How fucked up was that?
As she continued to wind the bandage around him, she said, “I’m trying to figure out what happened last night. Maybe you’ll confess straight-up, so I don’t have to piece it all together myself. Because I have to tell you, Jude, these gashes are either this side of an I can’t get enough of you obsession—or a please stop fucking me cry for help.”
“Kate,” he ground out, his intense gaze locking with hers in the window, his facial features turning stony, the thick cords of his neck pulling taut. “Take two seconds to decide which is more accurate.”
Her brow furrowed and her hauntingly beautiful face scrunched. Uncertainty flashed in her eyes.
Jude swore under his breath. Tore his gaze from her. He stared out at the skyline as anger burned through him. The cumulus clouds overhead threatened to break open at any second with a torrential downpour. Lightning rippled through the haze and an ominous rumble of thunder followed.
Perfectly apropos for the storm raging within him.
“I can’t read the barometer when you’re like this, Jude. You’re tense and moody. And I need more information.”
He let out a low growl. Then quietly insisted over his shoulder, “You once claimed to know me well enough to champion my cause.”
“Sure,” she conceded. Then hastily—and cryptically—added, “When I did, you cut me out of your life.”
His gaze snapped back to the window. But connected with hers again in the pane, the image of her slightly distorted with the sudden onslaught of rain sluicing along the sleek side of the building.
It was a wonder he could temper his fury over her having doubts about him when he was also aggravated by her obliviousness at being so entangled with him at the moment. She did a damn good job of not visibly taking in his naked torso and the tattoo covering half of his right biceps and shoulder, which she’d not known he’d had prior to today. It was a symbolic, artistic rendering that held significance to him, but to him alone. His dress shirts, suit jackets and tuxedoes always concealed the ink.
Damn it, never once had Kate appeared to take an interest in the bodily characteristics he possessed or his overall physicality. She was interested in his mind, his actions, his motivations, his…feelings. What intrigued Kate were all the psychological fragmentations of his intricate emotional composition.
So why the hell should it surprise him she was acting purely clinical with him now? Keeping her eyes locked with his, not letting them wander to his shoulders, his back…or his chest.
His teeth clenched. He’d created this reality with her by never revealing she enticed him. Excited him. In a way he hadn’t imagined possible after losing Annalise.
Jude had no one to blame but himself that Dr. Kathryn Stockman was the consummate professional.
That did not keep her unwavering objectivity from grating on his nerves.
Though he told her, “Perhaps we should stick solely to patching me up, Doc.”
She let out a low tsk. Jude recognized the disapproving sound for what it was. And could astutely deduce what her next words would be.
“I let you break free last time, Jude,” she judiciously commented. “But now…?” She speared him with a dogged look. “I don’t think so.”
His muscles tightened. She continued speaking while snipping at the gauze with her scissors and securing it along his spine with tape.
“Something happened that compelled you to call me—completely out of the blue. And here I am. So spill, Jude. Because I came to help you.” Her expression remained piercing. “If that’s what you want, it’s exactly what you’ll get.”
As a rule, Jude was forthcoming about what plagued him when she asked. With the exception of that one secret he maintained—his unrelenting desire for Kate.
He’d been smart enough two years ago to sever ties with her so he didn’t step over the line. He wouldn’t have called her this morning if there wasn’t something urgent, incessant and wholly unidentifiable clawing at him—and it had nothing to do with his latest three a.m. sexcapade. Something else had Jude spun up—and he needed Kate’s calming, reassuring presence to set his entire existence on its proper axis so he could plow through the mental roadblock.
Granted, he’d thought a spontaneous encounter between the sheets would be just the ticket to alleviate some tension and put him in a better frame of mind to sort through the melee. To figure out what the adamant tapping of a finger on the back of his brain was all about.
Something he needed to know. Something he did know, in his subconscious mind. Something he needed to discuss with someone… For some inexplicable reason…
Jude had no goddamn idea, and it was maddening, because he didn’t even know where he’d start if he did choose to confide, once again, in Kate.
He was feeling restless of late. If not somewhat reckless.
So, yes, when the pretty blonde from Topline had batted her velvety false lashes at him and her sparkling white teeth sank provocatively into her crimson lip and her eyes glimmered seductively…he’d taken the bait.
And was paying dearly for her uninhibited, hellcat response to him.
Yet that wasn’t the current issue at hand. Presently, he had Kate to deal with.