Page 44 of Fated to the Gargoyle

My eyes stay on her breasts the whole time. My tongue slides out of my mouth, and I snap it back in.

She grabs the washcloths and opens the glass.

“Let me take care of you this time,” she says, and shuts the glass behind her.

A rumble starts low in my chest, and she smiles at the sound of it. I pull her under the water with me. She tips her head back and looks up the whole long way to my face.

“Tonight you try on the pants.” She leans back against the tile and takes full inventory of me. “Matter of fact, I might need new measurements, because what you’re packing… good Lord.”

I hold my hand out for the washcloth, and she lifts it up out of my reach.

“Nuh-uh. I told you, this one’s mine.” She snaps the washcloth once and works the soap into it. “You’ve always smelled good to me, so I figured you kept yourself up. I don’t need the play-by-play.”

“I may look like a barbarian,” I tell her, “but I care for myself.” Then I bend down through the water until my face is level with hers, close enough to count the drops on her lashes. “I am not human, Treasure,” I growl, low. “I do not always live in the human way.”

“Mm.” She goes right back to scrubbing my chest. “Scary. Hold still.”

Then she tips her head back at the water coming down on us. “Now what’s up with this shower? No shower head, the water just falls out the ceiling.”

“Shifters build to fit themselves.” I sink to one knee on the tile so she can reach my shoulders, and even kneeling, she has to stretch. “It will take me time to learn to live in a home again. It has been long.”

“And you have me now.” She says it plain, scrubbing along my arm. “So you and Sable aren’t doing it alone.”

There is nothing I trust my voice with while she works. No hands but my own have ever done this. My eyes burn gold in the wet glass.

She quits scrubbing and leans in. Kneeling has put my heartbeat right at her ear. She rests her head against me and listens. Then she picks the washcloth back up and finds where she left off.

I owe her words for this morning. “The thoughts you heard. I did not intend⁠⁠—”

She reaches up and presses the washcloth over my lips to hush me. “Soren. I teased you. That’s what I do when I like something.”

She drags the cloth away and cuts her eyes up at me. “For the record? I’m real curious about all them positions you owe me.”

My ears pull flat against my head.

“Ohhh.” She points the washcloth at them. “They go flat when you’re embarrassed? Soren. That’s the cutest thing I’ve ever seen.”

I answer that by rising off my knee and pulling her flush against me. She catches herself with both hands.

“Oof,” she says, muffled.

Her breasts press warm to my stomach, and I lengthen against her, shameless about it.

“See, this is what I mean.” She leans back to take me in. “You gotta give me a breather. Don’t get me wrong, I love it. But you’re gonna kill me with that thing.”

I loosen my hold and set space between us. “No, I will not. And if I ever cause you pain, you will tell me, and I will stop.”

“I didn’t say that.” She sighs up at the ceiling. “I’m just…” She waves a hand around for the words. “I thought I was gonna die from all the orgasms.”

I smile wide enough to show fang, and she swats my chest with the wet cloth.

After, we dry off and dress. She slips her flats on at the bedroom door and picks her purse up off the dresser. Then she walks the front room, trailing a hand over everything she passes. Whatever she names, I will build it, buy it, or dig it out of the ground.

She stops in the middle of the room and turns a slow circle, already placing things. “I can’t wait to settle in here.”

I scoop her up mid-sentence and make for the door. “We can start moving you tonight.”

“Huh?” She twists in my arms. “Wait. I can’t.”