No answer. Also, no sounds of shoes shuffling closer. Had he already left? Maybe his agreement to let me try to help him had been a trick. Get my hopes up, then dash them. That sounded like something Hades would d—
The door opened, cutting off my pessimistic hypothetical. And suddenly Hades was in the bathroom with me.
I could hear club music pumping from below, but I hadn’t heard him approaching. What kind of gator is this?
I swallowed. The bathroom was the one room upstairs my mother wouldn’t have stamped with her seal of approval. It had been thoroughly updated with a sleek glass shower, a separated toilet, overhead lighting with a dimmer switch, and even a charming claw-foot copper soaking tub—not exactly historically accurate. But there was only so much renovation one could do when it came to old bathrooms in old houses. The space was tiny compared to the rest of his apartment, where he’d obviously knocked out walls.
So not only had I invited a gator into my sanctuary—the only place in my prison where I was allowed any privacy—but the predator also took up most of the space. And the air. My heart sped up, trying to catch the breaths that had suddenly become shallower.
We’d never stood this close upright. My head barely reached his shoulder.
He looked all around in the room where I’d dimmed the lights. “What’s this?”
“This is the first step to no nightmares. A nice warm bath.” I waved my hand toward the cooper tub I’d fill up with water and some Epsom salts I’d found underneath the sink, like voila.
But then I had to clear my throat and add, “You’ll, um….need to take off all your clothes and, you know…get in.”
A beat of silence, and I wondered if he’d say no. I have to admit, I’d say no if I were him.
But then he took another step into the bathroom, closing the rest of the small distance between us. He wasn’t standing close enough to touch. Still, I could feel his predator energy pushing against me as he started to remove his clothes. Slowly. Sensually. With more grace than a man who wore a leather jacket and jeans like a business suit should have possessed.
He was doing that alligator-jaw trap thing with his eyes again. I tried and failed to look away as he revealed his body, piece by piece. Heavily veined forearms, the sleeve tattoo, abs so defined, they cast shadows.
Then…
Okay, must stop openly staring at my captor.
I ripped my gaze away from his and pinned it on the ceiling, refusing to look. But he didn’t have to tell me when he was fully naked. I swear, I could feel the piece of male anatomy I refused to look at pulsing between us. Even before he said, “Now what?”
“Just get in.” I meant to sound efficient, but my voice squeaked out.
Another still beat, but then he stepped around me, and the sloshing sound of water told me he’d lowered himself into the bath.
“Now what?” he asked again.
I turned around, and dear Lord…How could one man look so masculine lounging in a copper bath?
I tried to swallow, yet again, but no dice. My throat had gone that dry.
I hastily turned and picked up the hand towel I’d set on top of the sink, along with a bar of his Black Amber Mistral soap that I’d grabbed from the shower.
“Here’s a hand towel and some soap.”
He just stared at the items I was holding out to him.
“Alright, Persy, make me clean.”
I doubted anyone or anything could do that. Not enough expensive soap in the world. Also, why couldn’t he do it himself?
The challenging look in his eyes told me it was better not to ask. None of the soothing nighttime routines I’d looked up for my little sister had included start arguing during the bath portion.
Besides, I’d given my little sister plenty of baths when she was younger. I’d read The Baby-Sitters Club series way too many times, and I used to beg Mama Fairgood to let me do all the work when it came to getting Daphne ready for bed.
No big deal. I picked up the towel and soap. I’d just imagine I was back home in Baton Rouge giving my baby sister a nice scrub.
I soaped up the wash cloth and efficiently began swiping it over his chest—which turns out to be decidedly not like a baby’s. Everything on him was a hard, unyielding plane. Did he even have any body fat?
Don’t think about his ridiculous physique.
