Page 15 of Bait (After the End #2)

Chapter Eight

While Candela showered and Torch changed, I focused on finishing up the salad, while I mused about what my life would be like now.

In the bunker we were all consumed with our mercurial council, and I’d never contemplated what I’d do if I had choices.

I liked being the librarian, but I could barely call what I’d been doing a real job.

Not when the council’s rule put people off the library for years.

There were times when weeks passed before anyone came to borrow anything, why would they if we always said no.

We had story time, with the books approved by the council, which were not exactly popular.

Otherwise, other than our movie nights which we thankfully could still do, I felt pretty useless in my position.

But I did love books and could see myself happily being the librarian for a town like this, with lots of kids.

If Candela’s dad was the librarian at the settlement, maybe he needed an assistant.

I was mulling on all that when I felt a presence behind me. I knew it wasn’t Candela, just from how much heat I felt at my back. His nearness was so unnerving the knife slid out of my hand, and I nicked my finger.

“Shit,” I cried out, dropping the blade and popping the injured digit in my mouth to suck on it.

“What the fuck, Sass?” I narrowed my eyes at him.

“Don’t sneak up on people holding knives.” He tugged on my hand until I let the finger slide out of my mouth.

“Let me see.” He was grumbling, like everything about me annoyed him, as usual. He smelled like lemons and mint, which was distracting.

“It’s fine.” I sounded equally annoyed as I pulled my hand away.

“You need to clean that up, so it doesn’t get infected.

” His hair was wet from the shower he’d taken, and he was in gray sweats and a tank top.

His body heat was overwhelming, and I could not stop staring at his mouth.

I loved his mouth. The bow dipped into a perfect shape.

He hadn’t shaved in a few days, and I could see the rough bristles.

I ached to rub my hand on them. He was not built like a gladiator, not this man, with his sinew and lean frame.

That didn’t make him any less deadly or less appealing to me.

But he’d never seen me as anything other than a kid.

“Whether you believe it or not, I’m capable of cleaning up my own finger and wrapping it in gauze.

I’m not that helpless.” He always made me feel like this, like he thought I could trip over my own feet.

Which only made me lash out and act defensive.

It was true that we’d been pretty sheltered all our lives, but I wasn’t so damned useless.

“I don’t think you’re helpless,” he said in that half snarl of his, taking a step back with his arms crossed over his chest. I didn’t refute what he said, because what was the point? He was always right. “I think you have a hard time asking for help.”

I looked down at his feet and saw that he was barefoot.

His toes were long and thin, which fascinated me.

How had I never seen his feet? It was those things that always captivated me about people and intimacy.

In that bunker we’d all been stuck together, living under this supposed glorious mission to preserve humanity, and yet we knew so little about each other.

We had seen so little of each other’s vulnerabilities.

I didn’t like asking for help. Especially in the bunker where it seemed like our value was centered around how useful we were to the council.

I wasn’t physically strong like Candela or Torch, or even as smart as Gregorio.

I believed my role as librarian mattered because helping people access knowledge or simply things that aided them in expanding their horizons or just feel good for a bit mattered.

But even before my ability to really do that was hindered by the council’s restrictions, it had never been the kind of job that helped people survive.

It was why I’d been so determined to give women my mother’s powder.

To at least defer their subjugation, but of course it wasn’t enough.

Putting off being put in a cage was not the same as blowing it up.

“Do you hate me?” Torch made a sound I remembered only too well.

“I don’t hate you.” Again with the growling.

“Pardon me if I don’t buy it given that you’re baring all your teeth at me.” He put a hand over his mouth, which kind of amused me, but I wasn’t going to let this go.

“I scared you that night.” The pain in his eyes when he said it was so stark I almost had to look away.

It was like he was haunted by the memory.

It was comforting to know I was not the only one.

“You were grieving Gregorio and scared about everything, and I burst into your room in the middle of the night rambling.” He did scare me, but now I knew he was trying to help me.

“What where you going to do?” It was something that I’d agonized about even before I knew what was really going on.

“I regretted pushing that panic button the moment I did it.” It had to be said.

He nodded tersely, but I could see his jaw working to a degree that made me feel for his poor molars.

Before he answered he rubbed his palms over his face, like he was trying to erase the memory of that night or something.

“I was going to try and break us out,” he laughed, and it was a bitter, hollow sound.

He ruffled his hair with an anxious energy I hadn’t seen in him.

“After Gregorio, I knew there was something very wrong, and I didn’t want you in there.

” The way he said it. Like he didn’t care about his own safety, that it was me he wanted to protect.

It made my heart pound like a drum. “I knew I was an ass to you, but I was beating myself up. Gregorio warned me something was going on, that he thought they were lying to us, and I didn’t believe him.

” The bleakness in his voice, in his eyes, was an echo of my own.

Because there was so much I hadn’t seen too. When I had it was too little, too late.

“I wouldn’t have either.” It was the truth. I was never a fan of the council, but I could’ve never imagined they were lying to us like they were. “I’m sorry I didn’t go with you.” I was sorry for many other things too, but we didn’t have to talk about them this instant.

He heaved a sigh that seemed to come from the recesses of his soul and reached for my hand again. “You’re here now, and that’s all that matters.” In his eyes I could see such pain. Like all these years he’d been beating himself up.

“You didn’t abandon me, Torch.” His head snapped back like I’d slapped him. His eyes grew dark, and I was afraid he’d get mad at me again. But he came closer instead. Close enough that I felt his cool skin touching mine.

The contact was electric. Like any time I touched Candela. Something ignited inside me. I was so aware of my body around both of them. Of the places that had never been touched. Of the places that craved it.

“Will you let me?” I reluctantly let him have the finger, and he made a show of turning it this way and that, with his face pressed so close that I could feel his breath on it. When a little drop of blood pearled on the cut, he lapped it up with his tongue.

I made a gurgling noise like I was choking, which only made him grin. One that looked like sex, dirty sex at that. I had no idea what to say, but my body seemed to be receiving info faster than my mind because something hot and delicious pooled in my belly.

“What if I kiss you?” I asked, sounding braver than I felt.

Something pained passed through his face, and he bit his bottom lip. Like I’d posed a very hard question.

“I don’t deserve your kisses.” I knew he believed that. I saw it in the shadows in his eyes.

“Why don’t I decide who deserves my kisses, Bernal?” I didn’t even know who I was. Maybe the trials of the day had whittled me down to my most primal instincts, but I went with it. I reached for his head and pressed my mouth to his.

He slid his tongue over the seam of my mouth so softly, like a whisper.

I moaned, opening for him. It was so different than with Candela, with her, there was no hesitation.

It was raw and hungry. This was more tentative, like neither of us knew the script.

Our tongues slid against each other while we touched.

His hands drifted to my ass and he lifted me, until my feet were not touching the floor.

“Your tits are driving me crazy,” he growled and bent his head to one of them. He sucked one of my nipples through the shirt, making me gasp. “Fuck.”

“Are you two flirting again?” Candela casually walked out of the shower still toweling her curls. Torch didn’t jump back or glare. He kept holding onto me, not breaking the connection. The space suddenly felt way too small for the three of us, and I was the one who broke.

“I wounded myself.” I held my finger up and took the opportunity to slide away from Torch, who was making my body all wobbly.

Suddenly the air in the rig was electric.

So much so I thought I could feel the air tightening on my skin.

And the way they were looking at me was doing things to my body.

It wasn’t openly lascivious or creepy like some of the men in the bunker could be.

These two just clearly wanted to fuck. Which was not something I’d ever considered.

The suppressors I’d been on had blunted my libido, but even before that, the idea of having sex with two people was not even a possibility.

At least not consciously, but now the thought of being plastered between them with their mouths and hands on me ran through me like an tornado, and I needed some alone time to examine all that.