Page 27 of Deacon

“Okay,” I whisper.

He doesn’t move. Head down, I dip past him into the bathroom and turn, my hand on the door.

“Thank you for helping me,” I whisper.

“Just being neighborly.” He gives me a long look with his dark puppy eyes.

My breath quickens. Is this shock or something else? He’s standing so close, and I’m so cold. My body must be starving for heat. That has to be all it is. Avoiding his eyes, I shut the door and sink against it.

What have I gotten myself into?

CHAPTER SIX

DEACON

She’s here. After months of wanting.

I have a deep hunger. Now that she’s here, it aches in my marrow. She’s in my house, flesh and blood, all soft curves, soaked clothes barely clinging to her perfect body.

The light under the bathroom door burns in my vision, leaving light spots behind my eyelids. I take a step back. I’ve already watched her for months.

What does it hurt to watch her a little more?

Silently, I open the closet door and step back into it. There’s a section where the wall isn’t fully finished. I used to keep a dresser in front of it, but a few weeks ago, I moved it with the intent to finish the seam.

Now I’m glad I didn’t, because where the wall and the doorway meet, there’s a sliver of an opening. It looks directly across the bathroom, to the tub at the back left corner. Steam rises from the dark copper basin, surrounding her in a fine mist.

She lifts the hem of her sweater and pulls it over her head with difficulty. It sticks to her skin then peels away.

My groin tightens.

She’s so beautiful. Curvy, her waist dipping in and blossoming out, the fine line of her spine going up to her drenched hair. She looks like one of those women in old paintings, where they’re always naked and languishing on something. Classically beautiful in her softness.

She undoes her skirt and tugs it down along with her tights. That makes her bend, but I don’t see her ass until she kicks them off and stands again.

Goddamn.

It’s better than I imagined, and I spent a lot of time fantasizing about it. My breath catches. She hooks her panties and peels them down, kicking them off her ankle. Then, to my disappointment, she sinks into the tub without turning around.

I tilt my head. That’s alright. I’ll have plenty of time to see the rest of her body later.

My dick is so hard, it hurts. Silently, my hand finds its way to the ridge and palms it.

I can’t do this here, not now.

But God, I want to.

There’s something so sensual about her. Maybe it’s her dark curls, the color of the woods. Or her velvety skin. Or her big pale blue eyes that remind me of ice on the deep river that runs down the mountain.

Or it’s the aura around her that I don’t know how to explain. It’s like she was made for a different world.

I don’t know, but I do know that she was made to be mine.

Moving on the sides of my boots, I leave the closet and go back into the hall. By the time I have my coat and hat back on, my dick has gone down, but my head is still rolling the image of her naked body around, fixating on every tiny detail. The mole by her shoulder blade. The single dimple above her ass.

When the barn is secured against the storm, I go back inside and change in the guestroom. She’s here, so I put a shirt on with my sweatpants before going down to the kitchen.

Downstairs, I take the phone from my office and lay it on the kitchen table. It doesn’t have a tracker in it. That felt invasive, so I justcloned it so I can see her texts if I need. I have an uneasy feeling about her situation, like sooner rather than later, she’s going to need help.

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