I feel the tremor running through his arms, not from strain but from something far more dangerous—panic and fury and relief all twisting together beneath his skin with nowhere to go.
Water slams into his back as he turns us deeper into the spray, shielding me with his body and taking the full force of the heat onto himself first. “Jesus Christ, Julian,” he mutters into my wet hair, voice low and ragged, breath shaking. “You fucking idiot. My idiot.” The words are furious-soft, like he wants to rip them out of the air before I hear them but can’t. “Scared the shit out of me… fucking little halo… fucking staying sober like I asked… Christ.”
I cling. I can’t help it. My fists clutch at his shirt, fingers tangled in the soaked fabric, knuckles white even though I’m barely conscious. The water is too loud, too hot, too heavy. Steam curls around us in thick waves. Rafe’s chest is shaking beneath my cheek, his heartbeat pounding against my skin like he’s been running for miles—like he sprinted all the way back to me on instinct alone.
He lowers me slowly, carefully, until my back meets the wall again—but this time his hand stays on my spine, supporting me, keeping me upright. My head lolls. My vision swims. I blink up at him through lashes stuck together with water, and all I see is fury carved into worry carved into something so raw it makes my throat ache.
“Stay with me,” he growls quietly, his voice low and sharp. “Don’t fucking drop again.”
I try to nod, but my body barely listens, everything sluggish and uncooperative.
Rafe doesn’t waste time, his fingers going straight to the front of my soaked hoodie as he grips the fabric, and for a second I think he’s going to rip it off me like he always does—fast, rough, claiming—but instead he lifts it slowly and carefully, like he’s peeling away a wound dressing.
It throws me so hard I frown, blinking up at him like he’s the one malfunctioning.
“Rafe…?” I manage, my voice thin and weak, barely more than a breath lost under the sound of the water.
“Shut up,” he mutters, but it’s soft. Too soft. The hoodie sticks to my skin, heavy with sweat and water and the scent of him still clinging to the fibers. He works it up inch by inch, mindful of my arms, of the weight, of every twitch of discomfort. When it finally pulls over my head, he throws it aside and cups the back of my neck, thumb brushing the tape residue on my throat.
His touch is gentle—actually gentle—and my brain stutters hard enough to lag, because that is not who he is, not with me and not with anyone.
The frown deepens before I can stop it, my brows pulling tight in confusion, and of course he sees it, because he always does, his jaw tightening for half a heartbeat like my reaction just hit some raw, unguarded nerve he didn’t expect to have.
“What,” he mutters, grabbing my wrist and sliding the soaked sleeve off with impossible care. “You mad I’m not throwing you around right now?”
I want to say yes. I want to say I don’t know. I want to say I don’t understand why his hands are shaking or why he’s looking at me like I almost slipped through his fingers forever. But all that comes out is a small, slurred, “You’re… being nice.”
His breath catches—just barely—but I feel it anyway.
“I’m washing you,” he says, his voice low and rough, trying just a little too hard to sound like himself. “Don’t fucking read into it.”
He’s lying, and I know it instantly, because I’ve heard him cold and controlled and brutal, and he has never sounded like this.
He strips the rest of my clothes off piece by piece, careful with every tug, nothing rough and nothing rushed, and when his fingers brush over my hip bone he pauses like he’s checking for pain, while the moment my knees wobble he steadies me without a word, his hand sliding down my side, firm but not demanding.
Then he reaches for the soap, and Rafe Scalzi—the man who tapes mouths shut and breaks ribs without blinking—starts washing me.
Gently, his hands moving in slow circles over my shoulders, down my arms, across my chest, careful around the bruises Kai left with the restraints and even gentler around the tape marks on my throat.
The water runs down his forearm, dripping onto my skin. His breath warms the space between us. He’s close enough that I can feel the tension in his body, the restraint, the quiet fury under every controlled exhale.
He murmurs under his breath—words I can’t fully catch. Something like, “Should’ve been here,” and “Don’t scare me like that again,” and “Good fucking boy.” All while washing me like I’m fragile porcelain.
I stare at him through the spray, confused and trembling and undone.“Rafe…” I whisper, voice cracked. “Why are you—”
He cuts me off by pressing his forehead to mine again, softer this time. “Because you stayed,” he growls against my mouth. “Because you fucking waited. And because I nearly lost you before I ever got to have you.”
The water drowns the rest, but I feel it anyway. Every syllable. Every touch. Every tremor of his hands.
The steam is thick enough to feel. Heavy as breath. Hot as fever. It blurs the edges of Rafe’s face until he looks unreal—like a hallucination I conjured from need and near-death. Water slides down his jaw in clean, merciless lines, catching on the stubble, dripping from his chin to my chest. His hands are still on me—one braced at my hip, the other resting just under my ribs, fingers splayed wide like he’s holding me together by force of will alone.
My body is jelly. Liquid. Melting under the heat of him and the heat of the water and the ache behind my ribs. But something in me manages to move—slow, trembling, hesitant like it’s waking from a coma. My hand rises between us, dragging through the spray. My fingers shake. I can barely control them. But I reach anyway.
I touch his jaw, barely, just the tips of my fingers brushing the sharp edge of bone, but that’s all it takes.
Rafe goes still—not his usual predator freeze, but something deeper, a full-body halt like that single touch hits a nerve buried so far under his skin he didn’t even know it existed.
His breath stops, and his hands tighten on my waist just slightly, just enough for me to feel the tremor running through him.
