Page 51 of Playing it Safe

I turn. He looks down at me, hair plastered to his forehead, tattoos dark and slick under the water, and reaches past me for the shampoo. He squeezes some into his enormous palm, rubs his hands together, then lifts them to my hair.

"Cameron —"

"Let me."

I open my mouth to tell him I've been washing my own hair since I was four, that I don't need — but his fingers press into my scalp, and my words dissolve.

He works slowly and methodically, smiling at me while his fingers send magic tingles through the base of my skull. I’m scared of how much I like this.

Cameron finds a knot in the muscle at the top of my neck. My eyes close. My head tips back into his hands.

Nobody has ever done this. I wash my own hair. I tape my own wrists. I carry my own bag and drive myself to the rink.

"Hey." His thumbs still against my temples. "Where'd you go?"

"Nowhere." My voice comes out wobbly. "I'm here."

"You went somewhere." He gently tilts my head forward and guides me back under the spray, cradling my hairline so the suds don't run into my eyes. I decide he's done this before. For someone else. The thought makes my throat close.

The water runs clear. He reaches for the conditioner and starts again — slower now, drawing it through the length of my hair, working out the tangles from the ends up, the way you're supposed to, the way I never bother to. His knuckles graze my spine. I stand there and let a man wash my hair, and something in my chest comes loose from its mooring and drifts.

I open my eyes. Through the steam, I can see the pulley tattoo, rising and falling. "You don't have to take care of me," I say. It comes out smaller than I intend. "I don't know how to — I'm not good at the being-taken-care-of part."

His hands go still in my hair. His dark, steady eyes don’t waver.

"I know you're not," he says. "That's not why I'm doing it." His thumb catches a drop of water at my jaw. "I'm not doing it because you need me to. I'm doing it because I want to."

Is there a difference between being needed and being wanted?

My eyes sting, not from the conditioner.

"Okay," I whisper.

"Okay?"

"Okay. You can wash my hair." I press my forehead to his sternum, right over his hammering heart. His arms come around me, and the water goes lukewarm, then cool, and neither of us moves to fix it. "Just this once."

I feel him smile against the top of my head. "Sure, BB." His lips brush my wet hair. "Just this once."