couldn’t act on. He recognized the lust in her eyes—had felt it hum and crackle between them for so long, the anticipation was daily torture—but she refused to outwardly acknowledge it and he wasn’t stupid enough to ruin their friendship by making a move she’d regret.
But it was building. A mounting surge of chemistry toward an end point, a moment that wouldn’t be denied, a truth they were going to have to face head-on.
Unless she was about to refuse his invitation.
“Welcome home, angel,” he said, the phrase bitter in his mouth. Not home for much longer.
“See, when you call me names like angel, the issue is that I can’t decide how to castrate you.” She yanked at the zip on her bag with one hand while the other ran amok in her short hair. It was the color of rust on a barbed-wire fence and just as spikey on top, with the sides and back trimmed close. “Not that I don’t want to.”
“Whichever way you decide,” he said, touching the brim of his hat, “it’ll be a big job.”
She faced him, head tilted and eyes narrowed.
He grinned.
Amusement flickered in her green eyes, but she crossed her arms. “What are you doing here?”
His grin faded as his heart pounded.
He was here to tell the truth.
Denial jammed in his throat as he removed his hat. “Firstly, to check in on my favorite girl.”
“Yeah, I don’t have time for you right now.”
He frowned. “Have you consumed recently?”
She seemed hangry; her white skin was paler than usual.
“I’ll get you something to eat downstairs,” he said.
She jabbed a finger toward an empty coffee cup and paper bag, discarded on the rumpled blankets.
“So what’s the matter?” He noted her passport sticking out of her back pocket, and was instantly distracted by the sweet curve of her ass. God above, he loved those jeans.
“It’s complicated,” she said, picking up her phone from the bed and swiping it unlocked. “And like I said, I don’t have time.”
“Need a hug?” he asked, far too casually.
She hardly ever touched him. No contact was Frankie’s unique brand of agony. Except for her sexual energy—that touched him everywhere.
“If you try to hug me, I’ll bite you.” She cast him a small, see-if-I’m-joking smile as she twisted and sat on the end of the bed. Lifting a foot, she tugged hard at the laces of her chunky boots. “I’m having an epically bad day.”
“Why?” Concern instantly rolled his shoulders back. “Did you get hurt?”
She stilled, and then slid a strange glance at him. She didn’t answer.
“Right.” He crossed the room to stand in front of her. “Let me see.”
“You can’t help.” She huffed out a breath and muttered, “It’s too late.” She set back to work on her boots, yanking the laces.
“Frankie.” His concern swelled into frustration, but he did his best to leash it. “Show me.”
“I’m not injured.” Punctuated with another hard pull of her bootlaces. “There are changes at work that are out of my control, and that hurts, okay? I’m overwhelmed and so far out of my depth, I feel like I’m already sinking.”
He stared down at her, and she glared back.
“Alright. Hang on.” Sighing, he dropped to one knee, his eyes on her feet. These laces were one short-tempered tug away from tearing clean off.
She fell still. She was a fighter by nature, but always retreated into motionlessness when he got too close. Her stillness came with a flush on her cheeks and hunger in her eyes.
Yeah.
Suppressed desire was having a fucking field day with them.
Her next breath was shaky.
Like two hands trapping a fly, his focus contracted—latched around the woman before him. It hit him, then. He’d never been like this. On his knees before her, one greedy movement away from filling the space between her parted legs. Victim to the thought, his gaze slid up her shins, skimmed over her thighs. Christ, he needed to—stop looking—needed to just—stand the hell up—pull himself together.
At the sound of her hard swallow, he grabbed his self-control by the scruff of its neck and shoved his attention down. He reached for her laces, ignoring how she jerked her hands away.
“You shouldn’t do that,” she muttered.
The pulse in his neck throbbed as he released the tension at her ankles, passing the slack down the boot. “Excuse me for saving your feet from blood loss.”
“You shouldn’t be—there.”
Still lost in desire, he asked, “Where?”
“On your knees.” She sounded breathless.
Slowly, he raised his head. It was all too easy to imagine her words as a