Page 97 of Heart of Thorns

I lean over and check the timer on my phone. “Two minutes left, kitten. Think you can slow your breathing a bit?”

“Not with you d-doing that.”

My finger rubs a lazy circle. “I was going to wait until after to reward you, but I think I’ll start now.”

She groans. Her head tips back and rests on my shoulder, and I watch her struggle to unclench her muscles. And take a deep breath. Then another.

When she does, I increase the pressure of my rubbing.

“Fuck,” she moans.

“I wonder if you’ll come like this,” I muse to myself.

“Y-yeah, just?—”

“You’re getting tense again.”

She blows out a frustrated breath and sags on me.

“There.” I push two fingers inside her.

She immediately arches up, but I don’t care. There’s thirty seconds left on the timer now, and I seem to be in competition with myself. A race against the clock.

I pump in and out. My other hand comes down and flicks her clit, all while she’s trapped between my arms. If I wasn’t in ice water, I’d have an erection the size of Texas. As it is, I can feel my heartbeat in my groin.

The timer goes off, the noise shrill, but she’sright there. She grabs my wrists, holding my hands hostage, and I continue until she tips over the edge. She rides it out, her hips moving, her mouth parted.

When the climax subsides, she releases me and hauls herself out of the water. I follow more carefully, my gaze sharp on her red skin.

I climb out and offer my hand to her, then snag one of the two towels for her. I use the other one to dry off and smirk at her.

“That wasn’t so bad, was it?”

She shakes her head. “You’re impossible.”

“We’re going to add that into our routine,” I continue. “It’ll help.”

“If every ice bath goes like that, then… maybe.”

My smile widens.

“But…” She fiddles with the corner of the towel. “I didn’t say what I have to tell you.”

“Right.” I face her. “I’m listening.”

Fear flashes across her expression, and she glances around. As if someone snuck in while we were distracted?

“The arsonist,” she whispers.

“What about him?” I inch closer.

“He’s on the football team, Thorne.”

Fuck.

I sit in Rhys’s room, debating how much to tell him.

If anything.

---