“I’m taking a shower. You can grab one after. I’ll go find you some clean clothes and breakfast while you unwind.”
“Okay,” I mutter, just so he doesn’t force me to face him, which feels totally embarrassing after we just cuddled for so long. It felt so good, and I don’t want Zeb to think that enjoying that closeness means I want anything more. I already owe him enough… I’m surprised he hasn’t taken more.
There isn’t much time before he gets out of the shower. I check my phone and have several missed calls from Rana and a few text messages.Shit.I respond to her texts and let her know that I’m alive, but that I’m nowhere near Boston. I didn’t quite deal with the fact that I have an entire job and life that I just left behind to hop on the back of Zeb’s motorcycle.
Before I can give her a heavily edited version of the story via text, Zeb gets out of the shower. I wish he’d put some more clothes on but then again, maybe not. He walks out of the bathroom with the towel slung around his waist low. He’s totally unselfconscious about it, which would make sense if he spent time in the military.
Zeb catches his own gaze in the mirror for a few seconds, giving his face a brutal, scrutinizing look. He touches the sides of his face and then pauses to look at his own eyes before turning to face me. His hand briefly touches the top of his eyelid with the fake eye and then his hand drops away. I feel like I witnessed something private and intimate between him. I almost wish we hadn’t made eye contact as I sit on the edge of the hotel roombed. I could have kept gazing at my phone. Zeb smirks a little bit, so maybe he doesn’t feel attacked by me looking at his fake eye.
But I’m a sane, heterosexual woman and Zeb has anincrediblebody. I’ve never seen a man with a body like this in real life. Everything about his physique is completely natural. He has lean, defined muscles all over every inch of him supported by thick, powerful legs. The same legs that cradled me all night. Even his chest is firm and looks totally solid.
I can see each well-defined ab muscle. The water dripping all over his body only makes Zeb look sexier. Water darkens his very light hair and sticks it along the sides of his head, allowing me to see the definition in his jawline and cheekbones. He’s so fucking sexy, but covered in more tattoos than I realized. I shouldn’t stop and stare, but Zebulon’s body isn’t just perfect, each of his tattoos clearly has a story behind it. Asking would be weird, but I can’t help but wonder.
There’s a pair of boots on his ribcage with four sets of initials beneath them, a gigantic chest piece with angel wings and the wordTrigger, Death Before Dishonor tattooed on the other side of his ribs, and more tattoos intertwined with various scenes and pieces all over Zeb’s chiseled body. There’s something strangely beautiful about him and his skin is so pale that it looks dusky gray, almost translucent in the dim bedroom light.
He turns away from me and drops his towel to grab a fresh pair of boxers. I don’t have to look at him, and he doesn’t seem to care whether I look or not, but I… can’t help myself. Biting down on my lower lip, I look over at him and my face slackens as Zeb unwittingly hypnotizes me.
My throat tightens as my heart races and my body has a natural but embarrassing response to seeing a caked up white boy drop his towel. It’s only for a moment before he bends over to grab his boxer briefs. Without looking at me, he slides the underwear over his muscular thighs, allowing the fabric tocling to his ass cheeks before he snaps the waist band of his underwear against his flat hips.
I quickly look down at my phone before Zeb turns around. I can see him throwing on a shirt in my peripheral vision as he looks over.
“Hop in the shower,” he says. “And take your time… it’s been a hard ride.”
Chapter Eleven
Zayna
Ruger & Zayna Blackwood’s Home
Oklahoma
Afew years ago, I told my husband that he could bring anything weighing on his heart to me. This has never failed to bring us closer. I know he’s been through dark times and there’s a part of him that will always carry that darkness with him. Everything has been different since the news got bad. Immigration enforcement raided Deacon Hollingsworth’s casino last week and the only reason Ruger didn’t get caught up in the mess was because Deacon sent him across the border to get the first shipment of weapons his cousin Zebulon is on his way to pick up.
My husband and I are fluent in each other’s silent methods of communication. When he comes to bed after putting Eden and Talitha to sleep, I set down my book and wait for him to start talking. Ruger looks over at me.
“You didn’t have to stop reading.”
I don’t say anything. He hates bringing his feelings to the surface, exposing any of his worries, or acting like he’s anything other than a tough, buttoned-up veteran who fights his way through every problem. I know that Ruger’s hands can kill, but his hands are also the most loving I have ever experienced in my life.
When God threw me onto this crazy man’s doorstep, he had a plan for me that I could have never even conceived.
“My problems are not more interesting than…” Ruger tilts his head to the side to read the title of my book. “Verity?”
He doesn’t have to worry about my sick obsession with Colleen Hoover. I snap the book shut and set it on my side table.
“You have a way of surprising me like that.”
Ruger takes his shirt off, which doesn’t exactly distract me, but it definitely makes me want to get closer to him. Lucky for me, I don’t have to wait long as Ruger climbs under the covers and grabs onto me like a monkey holding onto a tree branch. He smells delicious. My husband kisses my neck and my shoulders before pulling away and resting his head gently on my shoulder.
“Zeb might have kidnapped a girl.”
“You mean… your baby cousin?”
“He’s not a baby anymore. The military discharged him on medical leave a year ago. He’s happily working for Ethan Shaw back East… But he’s still a Blackwood.”
“And what does that mean?”
“He’s more like me than Gideon is what it means,” Ruger whispers, kissing my shoulder again. I get the strange sense that he’s buttering me up to give me some bad news.
