Page 27 of Wolf Fated
"We'll see how long your lead lasts," he said in a teasing tone that had me anticipating things that an engaged woman shouldn’t be thinking about.
We fished for hours, which only felt like minutes to me. Most of the time we were just quiet and enjoying the silence and company and watching the waves roll against the boat. Axel caught a tiger shark, a huge catfish, and a blue stripped fish with a huge mouth.
"What is that?" I asked, looking at the two-foot beast.
"A Wahoo." He shrugged. "I've gotten larger ones before, this one's practically a baby."
After I stifled yawn, I drew up my line only to find the hook had been severed off. "Shit."
"Bad luck there." He shook his head. "Why don't we call it day. Plenty of time to do this again if you like."
"Oh yes." I nodded my head so fast I got dizzy for a millisecond and stopped. "Definitely."
"Get cleaned up. There's a cabin to the left past the lifeboat for privacy and meet me in," He paused, looking out at the horizon, before facing me, "Thirty-seven minutes."
"Why?" I crossed my arms, raising my eyebrows. "What happens in less than forty minutes?"
"You've lost fifteen seconds. Do you want to eat dinner smelling like fish guts?" He narrowed his eyes at me, but his voice was teasing.
"Fine, fine." I uncrossed my arms and held them up in surrender. Before he could reduce the time again, I hustled to the cabin. I really wanted to shower and get changed, except I only had the clothes I was wearing. Oh well, at least I could get out of these rubber fish pants.
Inside the cabin, I made good time undressing and then scrubbing my body and hair in the shower. The water was soft and took several rinses to get all the shampoo out.
Once I finished, I wrapped myself in a towel and added a second one around my head. Steam coated the mirror and filled the entire tiny bathroom in a dense cloud. I inhaled a deep breath, letting the tension of everything fade away. This had been a dream come true and I knew my dad was looking down on me with envy and pride. We'd never had the money before to do a trip like this. All our funds had gone into finding a bone marrow donor for him. And it still didn't stop his leukemia. I had to watch my father wither away before my eyes as an eleven year old.
I took a shaky breath, rubbing tears off my cheeks. If I met Axel for dinner like this, he'd ask too many questions I didn't want to answer, I only wanted to think and talk about the good things about my father. There was enough bad in the world not to rip open old wounds that never have healed right.
After my tears stopped falling, I gathered myself up and stepped out of the small cabin.
A shadow moved forward and I screamed.
"Bloody hell, woman, what's wrong?" Axel frowned, his gaze checking over me, then the cabin before returning.
"What are you doing in here?" I tugged my towel around me tighter. "I'm not dressed, get out."
"Afraid I can't do that." He crossed the small cabin to me in two long steps and my breath stuck in my chest. "I need to get cleaned up for dinner too and seeing how this is the only guest cabin available on this boat... here we are." He looked way too smug as he took off his shirt.
And God, did he have to have perfectly chiseled bronze muscles. Like there were no suntan lines on him that I could see. Then he removed his pants and I let out a little squeak, stumbling back into the wall, my eyes closing from seeing his nakedness.
I mean, who doesn't wear underwear?
As he moved past me into the steaming shower, I swore I heard him chuckle under his breath. And he left the damn door open. Trying my best not to peek, I closed the wooden door, and leaned against the wall. But I couldn't stay like this. Any minute he'd come out of the shower. I hustled over to the bed wedged against the wall to get my clothes, but they weren't in the pile on top of the blue and gold nautical bedspread where I left them. I frowned and got to my hands and knees and looked under the bed. There was nothing there but a boarded bed frame. I stood back up, the towel falling off my head and I folded it up, laying on the edge of the bed and looked around again. I swore my clothes were just here.
I raked a hand through my wet hair and went to the small dresser opposite the bed. I tried to open the drawers, but they were locked with a combination.Fuck, fuck, fuck.
I paced in the small cabin and debated what to do. Should I go find a crew member and ask them if they had taken my clothes? Maybe they took them to wash them? But then they wouldn't be ready in time for Axel's countdown to be ready for dinner.
Behind me, the shower turned off and my heart skipped a beat.
Axel came out about three minutes later with his dark curly hair accented his amber eyes. A towel was wrapped around his hips and several beads of water trailed down his chest and hard abs.
"Where are my clothes," I blurted out.
He pierced me with his amber eyes and suddenly the room was too small, and the exit was too far away. "What's wrong with what you're wearing?"
"Towels?" I choked on the word. "You want us to wear these to dinner?"
"Why not?" He shrugged a shoulder lazily, but his eyes were full of mirth.
