"I hope there's hot water left," she says, clutching the clothes to her chest. “No telling in a place like this. I just needed a long, hot shower to feel clean, you know?”
“Yeah,” I say. Though I don’t know what it would feel like to feel clean. Haven’t in a long time. I grab my bag and head for the bathroom. Given the way she heats my blood, I need a cold shower anyway.
The water cascades over my shoulders, washing away days of grime, sweat, and the blood underneath my clothing that I missed. I do keep it hot, not to feel clean but so it stings, a small penance for sins too numerous to count.
The image of Naomi in that thin motel towel floods my mind—the way it clung to her damp skin and how her hair curled against her neck, still wet from her shower. The knowledge that she was naked underneath, nothing but cheap cotton between her and the open air. My dick stirs to life, hardening against my will.
I imagine her putting on the panties I bought her. Sliding them up her legs and covering parts I can’t handle envisioning being inside.
Then I imagine pulling them back off with my strong hands.
"Fuck," I mutter, resting my forehead against thecool tile.
What the hell's wrong with me? She's at least ten years younger than I am. She's scared, vulnerable, running for her life. I'm supposed to be helping her, not fantasizing like some teenager who's never seen a woman before.
I try to focus on something else, anything else, but my mind keeps returning to her eyes. Those eyes that somehow reach out and grab something inside me that I thought died years ago.
My hand slides down, almost of its own accord. I wrap my fingers around myself, stroking slowly. The pleasure is immediate, electric. I close my eyes, and there she is. Naomi. The towel slipping from her chest. Her skin glistening under the dim motel lights.
I work myself faster, biting my lip to stay quiet. The thin motel walls won't hide much. The water drowns out most sounds, but I'm not taking any chances. I imagine her mouth on mine, her hands replacing my own. I imagine the warmth and wet of the water is her pussy. I fuck the stream and my hand. The fantasy builds quickly, and I come with a strangled groan, leaning hard against the wall as my legs go weak.
As the evidence of my shame spirals down the drain, reality crashes back. I’ve just jerked off thinking about a woman I barely know. A woman who held me at gunpoint. A woman I torched my life for.
Wrath is the sin I’m used to. He’s been my companion.
Lust is a brand-new one on me.
The hell of it is, I'm not even that mad at myself. Something is almost reassuring about the whole pathetic episode. I've spent years feeling like a husk, the empty shell of something that used to live and breathe. But this? This feels human. Normal, even. Naomi makes me feel like a man again, not just the weapon I was forged into.
Maybe that's why I'm helping her. Not just because I believe she's innocent, though I do. But because she makes mefeel something beyond the dull ache of guilt that's been my shepherd.
And I feel that way because she is something special. She is the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen, but it’s the way she’s been able to survive that is nothing short of magnificent.
That’s also why I can’t stay. I got her clothes. I got her supplies. I got her to safety. But tonight, I'll slip out. Leave her the truck and weapons. She'll be better off without me. I can trick myself into thinking the lives that I took today were for a good cause. Saving myself. Saving Naomi.
But it’s always a trick.
Every life I took was always covered by the lie that it was for the greater good.
But death is my currency. It is the air I breathe and what I cloak myself in. If I'm with her, I'll simply be a danger to her.
And if I start caring about her, that may be even worse.
I open the bathroom door, steam billowing around me. The cooler air of the room raises goose bumps across my chest. I'm about to say something—maybe turn on the TV to see if the news has anything to say about us—when I freeze.
Naomi sits on one of the motel chairs, dressed in yoga pants and a T-shirt. That’s distracting enough. But it’s the Glock in her hands that really has my attention. "We need to talk."
Nine
Istare at the gun pointed at my chest and feel a strange sense of déjà vu. Though I suppose that's for things you only feel happened before but didn't.
"Pull a gun on me once, shame on you. Pull a gun on me twice, shame on me, I guess," I deadpan, voice steady despite standing here in nothing but a towel.
Naomi's eyes are hard, calculating. Different from the desperate woman in the woods. This is someone who's had time to think.
"I thought about leaving. I was waiting for you to get me clothing. I have weapons. A vehicle with what I would guess is an untraceable license plate. But I need to know. Who are you?"
Fair question. I nod slowly. "Can I get dressed first?"
