Sterling (Carolina Reapers 6)

Even with that. Even with all those heated discussions in the beginning of our relationship when we were tiptoeing around our feelings for each other so much it drove us crazy. Even then, during those moments, he knew when to push me, ignite me, and when to soothe me.

I melted a little more for the man before me. “How are you so damn amazing?”

Seriously, where the hell did he come from? It had been six weeks of fire and heat and mind-blowing bliss with him, and I still couldn’t understand why someone like him had chosen someone like me. Not that I was inferior—I loved who I was and how I looked. But I was proudly awkward, inherently flawed, and tragically driven. And him being him he could have anyone he wanted.

But he’d somehow, incredibly, he’d chosen me.

Jansen laughed, the smile on his lips real and genuine and enough to shake away the fear digging its claws in me, whispering that I couldn’t walk through that door. “I’ve rented out an escape room for my severely claustrophobic girlfriend, and you say I’m amazing?”

I reached up on my tiptoes, crushing my lips against his. He held me against him, slanting his mouth over mine, groaning as I slid my tongue between his lips. I fisted his shirt, my heart fluttering as he didn’t pull away because we were in public, didn’t try to tame what was happening between us.

He. Simply. Let. Me. Be.

And in his arms?

I was a flame, and he was the oxygen that helped me burn.

“If this is you stalling,” he said between kisses. “I can do this all day.”

I laughed, breaking our kiss as I smiled up at him. “Okay,” I said. “Let’s do this.”

His brows raised, and he waited a few moments, giving me another chance to say no.

So, I did what I’d become very good at. I grabbed his arm and hauled his sexy ass into the building.

Ten minutes later, we were set up in the escape room Jansen had bought out for just the two of us. The guide explained the rules to us, the objective, but I didn’t hear most of it.

Not with the noise in my head—like an old television caught between channels—nothing but crackling white snow. Icy claws crept up my skin, sinking into my lungs.

There were only four walls to the room, the door on the farthest one. No windows. And the guide kept saying lock. And even though Jansen had assured me there was a giant green emergency escape button—one I could clearly see right now—I still shivered as the guide exited the room and shut the door behind him.

Jansen remained quiet and calm by my side, and my shoulders tensed. I hated that we weren’t like the other normal couples who were booked for the other rooms in the establishment. Wearing happy, excited faces, eager to challenge themselves with a fun, safe game.

But not me.

This was a test to help me heal the old wound that had festered since childhood. And Jansen, he wasn’t complaining. Wasn’t pushing me to just have a good time and let it go. No, he stood there, holding me, patient. Standing in support, an island when I was thrashing and stranded in an endless ocean. Because that is how the panic felt—a lonely, cold, vast ocean with no escape. Nothing but the exhaustion of trying to stay afloat, keep your head above the raging water, survive.

But with an island so close to me?

It didn’t seem such a lonely place. Such a desolate, terrifying place.

Jansen’s support, his willingness to understand and support me felt like he was offering me a life raft. But I had to be the one to reach for it. He didn’t have the power to heal me. Only I had that capacity, but he was able to help me with the tools I needed to do so.

And slowly, with more strength than I thought possible, I reached internally for the line he’d cast. Mentally gripping it, I grabbed it with both hands, hauling myself closer and closer to the safety of that island until I made it to land and was able to breathe.

“Where are we supposed to look first?” I asked, my eyes clearing as I met his blue gaze. I glanced around the room, appreciating it for the first time. It was an Egyptian theme—golden walls covered in hieroglyphics, and a colorfully painted sarcophagus sat in the middle of the room. Other wooden crates were scattered about, some with clay pots and urns on them, others with elaborate puzzle boxes that looked like ancient safes.

Omigod we were locked in a tomb—that was the theme of this room.

I waited for that panic to return, to incapacitate me, to knock me off that island and send me right back into that endless, cruel ocean…