Right. Aidan’s blood was all over them.
August yanked off his shirt, jeans, and briefs, and dumped everything in the kitchen sink. While I unclipped my overalls and pulled off my crop top, he walked over to the wall and used a pole to open two of the hopper windows.
Even though it was probably not the time to appreciate his naked body, I couldn’t help myself from taking him in.
“Your underwear too,” he said, coming back toward me.
“My underwear?”
“It’ll smell like smoke.”
Nibbling my lip, I lowered my thong to the ground, then scooped it up and added it to the soiled pile. He grabbed a bottle of vodka from his freezer, doused the fabric, then struck a match and tossed it in. Flames burst to life and spread, consuming the last pieces of the terrible night.
“Go,” he said. “I’ll keep an eye on the fire until it burns out.”
Hoping the spectacle would rid him of his lingering anguish, I went into the bathroom and stepped inside the enormous shower.
Hot water spurted out of the rain-shower nozzle, raced down my hair and over my skin, dragging away the blood and smoke. I closed my eyes and didn’t move for a long moment. How had we gone from playing with paint to arson?
I touched my sides, felt the white paint that had dried there. Large fingers pressed mine away and curved around my ribs. I opened my eyes but didn’t turn. August reached around me for a bar of green soap that he dragged over my body. He worked the woodsy sandalwood into a lather over my collarbone and shoulders. When his palm coasted up my neck, I cringed, and he gentled his touch. Without saying a single word, he dragged the slick bar over my breasts, then over my stomach, and circled his calloused palm over my soapy skin.
When his hands drifted lower, I rested my cheek against his shoulder and closed my eyes again. Sensations rose like steam, curling through my veins, warming my blood, billowing through my stomach, and expanding in my chest. I relaxed against August’s solid chest, my breathing slowing as his fingers moved against me. When his mouth nipped mine, I dragged my heavy lids up and crooked my neck.
The sable and green eddied as he stared at me, watching . . . waiting.
Pressure built and swelled everywhere, and then I was soaring over a cliff into a lake full of moon and stars, the wondrous sensation buffing away the horror of my strange world.
As my body softened, as my moans quieted, he spun me in his arms, my wet skin sliding like silk against his. I hooked my hands around his bent neck and pushed onto my tiptoes, guiding his mouth to mine.
Our kiss was gentle at first, but soon his lips crushed mine, devouring me the same way the flames had devoured one monstrous Creek.
The shower had rid August of a layer of stress, which wasn’t to say he was calm. He was anything but. His upheaval worsened when my phone rang, and Liam’s name appeared on the screen.
I answered the call on speakerphone and sat down on the couch. August wound his arm around me and pulled me close.
There was rustling, as though Liam were taking off his jacket. “I just came back from the inn.”
“And?” I asked.
“And the duel will take place tomorrow evening.”
August’s fingers flexed on my waist. “She didn’t believe it was Lucy?”
For a moment, Liam didn’t answer, as though he hadn’t expected me to have company. “Oh, no. She believed it, Watt. Apparently Lori repeatedly warned her mom that Lucy was ill-intentioned.”
I blinked. “Then why are we fighting them tomorrow?”
“Because she asked me to call Jeb so he would bring Lucy in, and I refused to sacrifice your aunt.”
I didn’t say anything.
Something thumped on his end of the line. A shoe, maybe. “Would you rather I make Jeb bring her in?”
“No.” Lucy was far from my favorite person, but her courage to avenge her son had changed my opinion of her. Besides, I couldn’t do that to Jeb. A divorce surely hadn’t erased years of tenderness and love.
Liam sighed. “That’s what I thought. Come over in the morning so we can figure out how to win this damn fight.”
“Want me to come over now?” Trepidation distorted the sound of my voice.
“No. I need to think.”
“Try to sleep,” I whispered.
“You, too.”
I didn’t think I could sleep. I didn’t think Liam could either.
“I’m sorry it took so long for your dad to be avenged, Ness,” Liam said. “I’m sorry I was too much of a coward to do it myself.”
I swallowed down the ball of emotion rising in my throat. “You’re not a coward.”
He let out a rattling breath.
“Liam, when you were at the inn, did you see Sarah?” I asked.
“No.”Worry suspended my breaths for a few heartbeats. “Did you ask them about our Sillin?”
“I did. They said they took what was theirs.”
“They took more-”
“I was in no position to negotiate!”
His tone made guilt well up inside me.
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said, a tad less gruffly, and then he hung up.
August pressed his mouth against my temple. Then, suddenly, he rose and pulled me up. “Go into the kitchen.”
I frowned. “What? Why?”
“Because I have an idea.”
I sniffled. “Okay.”
While I walked toward one end of the apartment, he went to stand by the other.
“I’m going to test my reach,” he said.