“Look at me.”
I do.
“You think I took a bullet for you, brought you into my home, and stood outside that bathroom trying not to lose my damn mind because I heard you say my name, but I don’t want you?”
My lips part.
The room tilts again, but this time it has nothing to do with shock.
Ace lowers his mouth near my ear.
“Reina, I have wanted my hands on every inch of you since the second you looked at me like I was safe.”
A shiver moves through me.
He kisses just below my ear, soft enough to undo me.
“But I’m going to go slow,” he says. “Because your first time should not feel like something you survived.”
My whole heart stops.
Then starts again in a different rhythm.
“Ace.”
“I’ve got you.”
And this time, when he says it, I believe him with my whole body.
Chapter 5
Ace
Reinastandsinfrontof me wrapped in my towel, damp hair curling over her shoulders, cheeks flushed, mouth swollen from my kiss.
Untouched.
The word sits in my chest like a blade.
I should hand her my shirt, point her toward the bed, and sit my ass by the fire until my blood remembers how to behave.
I don’t move.
Neither does she.
Her fingers clutch the towel at her chest, but her eyes stay on mine. Rattled, yes. Shaken, absolutely. But there’s want there too, soft and nervous and so damn honest it makes my shoulder burn meaner.
She wants me.
She doesn’t know what to do with that yet.
That’s the only thing keeping me civilized.
My hands stay at my sides.
They have to.
I’ve used these hands for violence most of my life. Fists. Knives. Triggers. Doors kicked open in places where men screamed and begged and bled. I know how to take a room apart. I know how to get someone out when everyone else thinks it’s too late.
