Page 238 of Cross Checked
“Oh,” I whispered.
His laugh was softer this time but still edged with disbelief. “Yeah, oh.”
Tears slipped free before I could stop them, and I hated that too. Hated crying when I was angry. Hated wanting him so badly I couldn’t even keep the fight clean. Hated that part of me had actually believed, even for a second, that maybe the truth had made me less desirable in his eyes.
Cade saw every bit of it. His expression shifted, but not into softness. Into hunger sharpened by fury.
“Seeing what he’s done to you does make me sick, but it’s him, Pip. Not you. There is nothing he could ever do to pull me away,” he said. “It makes me want to erase him from your skin, your head, your memories, every room he ever cornered you in. It took what I already felt for you and turned it into something I don’t even know how to control.”
My breath shook.
He moved in until his body was right there, heat and muscle and restraint, but he still didn’t touch me.
Not yet.
That somehow made it worse.
“You know what’s been messing me up?” he asked quietly.
I shook my head because words were gone.
“The fact that after everything that man took from you, you still look at me like this. Like you trust me. Like you want me. Like you’re giving me something I have no idea how to deserve but would kill to keep.”
The tears came harder.
His hand finally lifted, and the first touch was nothing like the week had been. Not soft. Not careful in that distant medical way. His fingers slid along my waist, firm and possessive, avoiding my ribs but holding me like he rememberedexactly how my body fit in his hands. The contact punched a sound out of me before I could stop it.
His jaw flexed.
“There,” he said roughly. “That what you wanted?”
I swallowed, shaking.
“No.”
His eyes narrowed.
I reached for his shirt, fingers curling into the fabric at his stomach. “I wanted you to stop acting like you forgot how.”
Something broke across his face. A flash of heat. A flash of warning. A flash of Cade.
He bent closer, both hands bracing on the counter on either side of me, trapping me without pressing into me. His mouth hovered too close to mine, breath warm, eyes locked on my face like he was waiting for one tiny sign I wanted him to back off.
I didn’t give him one.
“You’re playing a dangerous game,” he said.
My pulse stuttered.
“I’m bored.”
His mouth twitched, but the amusement was dark. “You picked a fight with me because you’re bored?”
“I picked a fight because you’ve been acting like a monk with a devious imagination.”
His eyes flared. “Pip.”
“And because I miss you.” His face shifted, the heat still there, but something raw cutting through it at my words. I kept my grip on his shirt.
