He edged back, never looking away, slow as he settled onto the edge of the porcelain.
I sucked down my reservations and stepped close to him, his knees parting to make me room.
I lifted the cloth and began to dab it on the cut at his temple.
He didn’t flinch, even though I could see the tick of a muscle in his jaw. His breaths hard and his aura all around.
The scent of pines and wild grasses. Sweat and leather. The man a dichotomy.
I tried not to inhale it too deeply.
Impossible when he was right there.
So big and powerful. Even with him sitting, it felt like he was towering over me.
Me breathing his breaths as I carefully cleaned the wound then ran the cloth down his cheek to wipe away the dried blood.
He watched me the whole time, a frozen statue.
I could barely move within the magnet that pulled between us, and I struggled for an extra breath when I turned away to rinse the cloth before I returned to him.
Meticulously cleaning away the blood before I dug into the kit and pulled out some ointment and a bandage.
I struggled for coherency as I applied them to the wound.
The air was dense as it whirred around us. So heavy it felt as if I were moving through quicksand.
My tongue stroked over my bottom lip, and I reached out and barely brushed my fingertips over the fabric of his tee. “You need to take this off so I can inspect the wound on your side and make sure you aren’t hurt anywhere else.”
It was probably a terrible idea. My desire for him was already verging on dire. Being this up close and personal to his bare freaking chest was likely going to do me in.
But this wasn’t about the trembling in my belly or the want that had lit between my thighs.
This was about a man who had basically offered me and my children his life.
A tremor of uncertainty rolled through him, too, before he slowly pushed to stand. He crossed his arms and took the bottom hem of his tee.
He began to pull it up and over his head.
Revealing his torso inch by inch.
I bit down on the inside of my cheek.
Holy crapsnacks.
His abdomen rippled and shook as he peeled it up, his waist narrow and rising up to the brutal expanse of his packed chest and broad shoulders.
A shiver rocked down my spine, and I shifted my weight from foot to foot, unable to sit still with the flush that raced over my entire body.
Hot.
So damned hot.
I’d seen him without a shirt a few times, but it was dark, and I’d barely been able to make out the scourge of designs he had tattooed on his flesh and the litany of scars beneath.
A long cut ran down his right side over his ribs, and several deep, circular marks had been left on his abdomen.
I didn’t want to imagine where he sustained them.
