AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Yes, you did. You just didn’t realize it. Besides, I wasn’t giving you the choice.”
I shake my head at that. Such a goddamn caveman.
The warm water feels like heaven on my aching muscles, and I reach up, brushing my hair from my face and getting it wet. I grab the shampoo, but he’s right there with it, massaging it into my head, the scent of him surrounding me since he used his and not mine, clinging to the steam and my senses. He does the same thing with the conditioner all the while we’re silent, neither of us knowing how to start this.
He dumps a handful of bodywash into his palm and rubs his hands together, creating a foamy lather. With his eyes on mine, he starts to wash my body, rubbing, massaging, and cleaning me without lingering anywhere too long. His hands coast over my breasts, between my legs, and across my ass.
He’s hard, but he’s not paying any attention to that. This is about him taking care of me, as he always does, and I can’t get enough of it. Of him. When he’s done with me, he forces me to sit on the stone bench he has in here, and then he quickly washes his own hair and body before he turns off the shower, hops out to wrap a towel around his waist, and then returns with one for me.
“Can you eat anything?” he finally asks, his voice a soft purr.
“Maybe some broth. I need to check my glucose and make sure I’m not having any rebound hypoglycemia.”
“Do you feel like you are?”
I shake my head, and relief swarms his features.
“Good. Come with me.” He lifts me again, not giving me the choice, and then sets me down on his bed. With a quick kiss to my nose, he goes down the hall to my room and returns with a thong and a pair of sweatpants that he hands me to put on.
“I need a shirt.” I laugh the words.
“I know.”
He moves into his closet and comes back out with a T-shirt and sweatshirt of his.
I raise a questioning eyebrow, but he ignores it as he gets himself dressed. He wants me to wear his clothes. Probably for the same reason he put his bodywash in my bathroom and anytime I attempt to bring my own back in there, it magically disappears with only his to be found. I like being wrapped in him. I feel comforted and safe when I smell his scent on my skin.
And now, with it surrounding me in his clothes, well…
I stop thinking about it and just put them on, inhaling deeply and not even caring if he catches me doing it. I want more of this because I don’t want it to end between us. But deep down, I know it has to. Even if it makes my heart hurt in the worst of ways.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Katy is quiet, and I have no idea what to do with a quiet Katy. She has a lot on her mind, but when Katy is anxious or excited, she talks. Non-freaking-stop, she talks. It’s a magical portal into the wild thoughts that live in her head, and I love it. So a quiet Katy is disconcerting. What happened with her today scared me. But it also shook me with a reality I no longer want to ignore.
We have a lot to talk about. A lot to sort out.
But right now, she’s too lost in her thoughts for that.
Passing out at work and then learning that you’re pregnant is a lot to take in.
We canceled our dinner with her uncle and stepmom because Katy is wiped from the day—and frankly, she isn’t able to eat more than soup—but right now, I’m not what she needs. I pose too many complications in her head. I see it all over her face as she sips the soup I made her. I saw it when she reluctantly took my clothes to put on.
I’m not even sure why I did that other than I wanted her surrounded by me, so she’d know that I have her and that not only is she safe, but I’ll always take care of her. Only instead of making her feel that way, I think I’m fucking with her head. At least I hope I am. I hope I have her questioning and rethinking everything we wrote into that contract.
But still…
“Katy?”
She slowly lifts her chin.
“Kenna, Keegan, Owen, Vander, Stone, and Mason will be here in about ten minutes. I’m going to change and head to the bar down the block so you can have time alone with them.”
She blinks at me, a slow roll of her eyes and dark lashes. “You called them?”
I rest my elbows on the counter on the other side of the island from her. The exact same position I was in when I brought her here and proposed all of this. “You look like you need them.”
She puffs out a loud, exaggerated breath as if she’s trying to hold herself together. A tear tracks down her cheek, but she quickly wipes it away and then breaks out into a shaky laugh. “How did you know? I didn’t even know.”
