Present
Wrapping the towel around me, I ignored the eyes I felt through the glass and grabbed the clothes Micah had brought, taking them to the privacy—hopefully—of the bathroom. Of course, there could’ve been a two-way mirror in there, too.
Stripping off my soaked boxers and top, I dried my hair as best I could with the towel, brushed with the brush I found on the sink counter, and dressed, pulling on my clean underwear I’d washed out last night and hung to dry on the shower door, someone’s clean boxers over them, and their button-down white Oxford.
I rolled over the shorts to make them fit and buttoned the shirt, rolling up the sleeves. If I had to guess, I’d say these clothes were Rory’s, since he was the smallest.
I still swam in both pieces of clothing, though.
Heading back into the bedroom, I sheathed my knife and stuck it into my breast pocket. I still had no idea how I got the knife. Whoever brought me here might’ve wanted me to be able to defend myself, but if they didn’t want me hurt, why the hell dump me here in the first place?
I had so many questions.
Turning my head, I spied the wall of antique sporting equipment I’d vaguely noticed but hadn’t inspected. Plenty of weapons on that wall. Cricket bats, old blades from rowing teams, and…
I walked over, grabbing the shadow box of old fish hooks. Flipping it over, I pried out the backing and set it on the table against the wall, picking out four hooks and taking them to the dresser where Aydin had left the bandages.
Sticking each hook through the gauze, I wrapped the bandage around my knuckles, fitting the ends of the hooks between my fingers to pinch them in place, while the sharp, curved ends reached out like claws.
I bit back my smile, wrapping the gauze around my hand like a glove, ripping it free from the rest of the roll, and tucking the slack into the bandage over my palm.
Balling my fist, I lashed out, hearing the claws cut the air. I wanted a weapon I didn’t always have to carry. Freddy Krueger glove, it was.
With my wet head, weapons, and glasses on, I left the room, keeping my eyes peeled in all directions.
I passed the secret door and kept walking around the landing, treading quietly down the hallway that I saw Taylor come out of yesterday when I’d arrived.
I hadn’t heard any more movement above me or in the walls since last night. Maybe it was critters.
I passed a couple of rooms—a bedroom and a nursery—and then I walked past an office before I came to a closed door, quietly reaching for the handle as I debated.
I wanted to know which rooms were what, which ones had windows, and who was settled where, but I also didn’t want to draw notice.
To hell with it.
I needed to know.
Gently, I twisted the handle, but then I heard grunts from the other side of the door and stopped, leaning my head in to listen.
Another grunt followed by a groan with muffled whispers, and I took a step back, releasing the handle.
That was undoubtedly Micah and Rory’s room.
Noted.
I trailed around the second floor, finding another dark bedroom with the sheets mussed, clothes on the floor, and a couple of more rooms freshly made up by the cleaning crew yesterday.
I stepped into one with a massive bed, an ornate hardwood headboard and footboard, and a large cushioned chair in the corner. Unlike most of the other rooms, this one wasn’t white or black. Earth tones and decorative lamps dressed the room, and I instantly felt cozy and warm.
If it wasn’t already taken, then it was mine if I was still here tonight. I checked the handle for a lock, but there wasn’t one, same as Aydin’s room, and there was also a mirror in here, too.
I could secure the door with a chair and hang a sheet over the glass. Just in case.
Walking to the window, I peered through the curtains, taking in the rundown courtyard below with dead leaves covering the patches of grass, the remnants of a fallen tree, and a fountain in the center of the drive that held a couple inches of rainwater that had now turned brown.
It was a mess compared to the inside of the house. There may be outdated décor, torn drapes, and peeling wallpaper, but it was clean in here.
For now.
I left the room and closed the door behind me, trailing around the rest of the second floor, opening every door, every closet, and looking out every window to get a lay of the land.
I headed for the stairs to explore the rest of the first floor, but a floorboard creaked above me, and I stopped, looking up to the ceiling.
Footfalls moved from my left to my right, the wooden floor whining under the weight of whoever was up there, and I swallowed the lump in my throat, turning around instead.
I followed the sound, checking the ceiling for an entrance to the attic, thinking perhaps Will was up there. I guessed that messy room I found was either his or Taylor’s, but that meant there was one bedroom still unaccounted for.
But I couldn’t find an entrance to an attic or one to a third floor.
Hmm. I was pretty good at finding the secret room. I still had one in Thunder Bay, now that I thought about it.
Heading downstairs, I inspected every inch of the bottom floor, spying Taylor in the gym again, but I scooted away before he saw me.
Walking into the natatorium, heat rolling off the surface of the pool and fogging the windows and glass ceiling, I gazed at the water, tempted to dive in. I was alone, and it had been ages since I swam, but I wasn’t here to play.
I spotted a half-wall about fifteen feet beyond the other side of the pool and headed over to inspect. Probably some sort of dressing area or something.
As I got closer, though, I heard water running, but it wasn’t until I’d rounded the wall that I saw it was showers.
I stopped, seeing Will—naked, wet, flexed, and…
My stomach dropped.
And hard.
I quickly backed up, dashing back behind the wall.
Shit.
Pool showers.
What the hell? Aydin was naked in plain sight yesterday. Will was naked in plain sight today.
I breathed hard, but I didn’t move, remembering the last time I saw so much of him. He had been fit, his body unmarked back then, but before I could stop myself, I peered around the corner again, taking in the sight of him now, years later.
He’d changed on the outside, too. I let eyes fell down his body, the soap spilling down his skin and little bubbles dotting his stomach and arms.
I gazed, heat rising up my neck as he tipped his head back, smoothing hot water over his hair, steam billowing around his golden, wet skin. Tattoos covered both arms, drifting onto his chest and back, and they lined his collarbone and hands, but I couldn’t see them well enough to decipher everything.
I made out his basketball number on the back of his right hand, his Devil’s Night mask on his left arm against the backdrop of Thunder Bay, the cemetery, the Ferris wheel, and St. Killian’s easily visible. His other shoulder and arm featured a cascading vine of leaves surrounding a skull, words written on the forehead I couldn’t make out, and the rest of his body was covered in big and small pictures as well as words, some even draped around his collarbone like a necklace.
I wanted to see everything. I wanted to touch him.
He had shaved, and every muscle on his body had doubled in size since the last time I’d seen him, too.
I dropped my eyes and froze, staring at the other hard muscle standing damn-near upright, long and thick between his legs.
My lungs emptied, and he turned around, leaning into the wall with his hand as the water cascaded down his face, and he grabbed his cock, stroking it slow and tight.
I gripped the wall for support, heat pooling between my legs as I chewed the inside of my mouth.
I stared at his hard-on, and in the not-so-far recesses of my mind, I wondered what he was thinking about.
Me?
Or her?
A whisper hit my hair. “You want him?”
I sucked in a breath and whipped around, swiping my fist with the claws.
Aydin jumped back, slivers of red opening up on his chest where I’d caught him with the hooks.
He looked down and then up at me, reaching out and grabbing me by the throat with one hand, and my wrist with the glove in the other.
I whimpered.
Slamming me into the wall, the showers on the other side, he pressed his body into mine, staring down at me hard.
“You said you wouldn’t hurt me,” I told him.
“I’m not hurting you,” he cooed as the shower ran behind me. “I’m scaring you.”
He pressed my wrist to the wall out to our side, and he looked over, studying my glove.
He grinned. “It’s clever.”
Staring down into my eyes, he breathed across my lips and sweat covered my stomach and back. I needed air.
“What happened between you two?” he asked. “It’s not a coincidence that you’re here, you know?”
I studied him. Yes, I knew that. It had something to do with Will. “So you think whoever dumped me here is giving Will a present?”
“Perhaps.” He eased his grip on my neck. “They are definitely no friend to you, though.”
Spinning me around, he forced me to the edge of the wall, both of us leaning in and watching Will.
“Do you think he’ll protect you?” he whispered.
I tried to jerk out of his hold, but he held tight. Will fisted his cock, leaning into the wall, eyes closed, and breathing hard.
“Does he have to?” I asked, my eyes trailing down his body again. “Why are we watching this?”
“You’re watching this,” he explained. “I’m watching you.”
“Why?”
He didn’t answer, and I turned my head, looking up at him. His amber eyes watched Will and his brow knit, troubled.
“I don’t know,” he finally answered. “Maybe to remember what it feels like when you weren’t alone. When you weren’t the only one looking out for yourself.” He looked down at me. “Maybe to remember what we left behind. And to remember what we didn’t.”
What was he talking about?
“Will and I are about the same age,” he said, “but I think we were probably very different in high school. He was the talker, right?” He smiled at me. “I was the quiet one.”
Now it was the other way around, it seemed.
“I wasn’t always like this,” he told me. “I was miserable. Six feet of weakness, fear, and cowardice.” He gazed at Will again as he talked. “‘You’ll be a doctor,’ they said. ‘You’ll study that. Work there. Go here on vacations. Spend your free time doing this. Marry her. Have three children. Live up there in that house after the honeymoon tour of London, Paris, and Rome.’”
I tried to picture him as he described himself, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t imagine him docile.
“Until one night, buried in my books, I saw her,” Aydin continued.
I listened, but I turned my gaze back on Will as Aydin spoke in my ear.
“It wasn’t her body or her face,” he told me. “It was how everything with her was effortless. Every movement. Every look.”
Will sucked in air between his teeth, his strokes harder and faster and the muscles in his arm tight.
“She loved to love,” Aydin said. “She loved to touch and to feel and to wrap her every breath around someone and hold them with it, because she was an artist.”
Everything warmed, and I envied how he described her. Whoever she was.
What would Will say about me?
“It wasn’t her job,” Aydin said, “but it was her calling.”
He paused, and then he dropped his voice as if thinking out loud. “It wasn’t her job,” he said again. “Then.”
It was like Will. He loved to love. He loved to be happy.
He’d wanted to make me happy once.
“I’d never wanted anything more in my whole life,” Aydin went on, “and I was studying to be a surgeon who would’ve gladly cut off his own hands to have her.”
Will squeezed his eyes shut, and I dropped my gaze to his cock again, my breathing nearly in sync with his strokes. What was he thinking about?
“Maybe I’m to blame,” Aydin told me. “In the end, I didn’t claim what was born to be mine because I was a shit twenty-two-year-old kid who knew nothing.” He trailed off and then continued, his voice lower again. “But later when I could finally stand up and claim her, I spit on her instead, because every effortless breath she wrapped around everyone else became another nail through my heart, and I couldn’t look at her.”
My chin trembled, and I wasn’t sure why. He wasn’t special. We’d all suffered loss.
But one thing was pretty clear. She was the reason he was here. Much like Will could saddle me with that honor, possibly, as well.
A woman happened to them both.
“I couldn’t look at her, much like he can’t look at you,” Aydin said.
My stomach coiled, and he released me, backing away.
I turned and looked at him.
“I just wonder…” Aydin said. “If he ever decided to run from here, would he care to take you?”
He turned and walked away, leaving me there and feeling more alone than I ever had in my life.
Will would leave me, and he would be right to.
• • •
I stood there next to the pool for I didn’t know how long, Aydin’s words hanging in the air even after he’d left the room.
Was Will planning on running? What would happen to me if he weren’t here? Or if he were sent home?
Would he fight for me?
I’d left him once. I’d let him be arrested and sent to prison, and in his head, I hadn’t cared at all. Maybe I deserved the same.
I walked to the pool’s edge, descended the steps into the water, and jumped in, sinking my entire body below the surface.
The water held me, warm and weightless, and I drifted back up to the surface, floating on my back.
The saltwater stung the cut on my lip, but the pain filled me with anger and memory, and I knew this was coming. I always knew.
I just figured it would’ve come after he got out of prison, and as the subsequent years passed, it didn’t. I got comfortable.
Where would both of us be if he had just left me alone like I told him to?
I stood up, walking to the side of the pool as the shorts and shirt stuck to me like a second skin and tears hung in my eyes.
I used to think that if I got out of Thunder Bay and lived my life for me, doing what I loved and inviting only the people into my life whom I wanted, everything would be perfect someday.
But I hated everything I had, and loved nothing as well as what I’d given up, all of it tainted from the moment he was charged seven years ago, because I knew I didn’t deserve to be happy.
Despair sat on my heart as warm tears streamed down my cheeks, and I didn’t even realize the shower had stopped running until I noticed him standing there.
I looked up, seeing a towel wrapped around his waist as he stared at me. The air thickened, I almost couldn’t breathe, and I was torn between wanting to run to him and run away from him.
Just go.
I begged him in my head, meeting his hard eyes with my blurry ones, and there was so much to say, but if I didn’t explain, then maybe I wouldn’t have to feel him spit on me and throw me away for good.
Please just go.
He charged over instead, not going, and I gasped as he reached down, grabbing me by the collar and hauling me out of the water.
“Will,” I cried.
He picked me up under my arms and lifted me up, nose to nose with him, glaring at me as he dug his fingers into my body.
Another cry escaped.
My legs dangled, and I wanted to look away, but I couldn’t.
I was frozen, waiting for what was to come.
I could see it inside of him, ripping him apart, his lips tight and his brow narrow.
But instead of spitting, he shook me hard, growling like he was frustrated with himself more than me, and I broke into more tears.
“I’m sorry,” I cried.
I was so sorry for all of his pain.
But when I thought he was going to throw me back into the pool, he brought me in instead, wrapping an arm around me and pressing his forehead to mine.
His hard muscle nudged my thigh through the towel, and he took my face in his hand, breath pouring out of him as he hovered over my mouth.
“Will…” I started.
But he lifted my thighs up around his waist and backed into the shower again, slamming me into the wall as he took my bottom lip between his teeth.
I opened my mouth to argue, but the heat of his breath made my whole body shiver, and I sucked in a breath, tightening my thighs around him.
He ripped open my shirt, and a whimper escaped me as he pressed his chest into my bare breasts and thrust up into me, grinding hard.
I dug my nails in, but when he came in for my mouth, I turned away.
“Get off,” I told him. “I—We can’t.”
He wrapped his fingers around my throat and squeezed. “This is how it should’ve gone,” he whispered up to me, cutting me off. “You were a hot little piece of meat, and I know you liked it.”
He let my neck go and grabbed my breast instead, plumping it up and out for him as he dipped down and covered my nipple with his mouth.
I moaned as the heat of his tongue covered my skin, my clit throbbing as I grinded on him.
“We should’ve just kept it this simple, huh?” he said. “But you didn’t want people to know the shit we did.”
His mouth covered mine, stealing my breath as he slid his tongue inside and completely took me over, moving across my lips like I was a car he was shifting into gear.
“Why did you do it?” he asked. “Ashamed of what you liked me to do? There was still so much more to come, but you cut us short. We didn’t even do half of everything I had planned for you.”
I rocked into him again, panting. Yes.
But then suddenly, he dropped me to my feet, and my knees shook, everything going cold.
Huh? I opened my eyes.
I barely even registered him peeling my bottoms down my legs and taking my panties.
What?
“And now that you’re here,” he said, grabbing the back of my hair.
I gasped as he brought me in nose to nose again, slipping his hand between my legs and caressing my pussy.
“We have all the time in the world.”
Then…he turned and left, his threat echoing through my ears as it took a moment to realize what had just happened.
I blinked, locking my knees under me as I quickly closed my shirt and covered myself.
Dammit.
Aydin was right.
Will wasn’t an ally.
