She jerks her head back in the direction she came from. “Waiting back at the cabin.”
“He send you out here?”
“I sent myself.” The way she pulls herself up is downright stunning. “If I recall, I offered for you to watch me bathe once. Thought you might want to return the favor.”
“That right? You stay out here like that, Cora, and you’re much more likely to end up messy than clean.” She arches an eyebrow at me, and I don’t know why it fucking turns me on that she seems to enjoy sparring with me as much as I do her. I let my gaze rove over her once more. “You should go back to Cypress.”
I turn away from her until I hear a splash of water behind me.Fucking Christ.
“Don’t,” she snaps as she stops an easy arm’s reach in front of me in the water. “Don’t do this. What happened to no more running?”
My jaw tightens as I try to keep my eyes on her face instead of on the way the water is turning her undergarments goddamntranslucent. “I’m not running.”
“Oh,yes, you are,” she argues. “Why do you keep punishing yourself like this? What happened in Preston isn’t your fault.”
“It is. I didn’t—I missed something.Again. I keep making mistakes. What if the next one…” Jesus, she’s starting to tremble from the cold, and every instinct in me is begging to reach for her. “Cora.” My voice is low with warning. “Get back on the bank.”
“No. You’re allowed to make mistakes. I do. Cypress does. You forgive those but not your own. Why is that?”
“Get back on the bank, Cora.”
“No. Not until you talk to me.” She reaches out to shove at mewith both hands, as she’s so fond of doing, but I catch her by the wrists before she can connect with my chest, inadvertently bringing her even closer as she murmurs, “I know you’re scared. I’m scared, too, but I’d rather be scared with you than alone.”
“You’re scared of me?” I ask her, hating that she would be but understanding—
“Notofyou,” she says, rolling her eyes at me. “Oflosingyou. Of losing Cypress. I’m so scared to lose either of you. I—God, Aiden, I’m so in—” She shakes her head. “I could never be scared of you.”
“You should be.”
“Why?” She keeps pushing me, tilting her face up to challenge me while also doing nothing to fight the physical hold I have on her. “You’re a good man, Aiden.”
“Agoodman? You watched mekillsomeone, remember?” I ask her, snagging both of her wrists together in my left hand while I rest my right at the base of her throat. Not squeezing, just resting. Her eyes widen, her pulse heightening as her lips part and her pupils dilate. Scared? No. She’s excited. And getting increasingly more so as my thumb traces the side of her neck. “You also know it’s not the first time. Thatshouldscare you.”
She shakes her head, tilting her face down until she can brush my thumb against her mouth. “I watched youprotectme.” She kisses the tip of my thumb, traces it lightly with her tongue, and I groan. “I watched you keep us safe.”
“Cora, I don’t know if I—baby, you need to go.” My thumb sweeps back to her nape, and she tilts her head into it, baring her throat in the prettiest display of willing submission even while she’s being obstinate.
“I’m not going anywhere,” she says. “Let me help you.”
Because I’m just that fucking weak, I tug her to me so that her body is against mine, trapping her hands between us, and she gasps as she really feels me for the first time. A tremor racingover her skin as I savor the curves of her body, the soft swell of her abdomen pressing against my hard cock beneath the water where only a thin layer of soaked fabric separates her from me. So thin I could tear it with a flick of my wrist if I wanted to…and God, I do.
“You feel that?” I ask her, practically grinding myself against her, the temporary bliss calming that chanting in my brain while, at the same time, I hope like hell it’ll be enough to make her come to her senses. “Do you understand now?”
Her breathing catches, uneven with every inhale. “Yes.”
She tries to wriggle her wrists free, and I let her have her hands back, expecting her to run while I stay here and try not to chase her this time. Instead, her fingertips press into the planes of my chest as she drags them lower, ten separate searing points skating down my body, aided by the water’s glide yet leaving fire in their wake. My chest, my ribcage, my stomach… She pauses at the dark trail of wiry hair visible above the water, seemingly fascinated by it, before she leans forward and presses her lips to my chest, right over my pounding heart.
“Aiden, let me help,” she murmurs around another kiss, her tongue capturing the water on my skin. “You can have this. Have Cy. Have me.”
“Fuck,” I groan, my right hand catching her left and bringing it under the water, letting her feel my size. Her eyes widen again, and I bend my head to whisper in her ear even though there’s no one else to hear. “You remember how it felt to have my mouth between your legs?”
She whimpers, and I nearly break right then before she gets out another quiet, “Yes.”
“I wouldn’t stop there this time.” I dip my head, inhaling her scent just beneath her jaw, earth and rain and something else so devastatingly sweet that it makes me ache as she tentatively explores me, her fingers beneath my own as they stroke alongmy length. My hand squeezes over hers, showing her how to grip me the way I like. “I’d want to be inside you, too, baby. You understand that?”
She nods, nearly breathless, her chest rising and falling rapidly underneath the drenched bodice of her undergarments.
“Think about that and then think about how your hand can hardly close around the width of me. Cora, think…” My lips press against her pulse point, feeling it race. “Think about what I’d need you to take.”