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His fingers dug into my arms, and he hoisted me to my feet, where I barely got balanced before he dragged me into the bathroom. I tried to speak, to ask him what the hell he was doing, but he jerked back the shower curtain and lifted me over the side of the tub like I weighed nothing.
“W-wh—?”
My question was cut abruptly short when he turned the shower handle and a spray of frigid water hit me.
I yelped, blinking hard at the sudden burst of ice coating my skin under my jacket. I stripped the coat off like it was a living creature clinging to me, and scrambled to get to the tap. He held me firm around the waist, locking me just out of reach.
The wave of hysteria that had gripped me was long gone, replaced with a burning rage that could see only one outlet. I grabbed ahold of his shirt and used all of my not-inconsiderable strength to pull him towards the shower.
He’d been braced for me to push him, so the tug threw him entirely off balance and he pitched forward, falling against me.
My boots skidded on the wet surface of the tub, and I landed flat on my ass, the full weight of his body crashing down on top of me.
At least he was shielding me from the shower.
“You asshole,” I snarled, trying to wriggle myself out from under him.
He had regained his senses after my surprise assault and now easily held my arms pinned above my head while I squirmed, sliding uselessly on the slick porcelain. Without being able to find purchase on anything, it was impossible to get any traction. His knees slipped as he lifted his weight and straddled my waist, still holding me down.
“You’re losing your damn mind.”
“You think that was crazy, I’ll show you crazy, you fuck.” I jerked my hips up and flipped over, soaking my whole front in icy-cold water. Twisting my body, I was able to wrench my hands free of his grip, and this time he let me go. I climbed over the side of the tub, flopping onto the floor as a puddle started to pool around me.
Cade shut off the water and got out after me, standing with his legs on either side of my hips.
I should punch him in the nuts.
I should claw out his eyes.
Instead I pressed my cheek against the cold tile and closed my eyes, pulling in long, deep lungfuls of air until the urge to scream faded. The red haze of my anger towards him dissipated, and soon I felt almost like myself again.
“Help me up,” I grumbled, rolling onto my back. My shirt was soaked through, and my jacket, still in the tub, was probably ruined. “What kind of moron takes a girl who is throwing off electric sparks and tosses her under water?”
I wasn’t about to acknowledge that his plan had worked. That would be telling him he was right.
Cade said nothing but offered me his hand and pulled me to my feet. He was already so close the action drew me up along his front, his shirt lifting slightly from the press of my body. A flash of abs peeked out above his belt buckle, and my fingers accidentally grazed bare skin on his back when I went to steady myself.
In an instant, I forgot how cold I was, because I was flushed all the way through with heat.
His hands went to my arms, squeezing a ever so slightly too hard. I glanced up and found him staring at me, an unexpected intensity in his brown eyes. It was something I’d never seen on Cade’s normally emotionally shuttered face. Hunger. A bare, unhidden want had tightened his features, and he looked like he was in pain.
My heart pounded, and given how close we were he must be able to feel it.
Instead of pulling my hands away, I adjusted them up a fraction of an inch, my fingers tracing the bare, cool skin of his lower back, finding the groove of his spine and where it went lower, lower…
He sucked in a breath.
“We…” There was a chance he was trying to come up with something logical to stop this, whatever it was, but he didn’t finish the thought.
“We could have died,” I whispered. “We almost died.”
His hands moved up to my shoulders, then my neck. Strong, rough thumbs rubbed along the line of my jaw, and he kept touching me, tentatively, exploratively, until he paused at my mouth, one thumb pressing down on the center of my lower lip.
I fully stopped breathing, worried the smallest exhalation would send him flying off like a murmuration of starlings.
“We didn’t die,” he said finally, pressing down a little harder until my mouth opened.
Around us, the floor was a growing puddle of cold water. Goose bumps had erupted on my skin, but I didn’t think they had anything to do with the chill from the shower’s blast.
