His kind smile, nor his eyes so blue they’re reminiscent of husky puppies, are enough to fool me. His strength is evident in the long, lean muscles that move and bunch under his Henley shirt and in the length of his sure fingers as they reach out and grip the edge of my comforter.
“What are you doing?” I whisper when he folds the blanket away from me before reaching out to me. Instinct takes over, and I release the blanket. Yielding, even in the face of harm, is the only thing that kept me somewhat safe when—
I squeeze my eyes closed, shutting down those memories. They won’t help me here.
“Do you need help sitting up? I imagine you’re pretty fucking sore.”
“W-who are you?”
“You know exactly who I am.”
I expect frustration not the humor in his voice.
“TJ.” He winks a bright blue eye at my confirmation. “I thought you were an angel.”
“You’d do better thinking about real estate a little further south.” He grins. “I mean Hell, gorgeous. There’s nothing angelic about me.”
“I knew what you meant,” I mutter. He’s a damn liar though. His voice, the scent rolling off him, even his calculating grin are tiny bites of heaven.
“Let’s get you sitting up.”
His hypnotic voice is familiar and strange at the same time.
“Why are you here?”
I cringe when his cold fingers gently sweep under my arms, lifting until I’m sitting against my headboard. I should be worried about his impending attack as he touches me, but instead, I’m wondering when I shaved my damn underarms last. He doesn’t move away immediately, and although I can’t feel the warmth of his body, his face is close enough I can hear soft pants on his lips.
“I was in the neighborhood.” The gravel in his voice nearly lights my skin on fire.
“Liar.” I freeze immediately, worried he’s going to hurt me even more for being rude, but when he sits back his face is fixed with that sweet grin of his.
“Yeah,” he agrees. “You don’t have any food allergies, do you?”
Food allergies? What the hell? Next, he’ll be asking my favorite color and if I’m a cat or a dog person.
He picks the bowl back up from the bedside table, and a second later the spoon is being lifted to my lips. I’m unable to hide my wince when I open my mouth too far and feel the tender tissue in the corners split again.
“I can’t.” I hold my hand up in front of my mouth. “I’m sorry.”
And I’m apologizing to my future attacker. I’ll take the most fucked things in the world for two hundred, Alex.
He nods once, places the bowl back on the bedside table, and walks across the room. From the inside pocket of his leather cut, he pulls out a paper sack with a familiar pharmacy logo on it. My mouth begins to water immediately.
“What do you have there?” I’m not to the point where I’d climb off the bed and tackle him for a Percocet, but I also can’t deny my increased heart rate.
“Aleve.” My face falls as fast as it did the year I didn’t get a puppy for Christmas.
“Aleve?”
“For the pain.”
My frown doesn’t dissipate as he reaches into my fridge, and it only deepens when he walks back in my direction with a bottle of water and two blue pills.
“What’s that look for?” He offers the pills and the bottle of water, but I don’t take either. “You saw me get them out of the brand-new package. I’m not trying to drug you.”
I almost want to snort at his choice of words.
“Some of those party favors like I had at the bar the other night might be a little better in this situation,” I counter.
“Why?” He asks as he presses the pills to my lips until I open my mouth. He hands me the bottle of water. “So you can tempt me to hurt you while you’re high?”
Ice cold water dribbles down my chin, and my quick movements to correct my error only make me hurt more.
“You pushed me away the other night, and me being me didn’t appreciate it, but your eyes flared when I refused to let you go.” He pulls the bottle from my hands after I swallow the pills and screws the lid back on the bottle of water. “You were getting off on the fear.”
Getting off on it? I almost correct him, but somehow manage to keep my response to myself. Getting off is so far from the truth. I hadn’t even felt a hint of arousal until I was pressed against him on that dance floor, and that memory is groggy at best.
“You purposely put yourself in harm’s way.”
His eyes stay on me even when his hand moves to place the bottle of water beside the now cold bowl of soup.