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I’ve never had a woman in my life who hung around, who made a space for herself in my life and became comfortable around me. I didn’t want that, and I didn’t feel capable of it. But I can imagine Eve making breakfast in my kitchen. I can see her sitting on a sofa in the living room. I’ve thought of her lying in my bed more times than I’m willing to admit, and I don’t understand it. Any of it. Why? Why her? What is it about her that is making me feel this way?
At dinner, I had to keep eating to keep myself from talking. From asking her all of the questions that have been running through my mind since I’ve met her—like why she cried over the death of Cal Higgs, why she agreed to marry me, why she insists on fighting back against everything and say, and most importantly, why it doesn’t bother me near as much as it should? If anyone else talked to me the way she did, I’d scare them. I’d hurt them. I’d punish them. But I can’t bring myself to do that with Eve.
When we finish eating, instead of asking a soldier to take her back to her room, I offer to do it. She follows me out of the dining room and up the stairs, standing so close that I can feel her heat on my back. When I stop to point out the bathrooms on the first and second floors, she doesn’t stop in time and runs into me. It is like a ping pong ball hitting a brick wall. The force doesn’t even make me stumble. But I feel it like an electric shock, volts radiating out from where her skin touches mine.
“Sorry,” Eve says, her voice high-pitched and nervous.
We continue down the hallway, and when I stop to show her the library, it happens again. I can feel the soft press of her chest against my back. She isn’t wearing a bra because of the low cut back of her dress, so the only layers between us are the thin material of my sweater and her dress. Eve presses a palm into my shoulder blade, pushing herself away and apologizing, and it is like she has branded me. I feel the burn of her fingers on my skin even after she pulls away.
“Here.” I step to the side and wave an arm to usher her ahead of me. If I feel her body pressed against mine again, I can’t guarantee how I’ll react.
She blushes but doesn’t argue and moves to lead the way. Immediately, I realize this is a mistake.
The dress is cut low and her thick brown hair is twisted over one shoulder, showing off every inch of her back. I can see the delicate cut of her shoulder blades under her golden skin and the small dimples on either side of her spine just above her hips. Her body is trim and lithe and fit. Seeing her swaying in front of me might be worse than feeling her against me.
“The gym is on your right,” I say just as she passes the door. She stops to open it, and I am so distracted watching her that I almost run into her, catching myself at the last moment.
“I bet you’re here a lot,” she says, her pouty lips pulled into a small smile.
I clear my throat and look past her down the hallway, focusing on the far wall. Her room is at the end. Just a few more doors and she’ll disappear into her room for the night, and I’ll be free of her. “What makes you say that?”
Eve turns to me, one eyebrow raised and gestures with both hands to my entire body. “This. You.” She reaches out and lays a hand on my bicep, her fingers wrapping gently around my arm. “No one is born like this.”
My entire body tenses when she touches me. We are facing one another and for the first time since I’ve met her, we aren’t arguing. We are close to one another—touching, even—but aren’t engaged in anything other than a normal conversation. Without that undercurrent of anger, I’m not sure how to navigate this.
I know how to deal with lust. I know how to enjoy a woman’s body with no expectations of anything else, with no emotional component. But Eve is different. The pounding in my body isn’t just in my lower half. Something in my chest is rattling, loosening every time she gets too close, and I’m afraid of what will happen when it breaks away.
I shift away from her hand and nod. “I work out in the mornings before breakfast, but it’s available to you any other time of the day.”
Her brows furrow as I put distance between us and hurry down the hallway, but I try to focus on her doorway. I just need to keep my shit together for thirty more seconds.
I gesture quickly to my room and a storage closet without slowing down and then stop short of her door to let her show herself the rest of the way. Except, Eve doesn’t walk around me like I expect. Once again, for the third time, she bumps into my back.
My eyes close when her body presses into mine, and then her hand reaches out to touch my elbow, a nervous laugh bubbling out of her. “Sorry. Maybe I had too much wine with dinner.”
Her fingers drag down my forearm as she moves around me towards her door and before I can stop myself, I pounce.
I wrap my hand around her arm, spin her back to me, and press her against the hallway wall. My heart is thundering in my chest and heat is building between my legs. Eve looks up at me, a mixture of fear and confusion in her eyes, and I’m confused, too. Unsure what to do next. Where to go from here.
When my hand moves from her wrist to her waist, Eve’s back arches away from the wall. Her body reacts to me, rising up to meet my touch, and I have to grind my teeth together to keep from sliding my hand up to her waist and higher. To keep from letting my fingers explore the curve of her spine. Her lips part, a small exhale coming out as a sigh, and I feel like I’m drugged. Like I’m watching a tape of myself doing things I wouldn’t normally do and don’t understand.
“What are you doing?” Eve asks.
It would be easier if she was scared or angry. Instead, she just sounds curious. Her brown eyes are liquid, swirling with gold and amber, and they are hypnotic. I have to close my eyes to gain any kind of clarity.
I need to get away from this situation. Right now.
“Don’t touch me,” I snap. Eve shifts against the wall, trying to move away from me, but instead just ends up rolling her body against my leg. I can feel the switchblade in my pocket pressing into my skin, and my fingers itch to curl around the handle. “Touch me without my permission again, and I’ll slice you the way I did your boss.”
When I open my eyes, Eve’s eyes are wide, and her chest is heaving. Her breath comes hot and heavy so she brushes against my chest with every inhale. Despite what I’ve just said, my fingers tighten on her hip. I want to drag her body against mine until I can feel every movement, every breath and beat of her heart. I want to rip the dress off of her and get another good look at her nearly-naked body. I want to run my fingers over her bare skin.
Except, I don’t want to. My mind and my body seem to be at war with one another, and it is entirely Eve’s fault.
Finally, I push away from her, and she sags against the wall, gasping for breath as though my hand was around her neck. I spin on my heel and march down the hallway, calling back over my shoulder.
“Don’t forget the bracelet. Stay in the house or else.”
* * *
