Page 17

Raeann

M icah is all-consuming, all-encompassing.

I’m drunk on the high I get when I’m with him.

Like I’m free-floating, existing outside myself in a buzzed haze.

When I’m around him, nothing is in his orbit but me, and when you grew up where I did and how I did, you live for the moments when someone pays attention, someone sees you as not just the wild girl with the perpetually stringy hair and dirt on her knees, but the layers underneath that truly encompass who we are at our core.

Micah hasn’t moved from the couch yet. He stares, his eyes following.

Even when I take off my shirt and lay it nicely on the ground—and then my shoes, socks, jeans—his gaze never leaves me.

He sits back against the cushions with his leg over his knee, sipping the wine he brought from the kitchen like I’m his favorite show.

The sensation of being observed is as familiar as the watchful embrace that’s coated me recently when I’ve walked Athena down my street.

Or when I’ve stopped by my favorite café for a drink.

Like I have complete sanctuary wherever I go.

I dip my toes in the hot tub, and it’s so pleasantly warm compared to the chilled evening air that it calls me in like a siren. The giddy, playing-with-danger feeling spurs my actions.

I step down into the water, explicitly not looking at Micah before moving to the opposite side where a waterfall dribbles over into the pool.

Farther out, the view of the lake is spectacular.

The glow of the moon reflects off its shiny surface.

It’s like I’m living in a fantasy world.

How is Micah’s house exactly the way I would’ve built my own if I had never-ending funds?

Minutes go by and still Micah hasn’t come over. I peer over from the corner of my eye. A muscle ticks in his jaw, and his tattoo sleeve ripples from clenching and unclenching his fist. From this position, I can just see the eagle wrapped around his bicep.

Finally, I turn toward him. “Why did you fly Pawpaw in?”

Micah doesn’t show surprise that I asked him this question out of the blue. His emotions are schooled. Even. “Because I noticed the way you looked wistful when you talked about him at dinner.”

“So you thought you’d fly him in on a private jet and give us the best seats in the house?”

“You said he did a little dance when I got drafted, so I figured he’d want to see me in a game.”

I don’t have many examples to base this thought on, but dates don’t pay that much attention. Micah, however, can see inside my soul and know what the inner workings of my mind are.

“Jace.”

He scowls. “What about him?”

I try to hide a smile. He’s not cool and collected anymore, and it sends a thrill through me. “Do you not like him?”

Micah flexes his foot, then rubs his tattooed hand down his stubble. “Joey likes to mess with me, and he thought it would be funny if your new employee was male.”

“But,” I draw the word out, hoping I’m toying with danger, “how is that messing with you?”

“You know,” he says confidently.

Despite being in the temperature-controlled water, goose bumps sprout over my shoulders and course down my arms. “Because he has a dick?”

Micah’s jaw clamps shut, and it works for several long moments. “Raeann, I’m milliseconds away from taking you in a way you’ve never imagined, and it’s not nice to have another man’s name in your mouth while my thoughts are as dirty as they can be.”

My nipples peak, brushing against the lace of my bra.

A rush of excitement teases just under my skin, boiling there, waiting to erupt.

Apparently, I like poking the bear. I want to see how far he’ll go.

Can I entice him into the hot tub? Can I tease him into revealing the lengths he’ll go to have me?

Taking you in a way you’ve never imagined …

He’s so confident that he’ll be the best I’ll ever have, and looking at him now, I have no doubt.

Micah breathes out slowly. “Have you thought about his dick?”

I shrug nonchalantly. “About as much as anyone else’s.”

He shifts uncomfortably on the couch, looking away for the first time. My heart skips a beat, hoping I haven’t taken this too far. Athena pops her head up, but when I peer over at her, she places it back down again, her eyes drifting closed as if she hadn’t moved at all.

“He’s a good guy. He works hard,” I add.

“Which is exactly why he hasn’t been fired yet.”

“Can you fire my employee?”

“No, but I can dispose of bodies.”

I grip the curved lip of the hot tub. “Would you do that?”

“If he hurt you, yes. If he mildly annoyed you, I would offer him as much money as it takes for him to leave and make up some story about how he can’t work at Pet Threads anymore.”

“A bribe.”

Micah nods like these are words people say every day. He speaks with raw intensity. We all have an inner voice that thinks all the wrong, inappropriate things, but most of us check ourselves before those thoughts come out of our mouths. Micah never checks himself with me.

“Why?”

“Because there are no lengths I won’t go to make sure you’re comfortable in this world, Raeann. We should adapt to you, not the other way around.”

The tension breaks in my body, as if I’ve leaped off a cliff without a tether. My stomach clenches, and I hold a breath deep in my chest for fear of what might fly out of my mouth. Micah talks like I’m not just a thing to be held up, but a being to be worshipped.

He holds my gaze, like I’m a treasure he refuses to give up. Even his eyes are a trap. I get sucked in by the charming brown, but the gold latches on and drowns me in a swirl of emotions. “I thought we were going to make bad decisions together?”

The line of his jaw feathers. “As soon as you started taking your clothes off, I didn’t trust myself to be close to you.”

“You wouldn’t hurt me.”

“Of course not. But I would possess you. Use my body to occupy your every thought. Your every need.”

I squeeze my knees together. My heart pumps so fast, I feel breathless. “And you think I don’t want that?”

“I think you’re not ready for it.” His stare locks onto mine, begging me to deny it. “I have to admit, I’m loving this line of questioning, though.”

The edge of the water laps at my nipples. I scoop up a handful and let the droplets skim across the swell of my breasts while I lean back, watching them roll and then catch on the lace of my bra.

We’re quiet for long enough that my intrusive thoughts win. Sitting here, doing this, it’s not normal. I am in a hot tub in Micah Freeman’s house…in my underwear! “How many other girls have you brought here?”

He swallows. “Exactly zero. I bought this house after I broke up with my ex.”

I know the story. No one could get away from it if you lived within two states of Tennessee.

It was everywhere. In fact, Tab adjusted the length of the video she posted online to cut out the cringe-worthy portion of my happy, gas-fueled ramble where I ask her if I’m prettier than Micah’s ex.

Not my finest moment. “I don’t want to talk about her. ”

“Me neither.” He takes a big gulp of wine to empty his glass and stares out over the lake. “We should get back to us.”

I place my hand over my heart, feeling it beat hard like a drum. In the empty spaces between, annoyance pushes through, and then the jitters descend. Just one mention of her, and I’m flustered. More than flustered, I’m…panicked.

This can’t be happening. Not now.

“Are you okay?” Micah asks.

I nod, trying to get my breathing under control. My lids flutter closed, and I count my breaths to four and back, inhaling and exhaling.

“Talk to me,” he commands, and I’m startled when his voice is much closer than before. I can hear it easily, even over the rush in my ears.

“I’m fi?—”

A hand covers my own across my chest, and I peer up to find Micah in the hot tub with me, white shirt drenched up to his chest. “Breathe.”

Athena, who’d usually be right by my side, still sleeps on the couch. She lets her guard down when Micah is around, which is saying a whole hell of a lot. The idea that it’s him reassuring me gives me pause. “It’ll go away,” I tell him.

These bouts of anxiety have happened to me my whole life but have been so much worse since the storm. So. Much. Worse. At some points, even debilitating.

I take a deep breath, willing away the rush of memories that spring forward of the freight-train like noise barreling down on us. I reach out, clenching my fingers around Micah’s bicep.

“Should I get your pills?”

My eyes fly open. “How do you know I take medication?”

“I’m obsessively observant.”

That’s one way to look at it. The other could be called something not so flattering. I take steadying breaths, one after the other.

“Should I wake Athena?”

I shake my head, and as soon as I do, he moves in closer, fitting his body to mine until we’re touching more than we’re not. With my head on his shoulder, he keeps his hand on my chest to monitor my heart rate, cradling me.

“You’re beautiful,” he whispers.

“Yeah, every last malfunctioning part of me,” I mutter as I wrangle my body under control.

“Your imperfections are perfect reminders of your history.”

I trace the outline of his chest over his shirt, wondering if he knows what happened to me. I wouldn’t be surprised. He knows a good deal already.

I don’t know what time it is, but the sky has turned dark, the stars shining in a tapestry of twinkling lights before my anxiousness subsides. “You must be exhausted,” I murmur to Micah.

He shakes his head. “I’m the most alive I’ve ever been.”