Unable to restrain myself, I inched the door open. Little by little until I saw her back. She was still sitting in the water, but she had her head resting on her knees, her arms around her legs, tucking them against her chest.
I heard her take a long breath, and I did the same to steady myself, as I pushed the door open. I felt another twinge in my pants, but I ordered myself to behave.
Rose looked over her shoulder and gave me the softest most heartbreaking smile I’d ever seen.
“What’s wrong, Sugar?”
“Nothing. And you don’t have to come in.”
“I’m not stupid. Nothing always means something.”
“Really, James. I’m just tired.”
You’re not the only one, I thought, my body feeling heavier with each passing second as I strained against the urges. At least all of the most alluring parts were covered, I thought to myself, even though it wasn’t totally accurate. I wanted her. All of her. The silky curve of her back, her hands that curled deliciously around her legs.
But the most damning sight was the side of her breast peeking not-so-innocently out.
She definitely wasn’t covered enough. I knelt next to the tub, more to hide the evidence of my growing erection than anything. My jeans cut in, and I hoped that’d be enough of a deterrent to keep the fucking traitor from growing out of control.
“Didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable,” she said. “I didn’t think. I just... don’t want to get out of the tub and I wanted you here—selfish, I know.”
“I’m fine.”
She huffed a laugh. “Yeah, we’re both just fine.”
The urge became too great to resist so I traced the path of a drop of water down her back, and she shuddered, goosebumps raising along her skin.
Her brow twitched as she laid her head sideways to watch me. “If you want to step out, I can get dressed.”
But the look in her eye said that was the last thing she wanted to do.
I brushed my fingers across her cheekbone. “Enjoy your bath. How’s your head?”
“A little better. Tension headache. Last time I went to the doctor they gave me muscle relaxers for it, but a bath is more enjoyable.”
“I agree.”
With a giggle, she hid her face. “We’re supposed to be not doing the sex thing. Me naked in a tub is not exactly—I mean I can’t imagine it’s making anything easy.”
Easy. No. I brushed the tip of my nose against her shoulder and kissed her cooling skin. But it was enjoyable “I think I can bask in your beauty without losing all of my control.”
It wasn’t a guarantee though.
Her slight smile seemed to chase away a bit of the pain on her face. “You never let me see your scar.”
I drew back. I’d lost the ability to swallow, let alone speak. I hadn’t intentionally showed it to anyone. My fingers moved to her knees, but she brushed them away, and tugged her legs closer. “I haven’t shaved in a few days.”
“You want to see my scar and you’re embarrassed by stubbly legs?”
“You go first.” The color in her cheeks deepened, the touches of red spreading down her neck and across her chest.
“What kind of game are we playing?”
She smirked. “One that isn’t going to be ending in sex.”
I doubted that. Despite my every intention to follow through with my own rule, I doubted that I had enough resolve to pull me through this time.
I lifted my shirt, only high enough for her to see the scar. She released her knees, placing her damp fingers on the raised and marred skin. The end of our old life permanently etched across my skin. The bullet’s journey was effortless, but it missed its intended mark by inches.
“I didn’t think you’d make it,” she whispered. “Why did you tell him? Did you want to die?”
As soon as the raid on the Retreat began, Ross had turned his gun on her, believing Silver to be the breach in security. There had been at least ten feet and a table separating us, and I knew I couldn’t cross the distance in time to do anything to stop him.
I choked, the tightness in my jeans no longer my biggest concern. “I wanted to save you.”
“Saving me and leaving me to watch you die wasn’t exactly my idealized end to it all.”
I tried to put on a carefree smile, even as I watched the tears pool in her eyes. “Didn’t happen though, did it? We’re both here.”
Her head drooped forward again, her eyes heavy and distant, and her hand fell to the side of the tub. I squeezed the back of her neck and her eyes closed, a soft moan escaped her lips like a siren calling me toward the rocks.
“I couldn’t get to Ross before he killed you,” I whispered. “There was no other way to buy time.” And maybe I did for an instant want to die. That would have been my only chance of permanently escaping the horrors I’d seen and committed. I pressed and rubbed her neck and shoulders, slowly loosening her muscles.
Do you love her? Miles’ question repeated in my head. He knew the answer to the question as soon as I’d taken a bullet for her.
“How about you head back to bed, Sugar. You look drained.”
And I was going to be exhausted from holding back.
“Stay with me,” she whispered with a shaking voice.
How could I say no to that? My chest ached like an earthquake brewing beneath the surface of my skin. Pressure building at every joint. I could do one night. I owed her one night.
But as I closed my eyes, I saw the image from my dreams. My memories. The whip. Tying her to the table in the play room. Watching her kneel at my feet and nibble at the food from my fingers. My body didn’t know which way to go, aching in pain, regret, and need all at once. “I’ll stay. The food you requested is downstairs though, if you’re up to dinner.”
She squinted, her eyebrows pinching over her nose as she lifted her head. “Everything okay with Raini?”
The shift in conversation brought me back down. “Yeah. I’m not supposed to be telling you anything, you know?”
“Yep, but I’m good at keeping your secrets.”
I took a long breath, she was dead on about that, but regulations weren’t the main reason I didn’t want to discuss it. “Alley wasn’t the only girl to drop off the grid. We’re investigating a connection with an escort company—and the real Kirk.”
Her mouth dropped open. “There’s a real Kirk?”
“He was in negotiations with Miles, but I stepped in before they ever met, so I was able to take his place with all of the groundwork already laid.”
“Smooth.”
“Right, smooth.” I stared down at the beige tiles of the floor. I wouldn’t consider any part of the last few months smooth. “More like riddled with potholes and the possibility for a million things to go wrong.”
Her hand wrapped around the tattoo on my forearm. “So far, so good.”
“Thanks to a lot of luck.”
She scoffed, her eyes gleaming. “And the help of a very remarkable girl.”
“Oh,” I chuckled. “You’re developing quite the ego.”
Suddenly her pleased face faded and tears erupted, sliding down her face.
I leaned over the side of the tub, rubbing my hand over her damp back. “Anything but tears, Rose.”
I may have taken some pleasure in her submission to me—the look in her eye that told me that she was putting her trust in me even though she truly didn’t want to. But I took no pleasure in watching her cry.
She sobbed. “I need tears. I’m tired—and I don’t just mean I need sleep. I’m tired of being pent up, trapped, scared. I can’t escape my own body. The memories—”
Her voice cut out and her chest fluttered as the tears continued. “I want to be emotional. I want to fall apart. Because at least then I feel like I might be able to put everything back together.”
“You seemed to be doing good.”
“I—it’s harder at night. During the day, I can find some way to escape. And I don’t want to push, but
tonight is even worse. No matter what I do, when I close my eyes, I still see Gabe. I still haven’t been able to admit to anyone what I did. Trent stayed up with me all night one night, because I couldn’t stop crying.”
My fingers dug into the hard surface of the tub. I tried to compose myself, but the shattering in my heart was inescapable. “I knew he’d take care of you.”
“He wasn’t you, James. He wasn’t the man I shared that crazy hell with and trusted to protect me.”
Protect her. I’d stood by during her assaults. Left when she needed me most—when Gabe took her and dragged her through the building to rape her.
Left her to kill him, and him to haunt her nightmares as a result.
“But he was the only one I trusted.” I climbed to my feet as she wrapped herself tighter into a ball. I pulled a large yellow towel from the rack. “Out of the water, Sugar.”
She looked at me, eyes filled with something I couldn’t read. Then, without a word, she obeyed. The very action nearly leveled me. Beads of water ran down her smooth skin. My temptation and salvation all rolled into one.
Before my cock could get me into trouble, I draped the towel over her shoulders, keeping my gaze trained on hers, then, I lifted her from the tub and to the bath mat.
“I want to take you,” I said, pulling the elastic from her hair and watching the brown strands tumble around her shoulders. “I want to make you forget it all, but I don’t know if that’s the best thing right now.”
“I’m good with that.” She relaxed into my grasp, her weight pressing against my chest as her hair, curled from being twisted against her head in the damp bathroom, tickled my arm. “I just want you. I don’t need sex. I don’t even need words, unless you want to tell me it’s going to be okay.”
“It is, Sugar.” Heat radiated through my chest. “One day, I’ll make it better than okay.”
As soon as I got my head on straight and stopped dreaming about strangling people in my bed.
About strangling her in my bed.
I guided her toward the sink, pulling the bandage off that she’d taped and sealed to her arm to prevent the stitches from getting wet.
“Now I keep seeing Alley, too. Has anyone figured out what happened to her? Any idea why she did....” She trailed off.
“No,” I gently patted the stitched wounds with a dry cloth to make sure there was no moisture and covered the area with a thinner bandage to protect it while she slept. “But we’ll figure it out. If the information is out there, Trent and I will find it.”
She gave me a wry grin and patted the towel she held around herself. “How about you step out and let me put on my pajamas?”
I nodded and left her to wait in the bedroom, staring at the full-length mirror on the back of the door until Rose came out in a pair of shorts and a tank top.
It was quite possibly worse than seeing her naked, especially when her lips turned up in a smile and she leaned against the doorway. The mixture of apprehension and confidence was doing in my control.
“Food is downstairs if you’re hungry,” I said, taking her by the waist and pulling her closer.
“Probably should.” Her eyes were dull, and she leaned against my chest. “I missed you.”
I couldn’t imagine what she missed. Our entire relationship was like some code written in a foreign dialect with no clues to figuring out the key. Which parts were false leads due to insufficient or fabricated information and unsubstantiated beliefs?
And which parts were real?
Was it possible to miss someone you didn’t really know? Miles said that we already knew each other as well as anyone could because we’d seen into the darkest regions of each other. We each understood how far the other was willing to go. How much pain we could endure. And how much we could dish out when the situation warranted it.
Her gaze was locked on me when I looked down. I tried to smile, but I wasn’t sure that could hide my inner struggle.
“I missed you,” she repeated, and for an instant I thought she wanted me to say something in return, but she continued. “Not the things we went through, not even most of the things you did, just you. I know you’re more than what we went through, and I have a lot to learn about you, but during the quiet, after I found out your secret, there were times you just held me—we were simply there, no words, or facades, or expectations.”
Her words tugged at that rope of tension I’d been fighting for weeks. The one that had wound my entire body, clenching around my heart. But rather than becoming more uncomfortable, this time it stretched and gave way, freeing my muscles to relax and my mind to quiet.
The brush of her lips against my neck reeled me back in. I tangled my fingers through her mess of wavy hair and backed her into the wall. Kissing her gently at first, before giving into the ferocity of my newfound freedom.
Rose cleared her throat and pulled back a bit. “I assume the rules are still in effect.”
The damn rules. I wanted to keep myself from crossing the line.
She pressed against me, which only drew my attention to my growing erection—apparently that was her intent since she quirked an eyebrow and smirked.
“Ignore it,” I said.
“That’s going to be rather difficult,” she snorted. “We should go downstairs and eat before one of us gets in trouble.”
“If I’m not ready to eat?” I expected my stomach to growl to spite me, but it kept quiet and played along with my little game.
I pulled her hand from around my neck and pinned it against the wall above her head. Holding her other arm more gently at her side—since she couldn’t move it much anyway. My restraint slid away, buried beneath the fibers of the knot she wove around my chest. A battle of control that I wasn’t certain she even knew we were having.
I needed her not to move. Her chest heaved against mine, even as I stood there holding her. I pressed my lips to her neck and felt the erratic pulse beneath her skin.
A crash outside the bedroom door jerked me upright, pulling the tension agonizingly taut again.
“It’s Trapper. She’s been doing that all evening—practically since you left.”
I blew out a long slow breath. “We should probably go rescue the food before she gets any crazy ideas.”
Rose slipped from my loosened grasp, her incredulous look given away by her quiet laugh. “You left it out?”
“You messaged me that you were in the bath, I had other things on my mind.”
“Ah yes, Mr. Innocent.”
By the time we returned downstairs, Trapper had wrecked most of the living room, but the food was miraculously spared, still in the plastic bag where I’d left it. I wasn’t sure if that meant she wasn’t hungry, or if carry-out dining simply wasn’t her preference.
The whiplash of changing emotions left Rose and I quiet through dinner, but it was one of those moments where I yearned for some kind of ESP to give me even a subtle hint at what she was thinking. The silence left too much room for guesses and turning around on myself.
Too much time to contemplate the one thing I did know as truth. Part of me still wanted to tame her.
No, that wasn’t an accurate explanation.
I wanted to try to tame her, and I wanted her to kick back and fight me for it. Like a purebred muscle car, she was strong but unpredictable, and that combination is where things get fun—when you put your foot down and the tail kicks out, threatening to propel you off the side of the road. My first car was a ’97 Mustang that did just that.
More than once, and I never learned.
After we put away the leftovers and we cleaned up, I kept my promise and led Rose back up to her room. My conscious stuttered at the decision again, but I’d give her this even if it did drive me insane.
She snuggled under the covers, her form fitting against mine, perfectly cradled against me with her back to my front. I buried my nose in her hair, knowing the dangerous effects her drug-like smell had on my libido.
But instead of twisting me
into knots, my body relaxed next to hers, and the dark room faded away.
I felt a jerk, unsure if I was awake or asleep. Everything shook and shifted, and something thudded nearby.
I opened my eyes and shot up. It took me a few moments to remember where I was, but then I saw the bathroom door slam shut.
What the hell?
I sat in the dark silence trying to figure out what was going on. Had I hurt her? Did I do something in my sleep?
I almost couldn’t get out of bed, afraid of what would happen if I knocked on the door to check on her.
Maybe it was nothing.
“Rose?” I called across the room.
“I’m fine.”
I heard water running, so I waited, but she still didn’t emerge.
“Rose.”
The door creaked open, but she stayed near the sink. “It was just a dream. I didn’t feel good.” She dropped against the counter and rubbed the back of her neck. “Still don’t feel good.”
I crept across the dark bedroom, the light from the bathroom spilled out across the floor and stung my eyes. “Anything I can do?”
She closed her eyes and shook her head, before dropping it against the wall. “You think I’m—?” her question died away.
“What is it?”
“Why do you still want me?”
My throat and stomach collided. “Why wouldn’t I want you?”
She tried to retreat backward, but I caught her by the waist. “You think that—Sugar, you know my reluctance right now has nothing to do with you.”
I’d figured our earlier encounter had erased all doubts to that effect.
“But, you had to watch all of them with me,” her knees gave way, and I leaned her against the sink for extra support in case her knees buckled, while I held her to my chest.
“Rose, I—” I couldn’t find the words. I was responsible for every man who touched her, violated her, and she thought I held that against her. “There’s nothing wrong with you.”
I reached to caress her face, but she shied away as if my touch burned her. Had my distance caused this? Watching her go through this was worse than my constant struggle for control.
“It’s just the dream,” she said.
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