We lock eyes, and he strokes himself. “You like?” His eyelids drop so low, his eyes are almost closed. Shower water drips all down his big, hard body like rain sluicing down a marble statue.
“I’m checking on you.” I can barely get my lie out at a whisper.
His head tips back, so the water’s dripping off his hard jaw. “Gonna come in with me?”
His voice is rough, and his blue eyes bore into me. I can tell he’s goading me because his hand drags down to his base, revealing his long, thick length.
I swallow as I feel a swell of warmth between my own legs. “I just wanted to be sure you were okay.”
I stand there looking at him, realizing that the hand between his legs is the one with bloody knuckles, and also that his underwear are gone now. Realizing how messed up this is. He must realize, too, because he shifts so that the hand is on his knee.
I fix my eyes on that hand, then his face. “I should go,” I whisper.
“Yes, you should.” His voice is gruff.
I lean in slightly, so the steam is warm on my face. “Are you sure you’re okay? Were you here to skate this weekend?”
He lowers one of his legs, giving me a twitch of a smile. His eyes shut. “Fuck, it’s so warm in here.”
“Too warm? Do you need to get out?”
His hand covers his eyes, and he rubs his temples. “Nah.”
“How did you fall through?” I’m killing time now, and I know it.
His eyes crack open. The smile he gives me is a soft one. “How do you think?”
“You were going too fast?”
His cheek twitches. “Showing off. For the celebrity on the shore.”
My throat constricts. I swallow to loosen it up. “Why would you say that?”
He tilts his head. “Aren’t you?”
“No, of course not. I’m a public servant.”
“Showing off, then, for the public servant.”
His eyes hang onto mine, hypnotizing. My head feels as if it’s filled with steam.
“Where’d you learn to do that?”
“Do what?” His lips curve. Always with that twitchy little smile, that half reluctant smile. Like he’s not planning to be amused by anything, but then I go and make him.
“You just…took up skating?”
His hand pushes into his hair. “Elise. I just fucked my hand up trying to calm down. You’ve gotta go.” His voice sounds tortured.
My heart starts to hammer faster.
“Why?” Thin whisper, doesn’t even sound like my voice.
“Because…if you don’t,” he says, getting slowly to his feet, his blue eyes holding mine. “I’m gonna pull you in here.”
I can’t breathe, can’t even swallow. Time is flying past me, through me—me in this inertia.
“You don’t want that, do you?” He steps closer, and desire unfurls as I feel my pulse thump at my jugular.
Then he’s right before me in his naked, muscled glory.
“You don’t want to do this,” he says, peering at me with his dazed eyes under heavy eyelids. “You don’t want to get all…twisted up with me.”
I can see him breathing heavy, chest and shoulders moving. There’s a new scar on his left shoulder—a thin, horizontal line.
“Did you hurt your shoulder?”
“Surgery.” His fist is wrapping around his erection. He’s so close that if I reached out, I could touch it.
“I saw you,” I whisper.
I’m going to do this. I know right then, but I keep speaking, just above a whisper, like it’s just a conversation.
“You were being wheeled out…that day. I could see your shoulder wrapped in white. And Isa pushing the chair. It was at the outpatient center. I had an appointment. Just a check up.”
Once again, I get that falling feeling, like the floor is shifting out from under me as I hold his gaze. “Isa said she saw you,” he says quietly.
“Did she?”
He nods, his eyes almost shutting as he strokes himself and my blood pulses.
“I was sorry I had missed it,” he says.
“Why, though?”
“Why what?” God, his voice is deep. It vibrates.
“Why’d you want to see me?”
His mouth softens and his eyes bleed things that make me feel as if this can’t be real. “Don’t ask that.” I can see his arm and shoulder moving as he pumps himself, but I won’t look down again.
“What would you say if I did?” I ask him.
I’ve lost my mind. I know that.
“I’d say things I can’t take back. And you’d regret it.” He inhales and blows it slowly out as he looks at his hand around his perfect Luca cock, the one that haunts my dreams and wakes me in a pool of slick want when I least expect it.
“Oh, I think regret is our thing, don’t you?”
His eyes shut. “Maybe it is.”
His breaths are coming faster. I can’t hear them, but I see how hard he’s breathing. What would he do if I touched him?
I close my eyes. The room feels as if it’s spinning. Then I open them and let them find his. And I reach out and touch that little white line on his shoulder.