I stop with my hand on the door handle, my heart in my throat. I exhale and look over my shoulder, keeping my gaze on his, no matter how much I want to let it linger elsewhere.
“For my brother.” He jerks his head toward his bedroom. “But if I don’t go, he’ll only make it worse.”
“I understand.”I don’t.Not really.
“I’ll make it up to you.” He grins, raking his hands through his hair as he tips his head back under the water, looking at me the whole time.
“Okay.”
“I promise,” he vows, his usual grin melting into something more serious.
“Okay.”
“And Bell?” He leans forward, out of the open shower door. He flashes me a dirty sort of grin. “In case you were wondering: That was one of the hottest things I’ve ever seen in my whole goddamn life.”
I huff a laugh, and some of the tension melts out of my shoulders. “It was, wasn’t it?” I murmur, feeling my face flush.
“Let’s do it again, yeah?” He settles back in the shower, his hands a flurry of movement with body wash and a yellow loofah.
I bite the inside of my cheek. “Too bad you now have plans.”
He swipes away suds from his tattooed chest and stares at me for a beat. “Hold that thought. I’m going to kill my brother.”
I laugh and shake my head. “Not on my account. I have to meet Lola soon, anyway.”
“Alright, alright. I won’t kill him today. But I’ll be right out, yeah?”
I nod a couple of times and leave his bathroom. The spare bedroom door clicks shut behind me, my skin still damp beneath the towel wrapped tight around my chest. A red sundress lies crumpled on the corner of the bed where I tossed it earlier—another item from the perpetual overnight bag in my trunk.
My fingertips trace idle patterns against my collarbone, lingering where droplets still cling. The room seems to pulse with each heartbeat, time stretching like taffy between seconds. I exhale, and my shoulders drop an inch lower than they've been in weeks. My reflection catches in the dresser mirror—flushed cheeks, eyes wider than usual, lips slightly parted. I press my palm flat against my sternum, feeling the steady thrum beneath. A smile tugs at the corner of my mouth before I even realize it's happening, small and private and mine.
The towel slips from my fingers, landing with a damp thud against the hardwood. Goosebumps rise across my bare shoulders as I reach for the red fabric pooled on the bed. The dress clings to my still-damp skin as I work it down past my hips. Behind me, the unmistakable sound of air catching in someone's throat breaks the silence.
My movements halt mid-motion, the fine hairs on my neck standing at attention. I turn, slow and deliberate, to find Bishop Calloway's broad silhouette filling the doorframe, his featurescast in shadow while hallway light blazes around him like a warning.
His knuckles whiten against the doorframe, one shoulder angled higher than the other in a stance that leaves no path around him. His eyes drop from my face to the curve where the red fabric clings to my hip, then snap back up, pupils dilating before his throat works in a hard swallow.
The ceiling fan ticks three times in the silence between us.
Then the muscle in his jaw jumps once, twice beneath his skin. His eyes harden to flint.
“Stay away from my brothers.” Each word lands like a stone dropped into still water.
I run my palms down the sides of my dress, pressing wrinkles from the damp fabric. My spine lengthens inch by deliberate inch while across the room, Bishop's knuckles drain white against the doorframe, his chest rising with a breath he seems determined not to release.
I meet his gaze and let the corner of my mouth lift. “You don't get to give me orders.”
His lips part, then press into a hard line. He leans forward, both hands still pressing onto the doorframe like it’s the only thing keeping him upright.
“I don't give a fuck what you think you're doing back in Hollow Beach.” Each word comes out measured, like he's tasting them before letting them go. His voice drops lower, the kind of quiet that makes you lean in despite yourself. “I don't care how charming you think you are. Whatever game you're playing?—”
“Liar.”
His pupils dilate. A muscle jumps in his throat as he swallows, and for just a heartbeat, something raw flashes across his face before disappearing behind the wall of his anger.
He steps into the bedroom, the door swinging shut behind him with a whisper. His shoulders hit the wood with a dull thud,his spine flattening as if magnetized to the surface. The tendons in his neck stand out like guitar strings pulled too tight.
I cross the distance between us—one heartbeat, two—until the scent of his cologne mingles with Gage’s body wash lingering on my skin. The air between us thins. His pupils dilate, black eclipsing blue, and a vein pulses at his temple beneath dark hair that escaped his small manbun at the nape of his neck.
