Page 83 of Tamed By Her Touch

“I was!”

Kaelus made a skeptical sound and a moment later she heard the rustle of fabric.

“All right,” he said. “You may turn around. The ‘ritual of the underpants’ is complete.”

Clair did and saw that he had put on his underpants and a pair of the black trousers too. Unfortunately they did absolutely nothing to make him less attractive. They fit snugly over his muscular thighs and hips and sat low enough on his waist to leave the deeply defined V of muscle at his lower abdomen visible.

Why did her irritating coworker have to look like a Greek God?

This was a terrible idea, Clair thought. Not pretending to be married—well, that too—but specifically allowing Maera to make her dress him. All she wanted to do was run her hands over those incredible abs and feel his warm skin and smell his spicy, masculine scent…

“Now the upper garment,” Maera said, turning around again and interrupting her train of thought. “Something that pleases you, Doctor Donovan,” she said to Clair. “And make certain it compliments the lovely dress I gave you.

Clair looked through Kaelus’s clothing and saw a perfectly respectable black shirt. Well that would certainly match her metallic blue dress—black matched with everything.

She picked it up and started to hand it to Kaelus, but Maera shook her head.

“No, no—that won’t do!”

Clair frowned at her in confusion.

“It won’t?”

“No,” their hostess said firmly. “Surely you must have something more flattering to dress your husband in.”

Kaelus frowned.

“The black shirt is perfectly functional.”

“Yes,” Maera said gently. “Which is exactly the problem. It’s functional…practical—and not at all exciting.”

“I’m afraid my husband isn’t very into, er, exciting clothes,” Clair said. “He mostly lives in his lab coat.”

“Well, we must find something better than that,” Maera said bossily.

“Of course. Let me see what I can find,” Clair said politely. Personally, she thought the big Hybrid looked exciting enough as it was. His broad, bare chest and shoulders were drool-worthy in the morning sunlight. But of course, they had to keep their hostess happy.

She rummaged through his things again, but there was nothing “exciting” to be found. At last she turned back to Maera.

“I’m afraid my eminently practical husband has only packed plain clothing for this trip,” she said apologetically. “We, uh, thought it would be all about research—we didn’t know we’d have to dress up,” she added.

“That’s not a problem, my dear,” Maera said. “Just wait here—I have something that might suit him.”

She bustled off and returned a moment later with a garment in her hand.

“Here—have him try this.”

Clair took the garment and looked at it. It was a sleeveless charcoal-gray tunic made of some soft, fine material. It had an open V neckline and a series of small silver fasteners running diagonally across the chest.

Well—this was certainly different from Kaelus’s regular clothing, she thought. It was almost fancy. And the gray would go nicely with the blue-gray of her own dress.

“This is gorgeous,” she said, smiling warmly at Maera. “Thank you so much!”

“You’re welcome.” Their hostess beamed. “Go ahead and put it on him—I want to be sure it fits right.”

“Of course. Honey, let me put this on you.” Clair turned to Kaelus, who was looking like he regretted every life choice that had brought him to Titus Four.

“This is not the kind of garment that I usually wear,” he pointed out.