Her gaze shifted down to his cock, standing tall and desperately ready to spend quality time with her.
Brea pressed her hand to her chest. “I…”
Clearly, she didn’t know what to say. “You?”
“Ah…wanted to know if you need shampoo.”
“Nope. But it might be a good idea for you to hold my hand while I climb in. You know, so I don’t lose my balance on the wet tile.”
“Right.” Her voice trembled, but she still didn’t move, just swallowed.
She was reluctant to touch him.
He backed off. “But if this is too much for you—”
“No,” she assured him in a rush, then approached, hand outstretched. Her cheeks had gone red. “I just didn’t expect to see you this…exposed.”
She’d thought he’d be somehow less naked?
Wiping the smile off his face, he stepped into the walk-in shower, then released her hand. The hot water sluiced down his body, washing away grime and sweat. He groaned.
“Are you okay?” she asked. “Does something hurt?”
Brea was a carer. She worried about people, often more than herself. As he reached for the shampoo, he really looked at her face. The dark smudges he saw under her eyes worried him. He didn’t remember seeing them before.
“Fine,” he assured. “I’m better every day. What about you? Tired?”
“I am. I don’t know why, just feeling run down lately. Suddenly, I want to nap all the time. It’s got to be the change in seasons and the fact we’ve had such gloomy skies this week.”
Maybe, but he didn’t like it. As soon as he finished showering, he’d stop yanking her chain and take care of her for a change.
“Have you been sleeping?” she asked, changing the subject.
He lathered his hair, then grabbed the soap to scrub up his body.
Brea was still watching.
“Not much.” Now that he was almost healed and getting good calories, he wasn’t constantly exhausted. That was great during the day. At night? The fitful hours sucked.
“Are you still having nightmares?”
“Yeah.” He turned his back on her, not eager to continue this conversational thread.
He’d been around other soldiers enough to know the symptoms of PTSD. He was a month out from his captivity. If the anxiety and bad dreams didn’t ease soon, that therapist his bosses at EM Security Management had forced him to start videoconferencing with would put a label on him that might persuade everyone to bar him from action.
One-Mile wasn’t having that shit.
“Do you want to talk about them?”
“No.”
“Pierce…”
As he managed his final rinse, his half-formed plan to soap up his hard cock and stroke it for her went down the drain with the suds.
Fuck, he hated that the mood between them was dead.
“Don’t worry.” He cut off the water.
She handed him the towel. “Of course I’m going to worry. If I didn’t, why else would I come see you every day?”
“Why do you?” he asked, wrapping the terry cloth around his waist.
A pretty flush that had nothing to do with the warm, humid bathroom rushed back to her cheeks. “Because you matter.”
“To who? My bosses? The guys I work with?” He stepped from the shower, challenging her. “Or to you?”
She frowned. “Of course you matter to me. Now sit so I can put this ointment on your back.”
One-Mile wanted to press her for more, but it was too many words to speak with his jaw wired shut. For now, he had to settle for the fact that he mattered to her in some way. He could build from that.
Instead, he bit back a surly growl and yanked the prescription tube from a nearby drawer, then handed it to her and lowered himself onto the closed lid of the commode.
Seconds later, she set the tube down on the adjacent counter and began to spread the thick antibiotic ointment across his back, focused on where Montilla’s whip had opened his flesh repeatedly over his twenty-two days of hell. Her fingers glided over his skin in a delicate brush that made him shudder in pleasure.
God, he’d love to have her hands all over him…
“Your wounds are looking a lot better,” she remarked. “The scabs are really healing over.”
He grunted. He couldn’t see his back, but he’d believe her.
“Do you have any vitamin E oil?”
Why would he? “No.”
“I’ll bring some tomorrow. It helps with scarring.”
Honestly, he didn’t care about that much, except the damage done to his ink, but… “Will you put it on for me?”
“Of course.”
“I’d like that.”
She lifted her hands off him and washed them in the nearby sink. “I laid some clothes out for you on your bed in case you were too tired. Can you manage from here?”
He nodded.
“I’ll meet you downstairs.”
“Thanks.”
Thirty seconds later, he’d tossed on the sweats and T-shirt she’d folded nicely on his well-made bed he’d give anything to share with her tonight. Just being in the same room with her made him feel calmer, more centered. Whole.
Jesus, he sounded like a lovesick schmuck—and he didn’t fucking care.
After finding a pair of tube socks, he slid into those and padded down the stairs. He stopped halfway down when he spotted Brea on his sofa, head propped up on her open palm, eyes closed.
She was asleep.
On soft footfalls, he made his way to her and sat. She awoke with a start as he pulled her onto his lap and curled her head onto his shoulder.
“W-what are you doing?”
“Showing you that you matter to me, too. Rest.”
The starch left her body, and she melted against him, eyes closing again. “Just for a minute.”
“Sure.” He dropped a kiss onto her forehead.
She sighed, then her breathing evened out.
Suddenly, he was the happiest he’d been in what seemed like an eternity.
Without really trying, Brea had become his everything.
As she curled her legs against his side and cuddled closer, he started scheming ways to keep her with him forever.
Chapter 10
Thursday, October 23
Less than thirty minutes after her last client left the salon, Brea rushed toward Pierce’s front door, feeling almost giddy.
Today, his jaw had been unwired. Tonight, they would
