“I’ll figure it out.”
She nodded, then spun and walked toward the little hallway that led to the bedrooms, grabbing her bag on the wa
y.
As soon as she was in the tiny room, an image of Ian in the shower flashed in her mind. She rubbed a hand over her forehead, trying to banish the thought. There was a hell of a lot more complexity to this situation than she’d planned on.
She liked him. And boy, did she want him.
Wow, celibacy was so easy when there was no one around to tempt a person. His presence in her normally bare and boring life was so out of the ordinary it was like she now inhabited a different life entirely.
She tried not to think about all the things that work had evicted from her life. Like men. Like sex.
Those things had no place in her life, not until she found the book. She couldn’t afford them. He was here to work for her. And he was a damned thief. This was her best chance at getting the book back, and she couldn’t afford to lose her focus.
There was a job to be done. The job.
CHAPTER FIVE
Ian shut the bathroom door and leaned against the smooth wood. A great sigh shuddered out of him. Adjusting to the real world was going to be harder than he’d expected.
He turned and braced his hands on the small pedestal sink. A glance in the mirror confirmed it—he barely recognized the man looking out at him.
In prison, it hadn’t mattered that he was changing. He’d changed to survive.
Had he expected to return to his old self when he got out? Hell, he didn’t know. He didn’t even know if he remembered that man.
But he hadn’t expected to lose his damned mind over a university Acquirer. He didn’t want to like her. He didn’t want to want her. She worked for the organization that had thrown him in prison and tortured him for nearly a hundred years. She would throw him back in again when this was all over.
His mind should be on getting the book in order to barter his way out of this collar. Instead, his thoughts were on the woman who’d sprung him from hell—and it pissed him off.
Maybe he liked her because she was the first woman he’d seen in a century. Or hell, maybe it was because she was nice to convicts and worried about his ribs and was passionate about her work and wasn’t afraid to speak her mind.
Shite, he’d turned into a sap. Being so close to her all night, trying to keep the nature of his thoughts hidden, had been hard as hell. When she’d called lights out, he’d thanked the gods, if only to have a chance to hide the damn hard-on that wouldn’t go down.
Ian pushed away from the sink and turned on the shower. His clothes hit the floor seconds later, and he was under the cold spray before it could heat up. When the cold water did nothing for his erection, he reached down to grip himself. He was hard and heavy and fuck, it felt good.
“Gods damn it,” he muttered.
He couldn’t jerk off in the damn shower he shared with her. It was fucking barbaric and a shitty way to thank her for getting him out of prison. He squeezed hard, punishing, then let go with a groan. He touched the collar around his neck, reminding himself of where he stood with her.
He let the spray pound down on him and tried to get his mind off Fiona. He forced himself to remember what being trapped in that damned prison had felt like. It wasn’t hard. Hell, he’d been out only a few hours. Except the memories highlighted the contrast between where he’d been and where he was now.
It wasn’t the damn lust or the insistent fucking hard-on for Fiona that bothered him the most. No, it was the fact that it felt so damn good just to be with her on the outside, like a normal gods-damned Mythean. When prison sucked your soul out and wrung you dry, freedom felt like the best thing in the world.
He’d never wanted that closeness, that casual comfort in his first life. He’d been living it up. Young and stupid and careless. First struggling to survive, then so wealthy he hadn’t known what to do with the money besides spend it on women and fucking Model T’s.
Model T’s. Jesus. That’s how long ago it had been, and prison had made him realize how little he cared about that bullshite now.
He turned off the shower and scrubbed a towel over his skin. He had to keep his act together, do this job for Fiona, and get this collar the hell off. Finding the book was the best way to do it.
Scowling, he glanced around for his duffel bag. Damn it. He’d left it out in the living room. Fiona was in her bedroom now, so it was probably safe to run out there. He wrapped the towel around his waist and opened the door.
He stepped out into the tiny hall and right into Fiona. Who looked fucking gorgeous.
Of course.
“Oh!” Her back hit the wall and she stared up at him, lips slightly parted.