The sound is soft, unintentional. Fatal. Oh, I’ve just made a terrible mistake. My eyes flutter, my breath stuttering. I don’t even mean to, but it’s too much, he’s too much, and he knows it.
He goes motionless, gaze sharpening, tongue flicking over his lower lip with slow, deliberate intent. He hums. Low. Pleased. Possessive.
“Oh,” he murmurs, tilting his head, studying me like he’s just discovered his new favorite thing.
I swallow hard, my pulse pounding in my ears. “Finn?—”
He leans in, water dripping from his soaked shirt, his breath fanning against my damp skin. “You want to hear how I’d take care of you, sweetheart?”
I stop breathing.
He must see it, must feel the way my body responds, because he chuckles low, unholy, victorious.
“I’d ruin you so thoroughly you’d never be able to pretend you don’t belong to me. I’d capture every moan, every sigh, every shudder of your body.”
My breath shatters.
Heat coils, tight and desperate, in my stomach. My legs go weak, my fingers curling against the tile, nails biting into my palms. Waiting for his next move. Needing to see what he’ll do now that he has me completely alone and naked. Some sinful part of me is basking in this attention.
“Willow.”
The sound of my name is loud, cutting through the thick haze of lust and want. My head snaps up.
Carson.
His voice echoes from the direction of the locker room, closer than I’d like. Too close. Reality crashes back into me.
I jerk away from Finn, shoving at his chest, and he lets me go, but not before I catch the look in his eyes. He leans back against the tiled wall, drenched and utterly unbothered, as if I was always meant to be his. There’s not a trace of fear on his face—no concern about being caught, only certainty.
His gaze roves over me, unapologetic, dark with a promise I don’t dare acknowledge.
But he doesn’t stop me when I turn off the water and hastily step out of the shower and grab my towel. He lets me walk away. And somehow, that’s worse. Because I want to stay.
“Willow! Answer me, or I’m coming in.”
“I’m fine! Just showering, geez!” I call back, trying to steady my breathing—trying to steady myself.
Trying to tell my traitorous body that we cannot go back into that shower room and climb Finn like a tree. I might actually need my bodyguards to protect me from myself at this point.
“Three minutes.”
Three minutes?! I’ll show him three minutes. Demanding alpha.
Irritation spikes, probably enhanced by the mess of desire still tangled in my veins, and a low growl slips past my lips as I dry off in record time. My clothes stick to my still-damp skin as I yank them on, my fingers shaking with the need to get out of here.
When I shove through the locker room door, Carson is waiting.
He’s leaning against the wall, arms crossed over his broad chest, one ankle kicked lazily over the other. That too-perfect smirk curves his lips, pearly white teeth flashing as if he enjoys my irritation. Because he does. He is definitely a button presser.
His nostrils flare, inhaling and catching something.
I freeze. Shit, I didn’t wash Finn off. And Carson knows. He goes still, the air between us crackling, then suddenly he pins me against the brick wall.
My back hits the wall, the heat of his body caging me in. Holy shit, why is my body on fire? His breath ghosts over my neck as he leans in, scenting me, dragging in every lingering trace of Finn and my left over desire.
His growl is low, vibrating through my bones. “Why do you smell like lust… and your stalker?”
I shiver, swallowing hard, my pulse hammering in my ears. I try to find a reason—any excuse—for the way my body reacted or why I also smell like Finn, but it’s impossible to think with him this close. Even if I managed a half-hearted lie, it would dissolve under his presence.
