Read Justice Mine: a Base Branch Novel for Free Online Page B

man-ness.
    His thick shoulders were wrapped with layer upon bulging layer of corded muscle, and it didn’t stop there. They coursed down his arms, laying a beautiful palate of peaks and valleys. As wide as he was up top, his torso tapered in a perfectly sculpted V from his ample pecs, across his abdomen, straight into the faded blues that hung low on the Y of his hips. The— why am I not tracing that thing with my greedy fingers —muscles had her flattening her hand against the glass for support.
    If he were just a body, he’d be easier to look away from. But his face sucked her in with its mischievous smirk. As he cocked his head, his gaze drank her in, so much so he dropped the blue, oil-stained cloth on the ground and gripped the wrench in his hand so hard Mags swore she could see the veins mapping his muscles bulge. He raised a brow at her, and she didn't understand why he looked at her like she was the only item on a buffet at a deserted island.
    Magdalena's hand flew to her throat in surprise, but one much larger caught her attention. “Fuck.” She screamed and jumped back from the window. She slapped both hands to her face in total embarrassment, when she should use those hands to cover as much of her naked body as she could. She’d had it all on display, honking breasts with her pepperoni sized areolas and an untamed patch covering her mons.
    Would the hits ever stop? At this rate, she didn’t think so. Mags shuffled backward until her thighs hit the bed and sat. How in the hell had she forgotten about her lack of clothes? It had been a year since she’d slept in the buff, but it had been the only way she was able to fall asleep what only seemed like ten whole minutes ago—well, getting naked and rubbin’ one out.
    And now she paid a hefty price for the measly hours of sleep. Public humiliation. “Ahhh,” she groaned, uncovering her face and reaching for her phone on the nightstand. Only the sleek black thing wasn’t there. Leaning down, she scanned the floor then sat up and scanned the bed. She tossed blankets and sheets about, but came up broke. Story of your life.
    A knock reverberated through the room and Mags hugged a pillow to her front. “Go away. The show’s over.”
    “Open the door, Magdalena.”
    She hated the effect his rich, scratchy voice had on her. Ignorant of her disdain, her toes curled at the sound. “You may be hard of hearing from that damned machine of yours, so I’ll repeat. Go. Away.”
    “Do you fancy your phone?”
    “What?”
    “Open the door,” he repeated in the same demanding, yet even, voice as before.
    “Mad. Every flipping person in my life has gone mad,” she mumbled. Magdalena threw the pillow with such force it hit the bed, bounced, then tumbled to the floor off the opposite side. She eyed her luggage, but didn’t bother. Instead she yanked the sheet from the already disheveled bed and wound it around her body.
    If one thing in the whole of the last forty-eight hours had worked in her favor, it was the shirt-covered torso staring back at her when she opened the door. Had he been shirtless as he’d been five minutes ago, nothing could have stopped her from dropping the sheet and tossing herself at him like a chit. But even the sweat-dampened fabric did little to calm the rush of awareness plumping her nipples and other girly bits. To offset the thoughts bounding like fucking rabbits in her mind, Mags crossed her arms and tried for pissed, which wasn’t a stretch.
    Before she could open her mouth to berate him, Law produced a phone from his pocket and foisted it into her hands. “I took your phone because the bloody thing chirped every five minutes for an hour and a half, and you didn’t seem inclined to shut it off.” Mags inhaled to speak, but he didn’t stop. “Before you let me have it, I didn’t break into the cursed thing to turn it off. I put it in a drawer in the kitchen, under some towels, so I wouldn’t have to listen to it.”
    He raked one