Page 31 of Claimed Through Deception

She is building a wall. She is shutting me out, retreating into the same dark, inaccessible corner of her mind she used in the interrogation room.

I need to break it. I need to force a reaction out of her, to drag her back to the surface.

"Yes," I snap, my voice harsh and completely unforgiving. "I require a bath. Run the water."

She doesn't flinch at my tone. She simply nods once. "Yes, sir."

She turns and walks into the massive, open master bathroom.

I follow her, stripping the ruined, blood-soaked shirt from my shoulders and throwing it onto the floor.

The bathroom is clad entirely in black marble, anchored by an oversized sunken tub at the center of the room. Livia walks to the edge of the tub, turns the heavy brass fixtures, and the water begins to roar. Thick, heavy steam immediately rises, filling the cold air with condensation.

She reaches for a bottle of expensive bath oil, pouring a measure into the running water. She does everything with mechanical precision.

I stand behind her, shirtless. My torso is covered in a map of jagged, pale scars, souvenirs from a life spent in the crosshairs. The blood from the night's work is smeared across my chest and abdomen.

"Turn around," I command.

She places the bottle down and turns. Her dead eyes finally flick up, taking in the expanse of my bare, heavily scarred, blood-stained chest. She doesn't gasp. She doesn't shudder in fear. She just waits.

"Take a sponge," I order, my voice dropping to a dark, gravelly pitch. "You are going to wash it off."

For a fraction of a second, I see a muscle twitch in her jaw. A tiny crack in the titanium armor. But she smooths it over instantly.

She walks to the marble counter, picks up a thick, natural sponge, and steps back to the edge of the tub.

I sit on the wide, black marble ledge of the bathtub. My legs are spread, my boots resting on the floor. The steam billows up around my waist, hot and damp. I look up at her.

"My back," I say.

She steps between my spread knees.

The proximity is instantly suffocating. The hem of her black uniform brushes against the fabric of my trousers. I am entirely consumed by the scent of her.

She dips the sponge into the hot water. She leans over me.

When the hot, wet sponge makes contact with my bare shoulder, every muscle in my back locks.

Her touch is painfully gentle. She drags the soapy sponge across my skin, wiping away the dried blood. The heat of the water, the slide of the soap, and the small, trembling pressure of her hands against my heavily scarred flesh creates an agonizing, electric tension that hits me straight in the groin.

She works in silence. She cleans the blood from my left shoulder, moving slowly across the broad expanse of my back.

I close my eyes. I can feel the erratic, shallow puffs of her breath ghosting over the back of my neck. She is trying so hard to remain detached, to act like I am nothing more than a piece of furniture she is assigned to polish.

But her hands are shaking.

The sponge slips from her fingers, dropping into the hot water with a soft splash.

She leans over me to retrieve it. As she reaches down, her chest accidentally brushes against my bare shoulder.

An animalistic groan vibrates low in my throat.

The contact is brief, but it is enough to snap the fragile thread of my control. I am exhausted, running on the high of a mafia execution, and the woman I have been obsessing over for a week is standing between my legs, entirely at my mercy.

My hand shoots out. I grab her left wrist in an iron grip. Livia gasps, the sound tearing out of her throat as I yank her forward. The sponge falls back into the water.

I pull her down until she is practically kneeling on the edge of the tub between my thighs. I twist my body, bringing my face mere inches from hers.