Page 71 of Destined for Shadows
Cori finished her coffee and poured another cup. While she added sugar and cream, Bartol came out of the bedroom with a stack of neatly folded clothes and went straight to the bathroom. He didn’t glance her way once. After the shower started running, she headed for the bedroom and discovered he’d already pulled the sheets off of the bed. The man was more than a little fastidious. If Cori were in the market for a husband, she’d pick him just to put some spice back into his life.
She took the sheets and carried them to the kitchen where a washer and dryer sat in the corner by the back door. Both the appliances were the most basic versions one could find these days. Lucas and Melena must have picked the set out so that Bartol wouldn’t have too much trouble figuring out how to work them. She got the wash ready to go but didn’t turn it on yet since she didn’t want to mess up the hot water for Bartol’s shower. Once they were ready to leave, she could start it.
After that, she pulled her duffle bag out and organized her things, figuring out what she had left to wear and what would need to be replaced soon. Other than a pair of boots and some running shoes, she had nothing left for her feet. She had managed to grab four pairs of pants, some socks, her entire underwear drawer, and about a dozen shirts. All of it had been shoved into the bag haphazardly and took a few minutes to sort out. Cori had enough to get by for a little while, but she’d have to go shopping at some point and spend more money she couldn’t spare. At least Lucas and Melena had promised they would deal with the insurance company and get the process sped up so she could get her settlement money sooner. They’d even managed to get a police report filled out before leaving last night.
Bartol came out of the shower, hair wet and plastered to his face and head. He’d donned jeans and socks already, but he didn’t have a shirt on yet. Cori’s mouth went dry, and she couldn’t help but stare at the cut abs and chiseled pectorals on blatant display before her. It was enough to make her weep, thinking no woman had touched his body intimately in over a century.
His gaze hardened. “Stop.”
“Stop what?”
“You know what,” he said, voice clipped.
Cori rose to her feet from where she’d been sorting clothes. “Then put a damn shirt on if you don’t want me to look. I’m only human!”
“It’s my home,” he argued.
She lifted her brows. “You asked me to be here. I swear I won’t even come close to you if you don’t want, but I can’t control my eyes. They have a mind of their own.”
His expression flattened. “Your eyes operate independently of your body?”
“When you’re around they do.”
He clutched the dirty clothes he’d carried out, squeezing them. “There is nothing about me that is worth looking at.”
He was so wrong.
Kerbasi had certainly done a number on Bartol’s ego. Cori needed to pay the guardian a visit sometime soon so she could empty her revolver into his thick skull for being such a horrible person. At least with Kerbasi, she wouldn’t feel guilty about shooting him since he couldn’t die. It would just hurt him a lot.
Cori crossed her arms. “I’ve never seen a more sexy man in my life than you.”
His jaw ticked on the side where the scars were located. “Then you are blind.”
“If you say so.”
“You mentioned you wish to go shopping,” he said, lifting a brow.
Cori decided to let him change the topic. “You are in dire need of food in this house, and unless you want me to keep using your shampoo and soap, I need to buy some for myself.”
“You used my…” he paused, and seemed to gather himself, “soap?”
Cori smiled. “I didn’t have a choice. I rubbed it all over my body, which consequently, was right before you used it.”
He twisted the dirty clothes in his hands further. “Give me a few minutes and then we can go.”
“Okay,” she said brightly. “I’ll get the wash started for your sheets while you do that since, you know, I slept all over those, too.”
Bartol escaped into his bedroom without another word.
Twenty minutes later, they were on the road in her truck. Cori was grateful it had been parked far enough away from the cabin not to get burned, so at least she had one big thing that had survived intact. Bartol sat in the passenger seat utterly still. She figured she’d given him a hard enough time that morning and chose to leave him alone for the moment. Helping him overcome his past was a marathon, not a race. Cori didn’t want to push him so far that he might regress into his hermit state again. She’d feared that enough after their last kiss and swore she’d drop it down a notch with him. But saying was one thing and doing another. Keeping herself in check around him took a lot more effort than she’d expected.
They were nearly to Fairbanks when she decided to take a detour. After what had happened last night, she needed to check on something else even more important than her cabin. It had been on Cori’s mind when she’d fallen asleep on the couch.
“Where are we going?” Bartol asked.
She kept her eyes on the road. “This won’t take long, but it’s something I have to do.”
They reached the gate and proceeded down a long, narrow road.
