Water cascades over her suntanned skin, droplets catching in her eyelashes and forming a little river in the valley of her breasts. She tips her head back to let it run over her face, and I just watch her for a moment, completely mesmerized. I don’t snap out of it until she blinks her eyes open again, and I quickly reach for the loofah and body wash, pretending I wasn’t just staring at her like a creep.
“I hope you know how much it kills me to wash my scent off you,” I mutter as I squirt some soap onto the loofah and lather it up.
“Well you were the one in the shower first, washing mine off,” she scoffs.
“Trust me, I didn’t want to,” I grumble. “I don’t plan on washing those sheets ever again.”
“Gross,” she laughs, swatting at my arm with the back of a hand.
I hold the loofah out toward her, arching a brow in question. “Can I?”
She smiles softly, nodding.
Stepping in closer, I take her by the hand and glide the sponge up her arm, gently cleaning her skin.
“If you want me to stay over again, then you’d better wash your sheets,” she teases as I start soaping her up.
My gaze flickers up to meet hers. “If it were up to me, you’d never leave.”
She rolls her eyes, making a scoffing sound in her throat. “Don’t you have important Alpha stuff to do today?”
“Not if you wanna hang out,” I murmur as I rub the loofah over her gorgeous tits. “All I’ve got going is weekly check-ins with my pack enforcers, but my Beta can easily cover those.”
She purses her lips in consideration, chewing on the inside of her cheek.
Shit, maybe I’m being too persistent. We already took a big step last night– a fucking monumental one, considering the circumstances– and I don’t want to push my luck and mess this up. She may need space to process, time to decompress…
“I could probably hang out for a while,” she smirks, and I release a breath I didn’t even know I was holding.
“Yeah, cool,” I reply, grinning like an idiot.I swear I used to be smoother than this.
She doesn’t seem to mind, beaming a smile right back at me as I continue soaping up her body, moving to the left side. She flinches when I run it over the mark at the base of her neck, averting her gaze as I slide it down to the scars on her bicep. Trailing lower, I take her hand and clean her inner left wrist, the pad of my thumb following the sponge to trace the ridge of her scar.
“You still haven’t told me about this one,” I murmur.
She gives a little shake of her head. “I don’t like talking about that one.”
“It’s okay, you don’t have to,” I reply reassuringly, reaching up to tuck a wet strand of hair behind her ear.
Her amber eyes flicker up to meet mine. “I should, though,” she rasps. “It’s something you probably need to know.”
My brows draw together as I stare back at her, giving a little nod of encouragement.
“I already told you about the two scars fromhim,” she mutters, her lip curling in disgust at the mention of her abuser. “But this one…” she glances down between us, her fingertips trailing over the line running up her inner wrist. “This one’s from me.”
My heart trips over its valves, throat tightening. “You?” I choke, pain tearing through my chest at her insinuation.
Chey nods numbly, still tracing her scar. “After that night, I tried to forget, but I couldn’t. And then I just… I didn’t want to live with the pain anymore. So, I took a knife, and…” she trails off, swallowing thickly. “Every time it healed, I cut it open again, until I’d lost so much blood that my wolf wasn’t able to heal me anymore.”
“I’m so sorry, Chey,” I grit out as I wrap my arms around her, voice gravelly with emotion. Pulling her in close, I press my lips to her forehead, squeezing my eyes shut as my mind reels with the tortuous thought of losing her.
I can’t lose her.
“I barely had a pulse when Javi found me” she mumbles, continuing. “He got the pack medic, they gave me a transfusion, and they brought me back. I was so mad at Javi when I woke up, furious that he took my choice away and didn’t let me just die. But then I saw how much pain he was in over what I’d tried to do, and it was the wake-up call I needed. He gave me a reason to live.” Her lips curve in a soft smile as she pulls back to gaze up at me, cupping my cheek. “And now I have another.”
As careful as I’ve been with always allowing her to make the first move, I can’t help myself. I’m so overcome with emotion that I lose all self-control, yanking her body against mine and slamming my lips down over hers. I swallow her little squeak of surprise, but I’m not met with any resistance, her lips parting to let me in and her body going boneless in my grasp. I kiss her hard, searing her lips with my claim.
I will protect this woman at all costs.
