Page 23 of Shattered

My hands grabbed his biceps for balance, and the first thought that shot through my head was: where the hell did that lanky boy I remembered go?

Because Axel Irving was not lanky anymore. Not even close. Whatever he’d been doing for the past years included apparently turning into someone who could catch a falling woman one-handed while holding a bottle of body wash in the other.

I caught myself staring at his arms, at the way his shirt sleeves were pushed up to his forearms, at the solid muscle under my palms that had absolutely no business existing on someone who spent his days in museums and board rooms.

“Steady?” he asked, his voice maddeningly calm.

I yanked my hands back like I’d been burned. “Fine. I’m fine.”

“You should be more careful with the crutches.”

“I should be more careful? You’re the one invading my bathroom!”

“And you’re the one who just tried to charge at me on one functioning leg.” He set me back on my feet with irritating gentleness. “That wasn’t tactical.”

“I wasn’t being tactical! I was being furious!”

“I noticed.” He went back to arranging his body wash like he hadn’t just prevented me from cracking my skull open on my own bathroom floor. “This goes here, I think.”

“What are you DOING?”

“Making space.” He said it like it was obvious. “Shared bathroom. We have to be practical about these things.”

“Those are my—you can’t just—this is?—”

“It’s fine.” He glanced at me, expression maddeningly uninterested. “I’ve seen most of this before anyway.”

Every coherent thought vanished. “WHAT?”

“When I lived with your family.” He said it casually. So casually. “You weren’t exactly careful about closing doors. Or picking up laundry. The purple set is new, though.”

I wanted to die. Right there in my bathroom with my purple bra as a witness and the lingering sensation of very solid biceps still tingling in my palms.

“You—I’m going to?—”

“Nice choice, by the way.” He arranged his razor next to mine. “The matching set.”

“I HATE YOU!”

“No need to be embarrassed.” He moved to the cabinet under my sink. “We’re adults.”

“GET OUT OF MY BATHROOM!”

“Almost done.”

He was absolutely not almost done. He opened MY cabinet and started moving things around like he had every right.

I chased him out of the bathroom, swinging my crutches in a way that was definitely not doctor-approved. He dodged with infuriating ease—and infuriating athleticism I was absolutely not going to think about—heading straight for my bedroom.

“No. Absolutely not. The bathroom was bad enough?—”

He opened my closet doors.

“AXEL!“

“You have a lot of black.” He started pushing hangers aside. “Do you own anything with actual color?”

“This is an invasion of privacy!”