If you told me a few days ago that I would let a man wash me, I would have laughed in your face. I was a grown woman. I didn’t need someone to lather me up.
But there was something unexpectedly intimate about it, about how careful he was with me, how soft such a hard man could be.
And, well, I did need a shower. I felt gross.
Once they were clean, the cuts stung a little less too. Even as Caymen carefully toweled me off, slid panties up my legs, then a tank over my head, before lifting me up onto the sink counter.
His face was so serious as he located the first aid kit we’d picked up at the store and set out the items to sanitize and treat the cuts.
I reached up, pressing a finger to the parallel lines between his brows.
His gaze flicked over.
“Stop being so serious. It’s not a big deal.”
“It is serious,” he said, using a little tube of saline on each of my knees, then blotting the excess away with gauze. “I don’t want you getting hurt for me.”
“You made up for it,” I reminded him.
I wassorefrom how well he made up for it.
His lips curved up slightly at that.
“Still. If you’re hurt, I want you to tell me.”
“Caymen, you’re acting like I broke my arm or something. It’s a few scratches. Also, that was more fun than I expected,” I admitted. “But you owe me new flip-flops.”
“Shouldn’t have let you run in them.” He reached for some antibiotic cream and slathered it on the cuts. “It’s probably why you fell.”
“No, that would be the thick underbrush and my determination to make you work for it.”
“You did that,” he agreed. This time, the smile hit his eyes. “You run track in high school or something?”
“Nope. That was pure adrenaline. But I’m thinking maybe I should take up running.”
“Oh, yeah?” he asked, his smile going devilish.
“It might come in handy.”
“It might,” he agreed, placing the last gauze strip on my knee, and securing it with tape.
“I can walk!” I insisted when he scooped me up again.
“Yep.” But he kept carrying me until he set me down on the bed, gently pulled the lightweight blanket over me, then turned the box fan toward me and set it on low. “Now keep your ass here.”
“Yes, sir,” I said, being playful, but something flashed in his eyes that had my chest swooping.
“I’m gonna get cleaned up,” he said, leaning down for a quick, hard kiss, then walking off.
Alone, I pressed a hand to my chest where something warm and heavy had settled.
As I listened to the splash of water in the shower and the white noise of the fan, I had a sneaking suspicion I knew what it was.
Caymen came back out a few minutes later in a pair of basketball shorts, pausing only to grab a gun, both our phones, his wallet, and the car keys to set on the nightstand, before he climbed onto the bed.
Then he turned on his side, snaked an arm across my stomach, and rested his head in at my neck.
The warm sensation amplified as I leaned my head onto his.
