Free After the Rain (The Twisted Fate Series Book 1) by Unknown

He hadn’t wanted to be in such close proximity with her body since their latest incident , but he’d had no choice. She’d been as light as a feather, and with her in his arms like that, seemingly so fragile and vulnerable, his desire to find shelter and protect them – her – had only intensified.
    Marcus looked around the reception area, utterly disgusted. He wasn’t accustomed to this level of… he couldn’t quite find the words … this level of filthy cheapness.This was a roadside dive. He saw the irony of it all, of course: kicked out of their fancy hotel accused of solicitation, and then landing up in a motel that probably charged by the hour and had condoms on the bedside tables. But as long as it had hot water and something to sleep on, he was fine. At this stage, all they needed was shelter from the storm.
    The room was nothing like the previous one. It was small, dark, damp and dingy. The bathroom was pokey, with a shower that was so small, you could barely fit into it. There was a small, solitary bed pushed up against a wall of peeling pink paint. The carpets were filthy and the curtains stained and tattered, and it looked like rats had nibbled on the bottom of them. There was a suspicious-looking stain on the duvet, and he didn’t want to know what the guys from CSI would find if they came in with that light that illuminated bodily fluids. But it was (marginally) better than being blown away in a monsoon. They probably wouldn’t be able to sleep anyway – the sound of the storm outside was unbelievably loud and quite frankly, a little disconcerting. Marcus was unsettled by the fact that he even felt unsettled in the first place, and the more he thought about it, the more unsettled he became… fuck, this was not like him.
    They both threw their bags down on the floor, dripping large puddles of water onto the carpet. Not that it mattered – it needed a wash anyway. Marcus walked over to the grimy window and looked out. The wind was picking up, causing the palms to bend to snapping point. He hoped they’d be okay in there. He moved away from the window and turned around.
    And came face-to-face with a completely naked Stormy.
    “We need to have sex! Now!” she declared in a matter-of-fact tone that caught him off guard.
    “What?” he spluttered.
    “We need to have sex and just get this thing out of our systems.”
    Marcus could barely think straight as he gazed at her in absolute awe. She was better than he’d ever imagined, could ever imagine. Her skin was a pale white, her body petite yet soft at the same time. She had a small birthmark below one of her breasts, which he hadn’t noticed before. He had to smile to himself, because it was almost heart-shaped. How totally and utterly Stormy – even her birthmarks were cute.
    “So?” she prompted, snapping Marcus back to reality. “Are we going to do this or what?”
    “Do you really think that will work?” he finally managed to utter as he forced himself to pry his eyes away from her body.
    “Yes. We just need to shag each other and then all this sexual tension will disappear and we can go back to not liking each other and not groping in public.”
    Marcus wanted nothing more than to “shag her” (who said that these days?), but he wasn’t so sure this was the best solution to their problem. “What if we have sex and then want to have it again?”
    Stormy shook her head. “No, that won’t happen. I’ve got this whole thing figured out.”
    “Figured what out?”
    “Why this thing between us keeps happening.”
    “Okay,” Marcus folded his arms. “I’m all ears.”
    “So… I’m probably very different from anyone you’ve ever been with, and you’re totally different from anyone I’ve ever been with. So I think a lot of this … tension is just curiosity, as well as the astrological thing. But if we do it, we’ll totally satisfy that curiosity and then it can all go back to normal. And we can not like each other