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When his fingers wrapped around the handle, and around her fingers too, their gazes locked.
She blew out a breath. “Please don’t ask me any questions yet, Quaide. I need to get myself together first.”
“Of course, honey.” He caressed her fingers. They felt thinner.Shewas thinner.
But so was he. His jeans were hanging on his hips, and he’d added another hole in his belt the previous week. It shouldn’t feel so damn good to know that she was doing just as horrible as he was. All these weeks, he’d struggled with the idea of her happy and thriving while he was so miserable without her.
“Let me take the bag,” he said.
She released the handle, but he caught her hand before she could pull it away. When he strummed his thumb over her knuckles, a shiver ran through her.
So he still affected her.
That deep ache that had been knotting his chest since the morning he received her resignation letter transformed from a sharp stab to something bittersweet.
Rain stepped up behind her in the doorway, looking cool and collected where her poor sister was frazzled and frantic.
“Oh, can you take my bag too, Quaide? It’s so heavy.”
“If you hadn’t packed half of your wardrobe—and mine too—your bag wouldn’t be so heavy,” Dove shot out.
He captured her gaze and tried to transmit a message to her.It’s all right, Dove. Just breathe, my baby.
As if she understood, her chest inflated. She issued a low sigh and brushed past him.
He offered Rain a smile as he took her bag too.
“Make sure you have everything including ID,” he told them.
Dove shoved her feet into a pair of black boots and bent over to zip them. Her long, thick blonde hair trailed to the floor, and for a minute, he couldn’t move for the heat in his balls and a swirl of memories of her in that very same position, taking a pounding from behind. From him.
This wasn’t going to be an easy trip back to East Canon when he was half erect and ready to make up for lost time.
She violently zipped each boot and flipped her hair when she straightened. “I don’t think it’s a good idea to leave at all.”
“Oh? Do you have another plan?”
“No, she does not,” Rain cut across her. “She’s paranoid about going out too. She waits forever to go down the street to the market to buy us food.”
The revelation had Quaide’s protector instincts raging and the alpha male inside him pummeling everything in range with his fists. Dove was afraid to leave the apartment. That should never, ever happen. And it wouldn’t again—not on his watch.
“Rain.” Dove’s throat mottled with a red flush of anger.
“I know, I know. Shut up. You never used to be so mean, Dove.”
“Oh my god. Spare me.” She grabbed her purse off a hook near the door and threw the strap over her shoulder so the leather hung across her body.
He shouldered his way past the women snarking at each other to position himself in front of the door. When both sets of nearly identical blue eyes turned on him, he was stunned by the resemblance.
“We’re leaving the apartment on my terms, so listen to me.”
Dove narrowed her eyes at his command.
“You’re going to stay behind me. We’ll take the elevator—”
“Oh my god!” Rain burst out. “I almost forgot my toiletry bag!” She rushed back into the bedroom.
“There is no excuse for her,” Dove said in a flat tone that would make him laugh under any other conditions. But seeing the stress on her face was breaking his damn heart.
