Reid nodded. If Kayla wasn’t mistaken, an amused smirk clung to the edge of his mouth.
Embarrassment flooded her. She could only imagine the shade of pink that probably washed over her cheeks. “I can walk,” she muttered in Kane’s ear.
“You heard the lady.”
Kane let out a low growl. “She’s got a choice. X-rays at the hospital or ice at home until I know if there’s swelling.”
Though she should be used to it, Kayla bristled at his take-charge attitude. Still, a tiny part of her reveled in the attention, probably because there wouldn’t be much more in her future.
Her heart clenched in denial. “I’ll take the ice at home.” At the very least, their goodbye would be in private.
* * *
Kayla’s freezer looked about as empty as Kane’s apartment. The place he called home. The place he’d be returning to tonight, alone. He slammed the door closed hard.
“Don’t take your anger out on the appliances. I can’t afford new ones,” Kayla yelled from the couch in the next room.
“I can’t find an ice pack,” he called back.
“That’s because, despite how many times I’ve been hurt this week alone, we’re not accident-prone around here. There are plastic bags in the top drawer. You can put some ice cubes in there.”
He popped freshly made cubes into the clear bag and joined her in the room she called the family room. Ridiculous word, he thought. It conjured images he wanted to run from. Visions of sitting beside Kayla in comfortable silence, of bodies entangled, and of confidences.
Leaving her wouldn’t be easy, but he had no choice. She deserved better than him and, Lord knew, he didn’t deserve her.
She’d propped her ankle on a double set of pillows. After checking out the swelling, he realized it wasn’t nearly as bad as he’d first thought. A bad twist or sprain at the very worst. Still, a little first aid couldn’t hurt, so he laid the ice on her elevated foot.
A shudder rippled through her.
“Cold?” he asked.
She nodded.
He could warm her. The thought hovered unspoken, but the need to act on it was clear. Selfish, but clear. One minute he was kneeling on the floor by the couch, the next he was lying prone beside her—and not easily. The narrow cushions weren’t made for two.
“It’s cramped, but I like it,” she said.
He’d been around her long enough to recognize the sensual undertone. The unintentional but blatant desire in her voice touched something inside him, probably because he recognized the same longing in himself.
“I’m warmer now,” she murmured.
“I know.” Shared body heat had never felt so good. Her breath blew softly against his cheek, and the swell of her breast pressed against his arm.
Before he could enjoy the sensation, his weight began a slow descent off the sofa’s edge. He caught himself before falling and jerked his hips back onto the couch.
Her husky laugh reverberated through his already tight body. “Your choice, Kane.”
He respected her for that. The days of power plays were over. He hadn’t planned a return to this house, but then he hadn’t counted on things happening the way they had. In the split second before he’d hit the street, he’d had a flash of Kayla lying sprawled on the pavement covered with blood. A scene he’d seen once before with a different end. She was alive, though, and offering herself to him.
A blatant invitation he could accept or decline. An invitation with no strings attached, because as she’d so boldly told him, she didn’t expect anything in return. Selfish bastard that he was, he couldn’t turn her down. He needed her too much. One last battle lost before he waged his final campaign. He glanced toward the front door, knowing his last battle was one he could not let himself lose.
Before gravity could pull him back toward the floor, he shifted his weight so his legs straddled her hips. The weight of him pushed against the V of her legs with unmistakable pressure, and she moaned her pleasure. The sound twisted his insides into coiled knots only she could undo.
He reached for the buttons on the prim and proper shirt she’d changed into earlier at his urging. She’d already removed the mic on the way home. Keeping his eyes on the road had been damned near impossible, but he’d managed. Barely.
He worked at the buttons with shaking hands, reminiscent of his first attempt as a teenager in the backseat of an old beat-up thing his uncle had called a car. The only difference was this wasn’t nerves causing the problem, but overwhelming desire that could no longer be restrained.
“The hell with this,” he muttered. He grabbed the sides of her shirt in each hand and pulled.