My heart kicked into overdrive. Letting out a rough breath, I tried not to make a sound as I dragged myself out of bed and into the bathroom.
The hot water beat down on my shoulders, steam rising fast, but the heat did shit to wash away what I was feeling. I kept seeing her face behind my eyelids. Not Sophia’s. Jamie’s.
I could still feel the phantom slickness of her hand wrapping around me. I remembered how violently she’d tasted when she kissed me back, kissing me like it didn’t even matter what dead woman's name I was calling out into the dark. My hand drifted down over the wet, hard planes of my stomach, remembering how soft her curves had felt, how fucking good she’d made me feel right before I ruined it.
I wrapped my hand around my shaft. I was so hard I was throbbing, a tight, painful ache. I stroked from root to tip, imagining how incredible it would feel to finally break her open, to completely bury myself inside of her. To see how deep I could go until she forgot whatever name she used to have.
I caught myself. I was too far gone, standing on an edge I couldn’t drop over. I ripped my hand away.
“Fuck,” I cursed under my breath, my forehead leaning against the cold tile. I wasn’t going to get off thinking about her. Not after last night. Not like a desperate teenager. I tried to block out the memory of how perfectly her hand had fit around me, how natural it felt. My fist cracked against the tile once.
Stupid. I shouldn't have let it get that far.
I got dressed, deliberately deciding against a suit. I pulled on a black tee, sweatpants, and yanked my hoodie over my head like the heavy fabric could somehow block out everything I was trying not to feel.
When I walked out, she was moving around the kitchen comfortably, as if she lived here. As if she belonged. I paused in the shadow of the hallway, watching her.
She had on one of my oversized t-shirts now. No more bare skin. No more teasing.
“Good morning?”
She jumped at the sound of my voice before turning around. The expression on her face was caught somewhere between a fake smile and a grimace. Everything about her posture was fiercely guarded now. Before last night, she had been brazen, weaponizing her body. Now, she was completely folded into herself. Not scared. Just... closed off.
And I was the reason.
“Vincente.”
Her voice cutting through the room pulled me out of the haze. I looked up and realized she was waiting for me to respond. Seeing that I hadn’t been listening, she repeated herself, her tone flattening.
“Do you want a plate of food?”
I nodded. She slid the plate toward me without saying another word, rolling up the long sleeves of my shirt before she dug into her own food.
I had to say something. The silence between us was too loud, vibrating with the echo of her sticky fingers and my dead wife's name.
“You’re not walking around naked anymore,” I said finally. The moment the words left my mouth, I inwardly cringed. Of all the things to say, that was what I chose?
She didn’t look up from her plate. “Didn’t seem appropriate now.”
I nodded once, the bacon turning to ash in my mouth. “How did you sleep last night?”
She looked up then, her doe eyes locking onto mine. There was something deeply unreadable, something hollowed out and biting, in her gaze.
“Fine. I slept peacefully,” she lied.
My teeth ground together. I guess we were going to pretend nothing had happened. I could play that game too.
I cleared my throat, pulled my phone from my hoodie pocket, and slid it across the table. “Order what you need. Clothes, toiletries, food. Enough to stay comfortable for a few weeks.”
She blinked, genuinely surprised. “A few weeks?”
The way she said it rubbed a raw spot in my chest, like she couldn’t bear the thought of being trapped in my space for that long. But could I blame her?
“Yeah. Just in case.”
She narrowed her eyes at me, trying to map my angles, but she didn’t push. She just picked up the phone and started scrolling, ordering things like it was no big deal. I watched her fingers move. The delicate curve of her wrist. The deliberate way she avoided making eye contact.
After a while, I leaned back, forcing my mind onto business. “You know anything about Lady of Rage’s girl?”
