I stared after him, the downpour of rain washing more and more hair into my face and eyes the longer I stood there, and when I finally shook my head, I used both hands to push it back.
I climbed in my car, sitting my wet ass on my wet seat, and I cranked the heat up. I drove home, shivering the entire way, and when I ran into the house, the frigid rain pelted me and I cursed. I stripped out of my wet clothes leaving them on the bathroom floor, and then I stood in a hot shower, not bathing, not washing anything at all—just letting the water warm my skin.
He didn’t call me that evening, and by the time ten o’clock rolled around, I was on edge, confused, and hurt. I picked up my phone multiple times, staring at it and contemplating dialing him. I could—of course I could, but he’d said he would, and there was something that smacked my pride about that.
Rather than dial the phone, I curled up on my bed with a book and pulled a throw over my legs. Concentrating on the book proved impossible, and I tossed it aside, choosing to stare at my ceiling instead. The wind howled outside, and I listened to the rain hitting the window panes. I’d not shaken the cold from my bones since getting home, and I finally crawled under the quilt and sheets when I caught myself tucking my hands between my legs and shivering.
It wasn’t until after ten that night that something pulled my focus from the place my eyes had been staring on the ceiling. The knock on the front door startled me for a half a second. It must be him. I wanted it to be, and when I walked toward the door my feet moved quickly.
“Hi,” he said when I pulled the door open. He stood there shivering and wet, soaked to the skin through his clothes and his hair a saturated mop that hung in his face and dripped.
I glanced past him to the driveway, but his dad’s truck wasn’t there.
“Kane, how did you get here?”
He crossed his arms. “I just… I walked.” He glanced at me, but then he looked down to the ground between us.
“Why? I could have come to get you. Why didn’t you just call me?”
He shook his head. He seemed a bit lost, and I was still just as clueless as I’d been when I’d dropped him off at his home hours earlier.
“I needed to walk. I needed to think.”
I bit my lower lip. “And your walk brought you all the way here in the freezing rain?”
He actually smiled a little at that. “Of course my walk brought me here. Everything in my life seems to bring me to you.”
I stepped back from the door, and he paused for a moment, looking down at his clothes. He eventually took the step though. He stood dripping on the tile entryway floor, and I stripped his shirt over his head, dropping it to the floor. He watched me, and when I undid the button of his pants, he reached for my face and gripped my cheeks. He didn’t smile, he just held my face as my fingers worked, and when I was pushing his pants and underwear down his hips, he pulled my mouth to his.
“How can it feel so good … and so terrifying at the same time?” he whispered just before his mouth touched mine. It was a sweet kiss, a gentle one, and when he pulled back, he licked his lower lip.
I reached for his chest, running my palms over his hard muscles. His skin popped with goosebumps as my hands moved. I stopped short of his waist, though, taking his hand in mine instead, and I pulled him down the hall. I grabbed a towel from the linen closet on the way back to my bedroom, and he took it from me, drying his hair and his body as I leaned back against my dresser, watching him. He sat on the edge of the bed, the towel in his hand.
“What’s going on with you?” I crossed my arms. It was oddly reminiscent of Kane—the way he crossed his when he was vulnerable. Vulnerable was definitely how I felt.
His eyes moved around for a moment as though he wasn’t sure how to respond.
“Kane, please—”
“I’m afraid to be on top of you when we make love.” He stared at my chest as he said the words, and it was only the briefest glance to my eyes that I got when he went silent.
The comment was so misplaced I just stared at him, my mouth hanging open. “What?”
He took a deep breath, and it looked forced when he finally shifted his focus up to my face. “Terrified,” he said. “Terrified of seeing you under me. Terrified of seeing you looking up at me the way you did… Terrified you’ll look the same. Terrified you’ll feel the same.” He shook his head, and when he opened his mouth to say something more, he ended up closing it and looking down again. When he finally looked back at me, he shrugged. “How fucking twisted is that?” He truly seemed confused by what he was saying. “That making love to you would remind me of raping you.”