The Drift (Preacher Brothers 3)

I exhaled and ran a hand over my hair, the ends slightly damp from my earlier shower.

I turned away from the window and started heading back toward the room. I’d just go to bed, sleep this off, and maybe in the morning I’d have a clear head and picture of what was going to happen and what I should do.

You fucking liar.

I made my back into the bedroom, Wilder still in the bathroom getting ready for bed, the small lamp on the little table by the couch on and giving the room a muted glow. My bed was already pulled out, because I hadn’t bothered righting anything after I woke up in the morning. What was the point?

I glanced at where Wilder slept, and like every time I looked at that bed, images of me on top of him as I worked myself back and forth along his massive length until I came played through my head. Then the memory of him holding me after I found that completion, after he denied himself, gave me this warm, calming, and fuzzy feeling.

I swallowed, my mind and body constantly at war these last two weeks. And if I were being honest, these fourteen days seemed to last forever yet moved by at lightning pace. It felt as if I lived a lifetime here, yet everything had gone by in the blink of an eye. It was enough to confuse a girl even more than adding these combustible feelings and arousal, made me feel like I was losing my damn mind.

I sat on the edge of the bed, my back to the bathroom door, knowing he’d be out any moment. I should have just gotten under the comforter and pretended to be asleep. It would have probably been easier than pretending I didn’t want to continue what we started. I told myself he had to heal, that even if he seemed stronger every day, he nearly lost his life, and fucking like wildcats probably wasn’t the best form of healing.

And when I resolved myself to do just that, the bathroom door opened, and I felt the humid air fall out of the bathroom and bathe my back in wet heat. I felt Wilder’s gaze on me despite the fact that I wasn’t facing him. My entire body was strung right, and it wasn’t lost on me that we were truly alone for the first time since all this happened.

Chapter Seventeen

Zoey

He’d left, gone to speak with Frankie, and I’d been a coward, darting into the bathroom when he stepped out, needing that one moment for myself, to clear my thoughts.

And here I was, ten minutes later, still in the bathroom, staring at myself in the mirror, because I wanted to do something very specific with Wilder, but was afraid of the fallout, of what he’d say and how he’d react.

Man up. Stop running. Always running.

I took a stuttering breath in and left the bathroom, opening the door and seeing Wilder standing just a few feet from me.

I took that moment to look at him, to really look at him. Wilder’s hair was dark and short, damp from his shower, slightly disheveled. His facial bone structure was masculine, like it had been chiseled out of stone. His nose was straight and strong, and his jaw was masculine and square. The days’-worth of scruff that covered his cheeks and chin had heat licking over me and settling right between my thighs.

This is the last thing I should be thinking about. Although I knew he was healing nicely, this just wasn’t right. It wasn’t his fault I’d been taken by his twin, but the truth of the matter was, I was still here, forced to be in Wilder’s room until he was completely healed. Why that mattered, I had no clue, but I also couldn’t lie and say I didn’t like being around him, forced to or not.

But we should’ve talked, right? We most definitely shouldn’t have sex.

But that’s what I want.

Feeling my body climb higher with an arousal I’d never felt before, my eyes dropped to his feet. He was barefoot, and even that part of his body was so damn attractive. I lifted my gaze over his faded jeans, ones that molded to his muscular thighs and looked well-worn. His chest was bare aside from the white bandage wrapped around his bullet wound. I knew he hated wearing the bandage because the wound was all but closed, but Kimber insisted he kept it on, and I knew he only did it to placate her.

But even still, even knowing the wound that lay under it had nearly taken his life, his muscles in his chest were so pronounced, so cut and raw, that it was impossible not to feel wholly feminine around him.

The tattoos he had weren’t grossly exaggerated, and he wasn’t covered in them like his other brothers, but the ones he did have only seemed to accentuate the power he wielded. I had a feeling, just by looking at Wilder, that the authority he emitted was natural to him, as natural as breathing.