Page 68 of Cross Checked
I forced my hands to the front of my thighs, trying to steady myself on something that wasn’t him. “We should stop.”
Cade stilled immediately, no hesitation and no argument. His hands left my body, and the sudden absence felt almost as intense as the touch had been.
“Okay,” he said.
Just that.
Okay.
No pushing. No teasing me for the breathless shake in my voice. No making me feel weak for needing the line. He stepped back, putting two full feet between us while dragging a hand through his damp hair and staring toward the weight rack like the dumbbells had personally offended him.
My skin still burned everywhere he had touched me.
I turned slowly, my breath uneven, and found him looking anywhere but at me. His shoulders were tense as he adjusted himself, chest rising and falling too hard, jaw lockedlike restraint had become something physical he had to grip with both hands.
Something about that undid me more than if he had kissed me. He wanted me, that much was painfully, brutally clear. He stopped when I said stop, and the realization hit so deep I almost didn’t know what to do with it.
I grabbed my water bottle just to have somewhere to put my hands. “That was…”
“Training,” he said, too fast.
I stared at him.
He looked at me then, and the corner of his mouth lifted in a way that was almost pained. “Extremely intense training.”
A laugh broke out of me, shaky and embarrassed and relieved all at once. “You are impossible.”
“Probably.”
“We are never doing squats again.”
His eyes dropped over me once before coming back to my face, and the heat there made my stomach twist all over again. “That’s unfortunate.”
“Cade.”
His smile deepened slightly, but he stayed where he was. “What? I’m respecting the program.”
“There is no program.”
“There was until you got distracted.”
His brows lifted. “I got distracted?”
I pointed at him with my water bottle. “Do not make me say it.”
“I didn’t ask you to.”
“No, you just stand there looking like that and wait for women to incriminate themselves.”
His expression changed then, going hotter, quieter. “I’m not waiting forwomen.”
My breath caught.
He stepped back toward the bench, grabbing his discarded shirt and pulling it over his head in one rough motion like he needed the barrier as badly as I did. The fabric fell over his chest, covering all that tan skin and muscle, and somehow it did absolutely nothing to make the room safer.
I swallowed and tried very hard not to look at the front of his shorts.
Failed immediately.
