God, that voice. My body doesn’t hear the question, just his tone. That deep, unhurried rumble. Warm and wrecked and ridiculously real. It slides right beneath my skin like it owns me, like it’s always owned me.
No, I am not okay. Not in the slightest. “Uh… yes. No. Probably not.”
A slow grin curves his mouth. Dangerous and knowing and entirely too appealing. “Rough day?”
“You could say that.”
“Well, at least the ferry should be cooperating soon.” He glances toward the smoke still wisping up from below. “Mostly.”
“Is it actually broken, or is this just part of the scenic experience?”
His grin widens. “Little of both. These old boats have personality. Sometimes they throw tantrums.” He shifts his weight, and I catch the way his muscles move under that shirt. “Nothing we can’t handle.”
God help me, I’m sweating through my layers despite the freezing wind.
One of the other men, older, weathered, with the look of someone who’s spent his entire life on boats, chuckles and nudges Joe’s arm. “You sure you want to help with this?”
Joe hesitates for just a second, his gaze locked on mine, lingering too long, too intense, like he’s trying to figure something out about me. Then he finally tears his gaze away.
“Yeah. I’m in.” He gives me a small nod, polite, almost apologetic, and then jogs after the other two men, disappearing down the side of the boat and vanishing out of sight.
And just like that, I’m alone again.
Reeling. Breathless. Pulse hammering so hard I feel it in my throat. I stare after him, trying to process what just happened. Was that really Joe?
Cold wind brushes against my face, the lingering smoke clinging to the air. My suitcase wheels clunk softly against the metal as I turn slightly, needing a moment to breathe.
That’s when I spot Leon through the windows to the cabin where I was sitting earlier. He’s standing there, angled toward the glass, watching me this whole time. My stomach knots.
I linger there too long, pretending I haven’t noticed, hoping maybe he’ll look away. But he doesn’t. So I turn sharply and drag my suitcase behind me, moving toward the side of the ferry, boots clanging against the deck. The wind is fiercer here, howling off the open water.
My suitcase bumps along behind me, the cold metal handle biting at my palm.
There are two benches at the side of the boat, half sheltered by a bulkhead and mostly free of snow. It’s private enough, tucked just out of Leon’s line of sight.
I sink onto the wood, jaw tight, hands clenched.
Just breathe.
So I lean back against the cool metal behind me, then dig into my coat pocket and pull out my earbuds. If there’s one voice that can drown all of this out, it’s Joe’s. My favorite narrator. My shameless obsession. I press Play.
“That’s it, Omega. Let me hear you. Let me hear what you need.” That sinful voice fills my head again, picking up right where I left off.
The heroine moans, and what I wouldn’t give to be her.
“You’re soaked. Already dripping for me, and I’ve barely touched you. What do you think will happen when I actually make you mine? When I pin you down and take everything you’ve been saving for me?”
I close my eyes, and now that I might have seen him and have a face to attach to this voice, it’s so much worse.
Or better.
I can’t decide.
“Say my name,” he commands, voice rough with desire. “I want to hear it on your lips when you come apart. Want to know you’re thinking of me when your body can’t take any more.”
My thighs press together involuntarily. My breath speeds up.
What did he think when he said those words? Was he alone in a recording booth, reading from a script with clinical detachment? Or did he feel it, let himself sink into the character, into the fantasy?
