I drop into a crouch in front of her, brushing my fingers over the redness softly. I give her a hard look to tell her without words to stay where she is before heading to the spare bathroom to grab the necessities.
When I return, Lexi is still perched on the counter with her knees pressed together, and I once again crouch in front of her, dropping the items I gathered to the ground beside me.
“Good girl,” I murmur.
A shiver moves through her body, and I smirk up at her with a knowing look. It’s a good sign that she’s so responsive to me. Maybe it won’t come as quite so much of a shock when she receives the email in a few hours.
I start with the broken skin, carefully applying ointment with one hand as I drag my hand up and down her other calf in comforting sweeps.
Lexi hisses out a breath but keeps her hands in her lap as I work, ignoring how close my face is to her bare pussy.
God, what I wouldn’t do to bury my face between her thighs and drown in her cunt.
Once I’ve applied the salve, I move on to rubbing lotion onto the red, angry-looking skin.
Seeing Lexi hurt never gets any easier. Even when we were kids and she would skin her knee, it physically hurt me to see her hurting, and nothing has changed now we’re adults.
She stares down at the bottle in my hand, her brows tugging together in confusion as hurt sneaks into her dark eyes.
“Lex?”
“Do you have a girlfriend?”
I bark out a laugh. How can she be so oblivious to how deep my obsession with her runs? “No, no girlfriend.”
She sighs. “A recent breakup, then? I noticed in the bathroom you have all the same stuff I use at home, so maybe you had someone who left their stuff here?”
There’s an edge of something in her voice that sounds a lot like hurt, but that can’t be the case…right?
Because if it is, that means she cares about me as more than just her brother’s best friend.
I swallow past the hope lodged in my throat and glance up at her. “Wildcat, I’ve never had another woman in this apartment. No one left that stuff here. I bought it.”
She opens her mouth to respond but quickly snaps it shut again as she tries to process what I’ve just told her.
The wheels are turning, but every time she comes close to the truth, she shakes it off, as if my interest in her is impossible.
Little does she know, she’s the only woman that has ever been of any interest to me.
SIXTEEN
LEXI
Having Colten so close to the most intimate part of me is short-circuiting my brain.
Or maybe it’s the way he so carefully rubs lotion into my legs, making sure to moisturize every inch, not just where the carpet left marks.
Maybe this has all been a dream, because that’s the only way I can explain away…everything that has happened since I opened my eyes.
The way Colten has treated me has been a world away from the careful, barely there friendship we’ve fallen into since I came home from college, and the more I think about it, the harder that is to reconcile.
Is it because of what could have happened tonight? Maybe he feels bad for keeping me at arm’s length all these years?
But that doesn’t explain the pieces of me that are spread through his space.
The cushions that are so alike the ones in my bedroom at home, the sheets that I’m almost positive are the same brand I use, all of my favorite body products…
It just doesn’t make sense. None of it makes sense.
