do share it with my brother, though he wasn’t planning to stay here last night. Mostly I figured no sense in ruining the moment. Besides, if we had taken the time to walk to my place, you might have changed your mind. I couldn’t risk that.”
    That was spoken to tease her. The true story was that once she’d told him to get inside Ryder’s coach, it had never even occurred to him that his own place was spitting distance away.
    Tamara glanced back at him, but she didn’t say anything. She looked worried, her gaze darting left and right. Elec dropped his hand from her back to alleviate her feeling even more self-conscious than she already did. The compound was quiet, and they didn’t pass anyone in their quick dart to his coach. Elec had the door unlocked and they were inside, Tamara’s hand over her heart.
    “I’m not cut out for sneaking around,” she said.
    “Then maybe we shouldn’t sneak around. Who cares if people know we’re dating?” He certainly didn’t. But even as he said it, he knew the