Page 55 of Lamb

I’d spent hours wondering if Ash would take the chance to escape, if this was finally enough to push her to run again, realizing it was worth the risk to escape my grasp once more. After I’d managed to keep her by my side, careful not to spookher, lure her just enough to stay. All my hard work threatened to crumble with a few mistaken words.

I’d barely managed to sit through church, forcing myself to stay like some sick atonement from start to finish. I remained locked in my chair until I was one of the few dregs remaining. Then I drove every mile home under the speed limit, despite wanting to gun the engine so hard that even the dial wouldn’t keep up. And when I’d opened the door to the dark, curtain-drawn house, I’d unlaced my boots, shrugged off my jacket, and took each stair one quiet step at a time.

I’d nearly fallen to my knees hearing her soft footsteps moving around the bedroom. The fear and anxiety that had infected my stone walls released me, and I hadn’t realized how tightly it had been holding until I’d managed to take that deep breath of relief.

She was here. She hadn’t left. I hadn’t fucked up.

The bath water stilled, my face piecing itself back together, one soothed ripple at a time until a calm face looked back. My brown eyes were relaxed, and my hair was tidy and styled, as if a storm hadn’t just raged through me. A storm I’d never felt before. A storm I hadn’t seen coming.

My wet hand slid to my neck, my eyes following the movement in the bath water’s surface. Trickles of water dripped down my collarbone, tickling the ridges of my muscles as it slipped beneath my hanging shirt collar. I pressed my fingers to the side of my throat, feeling the calm, steady rhythm beating beneath.

“The water is going cold.”

I turned, the stool protesting beneath me, and found her lingering in the doorway.

I scanned her from her long, bare legs to her narrow, boxy hips pressed into the doorframe, the hem of my large black shirt falling just past her underwear. I swallowed, forcing my eyes tomove away, up to her cocked head, framed by her wild brown hair. Ash’s lips were flattened into a line, but her clouded eyes told a different story. They returned the languid cataloging stare, from my bare feet and denim jeans, all the way up to the damp shirt, before taking a teasing detour over my neck and face before finally meeting my gaze.

“You’re up,” I spoke.

Ash stalked into the bathroom, her strides narrow and overlapping, more the walk of a cat than a human. She strode past me like I was air. The steam filled with her scent, and I fought to lean in closer and take a deep breath.

She reached past me, so close her brown hair grazed the bare skin of my arm, and dipped her hand beneath the water. Our world rippled and swayed again, but I stopped looking at it. My eyes ate up every morsel Ash presented, tracing each line of her movements like an unsung song going around my head all day.

“It is still warm. Good.” Ash sighed, returning to her standing, lithe posture. Even all her years on the streets couldn’t hide the straight, proud pose of her shoulders. Class and education simmered deep in her bones, and it trickled through every layer of dirt, grime, and attitude she hid behind.

“Hold this,” Ash cut off my thoughts, a black shirt dumped on my lap.

I jerked up, her soft, pale flesh exposed right in front of my face. My mouth watered, knowing I could reach forward and take what was painfully just in reach.

I trailed the complex spattering of scars across her body, the shiny skin highlighted in the humid, damp room. I wanted to bite each one, leave marks deeper than the scars that bound her to her past.

Ash slid down the black panties and tossed them toward me, as well. This time, I caught them. I fisted the dark material between my fingers, locked on to whatever little game this girlwas playing as she had me straining behind my jeans already, treating me like I was nothing more than a hamper. A hamper all too ready to take a bite.

She took slow, delicate steps, gradually gliding beneath the milky-white surface. A satisfied, sensual sigh slipped from her lips, her shoulders sinking into the warmth, her face melting into relaxation, eyes falling closed.

“What are you doing?” I interrupted, waiting for those clouded, cautious eyes to flick to me, just for a beat.

Ash didn’t even twitch. “I am bathing.”

“I can see that,” I said, the noise becoming a rumbling growl as I glowered at the surface of the water, jasmine, and chamomile washing away her scent and obscuring her naked body beneath the surface.

“It is five,” Ash said in return, as if that explained everything. “You always run a bath at five.”

It was, and I had.

Routines were important, both in my plans and my own life.

I scanned over that delicate face once again, admiring the relaxed, creaseless edges of her skin. As much as I had been observing her, Ash had also been observing me.

A door once opened can be stepped through in either direction,so to speak.

Revealing her keen observations gave me an unusual sensation. Having always been the one to watch the room, pick people apart piece by piece, and read between the lines they so desperately tried to blur, it was a new experience to have the same done in return. I wondered if she liked anything she found, or if she discovered something to fear, like many had done in the past.

“Do you have a razor?” Ash shifted in the bath, finally opening those cool, cruel eyes. Water sloshed against the sides as she brought her knees back up to her chest, sitting uprightand bringing one leg to breach the surface. Her long fingers ran down her shin, sliding and settling underneath her knee, holding her calf from sinking back below. “I cannot remember the last time I shaved my legs.”

I frowned.

“Shaving my legs was a low priority.” Ash rolled her eyes, flicking open her other hand to count off her fingers. “After food, shelter, water, and—”

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