The Espionage Effect(61)

Tingles of awareness and sparking arousal charged my nerves to erotic life from the drowsy sensual place I’d been floating in. Gentle pressure of his flattened palms and his rippling fingers caressed around the curves of my breasts, circled around hardening nipples, floated over the quivering planes of my belly. His hands skimmed outward, sliding down my hips, then trailed back inward, down the sensitive crease along the uppermost edge of my thigh.

I sucked in a shaky breath when his hard fingers glided through the intimate folds between my legs, gently forward and back, only enough to be thorough in cleansing, but plenty to fire me into a trembling hot mess. But then he bent before me, lowering into a squat, and soaped my legs, one at a time, cradling and massaging around the muscles as he worked his way down my thighs, over and behind my knees, my calves, shins, ankles, all the way to my toes. He continued to find various knots and bruises, gently lingering over each one in assessment.

Then he lifted one foot and dug his fingers into the narrow channels of muscle and tendon in my arches, stroking with steady pressure from heel to toe. He slid a fraction of an inch inward, repeating the process.

I groaned, leaning forward, bracing my forearms on his shoulders.

His deep chuckle echoed. “This is what you moan over?”

I bit my lip to keep from smiling, sensing his purpose here. We knew the sexual chemistry between us was off the charts. But this moment wasn’t about sex. These minutes we shared were a rare gift of connection, therapy—healing. In a jarring situation, one I hadn’t expected, couldn’t have predicted, I’d been stripped bare, flayed raw down to my most crippling vulnerability.

Alec sensed what I most needed…and provided.

A deep pang of emotion hit hard in my chest, burning there; the sexual draw between us had been undeniable, but this…this was something more.

Before I had time to analyze the startling realization not yet fully formed, he stood, turned me, and rinsed me clean with caring but chaste movements. Then he placed his hands on my shoulders, guided me as we spun one-hundred-eighty degrees to switch positions, then handed me the bar of soap.

“Your turn.”

Tilting my face up toward him, I barely made out his features in the darkness. Although amusement tinged his tone, not even the hint of a smile belied his mood. Not in the firm line of his lips, nor in the intensity of his eyes.

Yet I felt the weight of the moment, both thick and ethereal, like the ever-present steam coalescing in the air. Our cleansing ritual went far beyond skin-deep for him as well as for me. He’d already divulged that he didn’t do relationships, had never let a woman close enough to have a second sexual encounter. Yet here we were: post second sexual encounter, third if you count the decadent pre-room-service appetizer.

Yet instead of being skittish or defiant about his sound no-relationship rule, he stood with me: relaxed, yet unmoving. Solid and sure.

I didn’t question the precious anomaly. Only respected it and cherished the gift for what it was. As I soaped up my hands with the bar that had flecks of coarse material molded beneath its smooth surface, staring through the shadows into eyes that gazed down at me with unreserved trust, I settled into the rare slip of time we’d been granted.

And as I ran my hands over the muscular angles and taut planes of his body, learning, yet already knowing, my inner darkness took on a glimmer of light that hadn’t been there before. Both of us had become orphans by fate, souls drifting through life as we searched for our place and purpose in it, yet neither of us were those personas within these glass walls.

We’d been attracted to one another, not by providence, but by circumstance. Drawn together, not by mere physical attraction, but by the soul-deep essence of who we were, what we’d become in spite of it all.

With methodical strokes, I cleansed the imposing man who remained docile—larger than life in the tiny space, yet his carnal side restrained in favor of something infinitely greater.

Any sexual current that had sparked naturally between us, ebbed deeper as it flared warmer. A stark sensuality lingered, holding us in its tenable grasp.

When I finished, after the remaining few minutes had passed in wordless reverence, he turned the faucet off. He opened the door and guided me toward the right, until my toes hit a plush bathmat. The following instant, a soft towel surrounded me. He rubbed my arms with it, then found my hands and tucked the ends between my fingers as he pressed a gentle kiss to my forehead.

I inhaled a breath far calmer than any I’d had since arriving half out of my mind.

“Are you hungry?” He swept his own towel over his chest and arms before he whipped the end over the top of the shower stall and let it drape there.

“No.” Wouldn’t have been any way to keep it down, even if I had been.

“Let’s get some sleep, then. Plenty of time to sort it all out in the light of day.” He grasped my hand before I had a chance to respond, then led me down a short hall and into his bedroom, leaving the door open behind us.

I let him pull me down to the bed, allowing the weight of all that had happened, everything that had come before, to draw me under without letting any of it penetrate the protective shield that Alec had wrapped around us.

His body molded behind mine as soft, cool sheets tangled between my legs, soothed my abraded skin. On an exhausted sigh, I surrendered to the sinking sensation, gave myself over to the darkness enveloping us, knowing without any doubt that Alec would protect me.