He turned and headed for the other room. “Yeah. In the bathroom.”
“No, you sit. I’ll get it.”
He sat and watched as I crossed the room. I turned the light on in the bathroom, doing a quick once-over. It was as clean as the rest of the apartment. Blue walls again, freshly painted. I could still smell the slight scent of paint in the room. Guess I knew what his favorite color was.
“It’s under the sink,” he called out.
I opened the cabinet. A bunch of hydrogen peroxide and some scary-looking needles were under the sink, right next to the first-aid kit. I didn’t want to know what the needles were for. Swallowing, I grabbed the kit, closed the cabinet, and stood up. When I glanced up into the mirror, the image reflected back at me made the contents of my stomach churn. A woman who looked more like a girl, in a bloodstained torn tee. It was the tee that did it, and I didn’t want it on for another second. Didn’t want anyone’s blood on my hands, even if that somebody had been trying to kill me. Setting the kit down, I violently removed my shirt, walked to the kitchen, and shoved it into the garbage.
He still sat on the couch, but he watched me with heated eyes, his fingers gripping his knees. “Heidi, you need to put a shirt on,” he gritted out.
His eyes were dark, and he perched on the edge of the couch as if he was ready to pounce without a moment’s notice. The way he was looking at me, like I was actually his, should have pissed me off, especially on the heels of what had happened just minutes before. On a normal day, I hated dominant men who thought they could control women once those women were “theirs.”
But right now, it didn’t piss me off.
It absolutely didn’t.
CHAPTER 5
LUCAS
I tightened my hands on my knees, fighting the impulse to cross the room and take the rest of her clothes off. I knew why she’d taken her shirt off. Through the open bathroom door, I’d seen the horror on her face when she saw the blood on the fabric. But, damn it, she was wearing only a sheer black bra and a pair of tiny shorts that looked as if they’d been painted on.
It was enough to tempt a saint, and I was no fucking saint.
My mind might know why she was half-naked, but my body hadn’t gotten the memo. It hadn’t even been in the same damn office as my brain at the time of delivery.
I knew she had to be shaken up from what those pricks in the alley had wanted to do, but I still couldn’t take my eyes off her. Her hair cascaded down her back, inexplicably curling at the ends. Those blue eyes I’d been fantasizing about didn’t have the same sparkle in them that they’d had earlier, and that pissed me off.
Those little assholes had stolen her sparkle.
She watched me, her dimples currently hidden. Her large breasts were clearly visible through the fabric of her bra, and she didn’t even bother to try to hide her rosy nipples from me. Her hard rosy nipples, which were practically begging for my mouth.
Jesus, Joseph, and Mary, she was trying to kill me.
Her waist tapered in, and her generous hips flared out. Hips that were meant for a man’s hands to hold while he was making her scream out his name.
No, not a man.
This man: me. Only me.
The shorts clung to the curves of her ass and her upper thighs, leaving the rest of her legs bare all the way down to her blue Converse sneakers. And she was in my apartment. Staring at me.
“Heidi . . .”
She fidgeted with her hands in front of herself. “Okay, in retrospect, maybe I shouldn’t have done that. But I couldn’t wear that shirt for another second. You know?”
Something twisted hard in my chest at her choked words. If I didn’t know better, I’d swear it was my heart. But I knew I didn’t have one anymore. I had a hunch that her admission hadn’t come easily to her. It wouldn’t have come easily to me, either.
She and I were a lot alike.
Standing up, I crossed the room and cupped her cheeks, brushing a thumb over her split lip. The gesture was tender and way too gentle for me, but I couldn’t help it. Not when she looked so scared and uncertain. “It’s okay, darlin’. I’ll get you a shirt.”
“Thank you,” she said, still not looking away from me.
Reluctantly, I let her go and walked into my bedroom. Grabbing my favorite shirt, I handed it to her, balled up in my fist. “Here.”
She took it, a small smile lighting up her pale face. “Blue. Of course.”
“Yeah.” I cocked a brow. “And?”
“You like blue,” she said.
I did, but I couldn’t remember telling her that. “Put it on.”
“Oh. Right.” She slipped it over her head. After she had her arms through the holes, she hugged it close and whispered, “Thank you, Lucas.”
It was the first time she’d willingly used my name. I liked the way it sounded on her lips. All soft and sweet and seductive. But the way she looked at me, with her sparkling blue eyes, made my stomach clench tight and roll into one big knot. “Don’t look at me like that.”