But Cain wasn’t looking at the sink. He was looking at Ginger. Setting his toolbox down on the floor, he did nothing, in fact, but look at Ginger. Her breath caught as his eyes caressed her face, trailing from her hair to her eyes, sliding down her cheeks to her lips in leisurely perusal. Her pulse raced, throbbing in her throat, as he dropped his intense gaze to her breasts, holding there for an interminable moment before lowering his gaze to her hips and legs. She could hear the subtle increase in his breathing—the way it quickened, the way it grew more ragged as time stopped and Cain studied her.
As his eyes skated back up her body, they were hungry, and she was acutely aware of his size, so much bigger and stronger than she, in the small room they shared. But she wasn’t frightened or intimidated—this was Cain, after all, whom she’d known forever, and she had a funny sense that he was trying to catch up, trying to figure her out the same way she was trying to get her bearings with him. He was logging the changes in her, and the shift in his breathing told her he liked what he saw, which made it the most erotic sixty seconds of Ginger’s heretofore unerotic life. Her nipples tightened, her veins pulsed, and her private places flooded with a sudden rush of liquid heat.
Cain. Oh God, Cain, how do you do this to me with just a look?
She wanted to race across the room and leap into his arms. She wanted his lips on hers, his hands on her body. She wanted clothes littered across the kitchen floor. She wanted things she’d never experienced before—the weight of his body on top of hers, the heat of his skin branding hers, his breath in places that had never seen the light of day. She was on fire. She was . . .
Gaping.
And he was staring at her with wide eyes that seemed to know exactly what she was thinking.
“You done?” she sniped.
“Are you?”
“So full of yourself.”
Cain took a deep breath and released it in a huff, stepping toward her. And she noted a change in him—his movements were still graceful, but they were tight and focused now, like a wolf stalking its prey. And his glance was less about exploration, focused with laserlike precision on her eyes.
“Princess,” he drawled, moving still closer, “I know I was an ass to you once upon a time, but I swear I’ve changed.”
“You seem the same,” she murmured, but her voice lacked conviction because she wasn’t telling the truth.
In some ways—in the way he set a woman on fire with only his eyes—he felt the same. He still teased her as he always had. His conversation was as loaded with innuendo as it had ever been. But there was something deeper and more earnest in his voice when he’d talked about Woodman a few nights ago, and now, when he said he’d changed, something about the way he said it felt less like a line and more like . . . honesty.
“I’m sorry, Gin,” he said gently, taking another step toward her, mercilessly holding her eyes and not allowing her to look away. He took a deep breath and let it go slowly before saying, “I’m so fuckin’ sorry I stood you up that night.”
These words. Oh God.
Her longing for these words—for some indication of Cain’s remorse—had haunted her for three long years, taunting her with their unattainable sweetness. And now, out of nowhere, here they were, delivered by the devil of her dreams. Her eyes swam with grateful, relieved tears, and he blurred before her.
“You hurt me bad, Cain.”
He nodded once, his eyes grieved. “I know. I’m sorry.”
“Why didn’t you say anythin’ before now? Why didn’t you ever write to me, Cain?” she asked, taking a step in his direction, closing the distance between them, wanting the warmth and strength of his arms around her, as much to comfort her as to satisfy her fierce desire to be touched by him.
“Because you weren’t my girl.”
“I was. I wanted to be.”
And then, like he’d read her mind, he opened those arms that she’d missed like a second skin, and Ginger stepped forward, her forehead landing on the bare skin of his neck as he embraced her. She took a ragged breath and held it, savoring the familiar, reassuring smell of Cain. She closed her eyes and exhaled, letting her breath caress the skin of his throat and memorizing the way his hard muscles felt under her fingers.
Her hands were flat against his chest, and she could feel the furious pounding of his heart, the way it thundered under her palms, but she slid her hands to his sides and stepped forward so that her heart was pressed against his and she was holding him too. And in so doing, she offered him the forgiveness she’d withheld since that terrible night he’d hurt her. And as though accepting it, his arms tightened around her, and he pressed his lips to her head.
“I’ve missed you, princess,” he muttered, his lips making kissing sounds against her hair, his voice low and strained. “I fuckin’ missed you.”
“Cain,” she sobbed, forgiving three years of heartbreak as she accepted his apology and welcomed him back into her life. She felt hot tears pool in her eyes and fall onto his chest. “I missed you too.”
“I dreamed of you, Gin.”
Oh God, my heart.
She’d dreamed of him too.
“Every night,” she murmured, kissing him, letting her lips touch down on the hot skin at the base of his throat and linger. She felt him shudder and reveled in his reaction, heady with this new power that she held over him. She lifted her lips, then dragged them over his skin again, her eyes closed, the muscles deep in her body tensing reflexively, instinctively, in preparation for something she hadn’t yet experienced.