Page 64 of Once Upon a Fable

Hell.

Everything in between.

Only once bubbles covered me did I step back under the cold spray and rinse. My skin burned from the cold, and the contrast between the muggy air and the snowy water was almost an aphrodisiac. My senses were on high alert and strung out. My jumpiness at an all time high.

Thanks to hypersensitivity, I knew he’d returned. I knew before the door even opened. Instincts did their best to protect me, sending my heart hiccupping before catapulting into an all-out sprint.

The bathroom door opened.

He strode in.

Our eyes locked from across the room. Droplets continued to rain over my face, and his naked chest glittered with the numerous scars that painted a story of his pain.

His gaze dragged from my eyes to my bare breasts, exposed stomach, naked core, and every inch in-between.

He didn’t slouch against the doorframe this time.

He stood stiff and solemn.

He didn’t reach for his straining erection or attempt to provide any relief to the stark arousal on his features. His hands balled into fists by his thighs as he continued to drink me in. His tongue wetted his bottom lip as he became transfixed by my ass as I turned my back on him and shot him a glower over my shoulder.

He acted as if he’d never seen a naked woman before, but beneath that eager innocence, something far too dark to understand existed. Flashes of it appeared and disappeared in his eyes. Something cruel and sadistic. Something that hinted he wasn’t innocent at all and had done things I could never imagine.

More time passed between us as he watched me finish my shower.

He didn’t rush me or bark orders for me to come to him.

It was almost civil in the way he stood like a gentleman, granting me his every thought and desire through the heat in his blackened gaze.

Beneath the chilly water, my core clenched despite myself. It reacted to his severity, his strength, his savagery. He was a man who would never survive in society because of whatever had happened to him out here.

Whatdidhappen to him?

Was I once again making things up? Was I romanticizing a situation that had nothing romantic about it? Whatever tales I came up with about his background, they were all wrong. The most logical explanation was, he was a wanted convict who’d been hiding from the law for whatever crime he’d committed. Judging by how easily he’d strangled me and continually threatened to take my life, he was probably wanted for murder.

Whatever heat had threaded through my core dissipated, leaving me shivering even harder beneath the spray.

Almost as if he knew I’d reached my limit, he stalked in bare feet to the rack and plucked off a fluffy cream towel. Silently, he came closer to the shower and spread it wide, ready to wrap around me.

A white flag perhaps?

A sign of truce between us?

Never looking away from him, I turned off the shower and gingerly stepped across the wet tiles. I paused before him. More naked than I’d ever been before someone. His eyes once again fell to my breasts and lingered on my pebbled nipples.

I was confident in my body. I’d trained it to keep me safe while climbing and to stay healthy in all my risky endeavors. I was toned. I was strong. Past lovers had appreciated my hard work and commented on muscles they didn’t even have.

But no man hadeverwatched me as he did.

No man had ever given me his utmost attention.

No man stopped breathing or began to tremble the longer he studied me.

The way he watched me was borderline worship. He made me feel both like I was his for the rest of my life and that I was the ruler for the rest of his. He made no attempt to hide such fervency. No masks or quips to keep the upper hand. No games that so often existed in the bedroom between new partners.

Silently, I turned and gave him my back.

His sharp inhale sent my skin prickling, followed by the almost unfightable reaction to crumple at his feet as he draped the soft towel around my body and wrapped me tight.