His gaze locked tighter on mine. “Yeah?”
“Yes.”
“Tell me what this is.”
My stomach flipped. “Cade.”
“I need to know we’re talking about the same thing, Pip.”
The command in his voice should have made me defensive. Instead, it made me feel anchored, like he was not letting me drift into the moment without naming it first. I could hear rain against the glass, feel the softness of his hoodie against my skin, see the way his eyes stayed fixed on my face instead of wandering lower even though I knew he wanted to look.
“I want you to watch me,” I said, the words barely above a whisper. “Like I watched you.”
His jaw flexed.
There it was. The crack in him. The one I was starting to crave seeing because Cade controlled himself so tightly that every slip felt like a confession.
“Fuck,” he said, and my name sounded wrecked enough to make my thighs press together beneath the blanket.
“You want me to watch you play with your pussy?”
I breathed out slowly, trying to keep my hand steady around the phone. “You said fair was fair.”
“I know what I said.”
“You also said if I stayed, you’d know I wanted to watch.”
“And you stayed.”
“I did.”
His eyes dropped then, just briefly, to where his hoodie bunched high on my thighs. When they came back to my face, his expression had gone so dark and intent I forgot what breathing was supposed to feel like.
“Are you wearing anything under my hoodie?” he asked.
My pulse tripped over itself. “That is a very invasive question for a school project.”
His mouth curved. “This stopped being about school the second you told me you not to step back.”
I should have argued.
I should have defended the sacred academic integrity of my human-interest project and my major and the notes I had absolutely abandoned twenty minutes ago.
Instead, I looked at him through the screen, felt the truth settle under my ribs, and let myself stop fighting for one second.
“No,” I said. “I have your hoodie and my panties on.”
The sound that left him was quiet, rough, and almost not there, but I heard it anyway. More importantly, I saw what it did to him. His hand moved over his jaw, his eyes closing for half a second like he needed that much time to survive the answer before he opened them again.
“Show me your face,” he said.
I blinked. “You can see my face.”
“When I talk to you,” he clarified, voice rougher now. “I want to see what I do to you.”
My breath shook.
That was worse somehow. Hotter. More intimate than him asking for anything else because he wanted my reaction. Not just the act or the fantasy. He wanted the truth in my face before I could hide it.
