Chapter 16
SUTTON
There are few things in life more offensive than a cold shower. Especially when you’re standing under it naked at seven-thirty in the morning. I stand here for a full ten seconds, staring at the shower handle like I need a master’s degree to make it work.
Nothing happens no matter which way I turn it. It’s still freezing.
I twist it again and again, no change.
“Are you kidding me?” I mutter to the empty guest house. The water keeps running, cold enough to make my teeth chatter.
Fucking fantastic. It’s the perfect start to my first official morning living on Shepherd Haynes’ property.
Ugh.
I shut off the water and step out of the shower, grabbing the oversized T-shirt I found laid across the chair in the bedroom.
It’s definitely Shepherd’s. It smells like cedar and clean laundry and that faint warm scent that seems to belong to him specifically.
It hangs halfway down my thighs, which is convenient because it’s the only thing I’m wearing at the moment.
I really don’t want to have to bother him or ask for more help after all he’s already given me but I don’t think I can survive cold showers for the rest of my days.
I shove my damp hair into a messy knot and then I step outside barefoot, already regretting my life choices given the crisp fall morning.
I cross the damp grass between the guest house and the main house, muttering to myself the entire way.
“Two dollars a day for rent and I can’t even get hot water…”
I’m kidding, of course.
I knock on the back door but there’s no answer.
He has to be in there.
He doesn’t have practice this early in the morning…does he?
Shit.
Did he already leave for the day?
I knock again, louder this time, and again, I hear nothing.
Fuck!
I turn to run back into my small house when Shepherd’s back door opens and there he stands, shirtless and literally dripping.
Water beads at his temples and trails down past his collarbone, his shoulders filling the doorframe like they were built to the same dimensions.
And he has this stupid, unfair, carved-out-of-granite torso that I absolutely did not need to see first thing in the morning, but also oh, my God, his perfectly etched torso is… everything.
Water droplets slowly slide down the center of his chest and my gaze follows.
Down.
Down.
Down.
Oh my God.
And that’s when my brain completely stops functioning.
“Sutton?” His voice snaps my attention back to his face, which somehow makes things worse because now his eyes are traveling down my body.
Specifically, to the fact that I am standing on his porch wearing nothing but his T-shirt.
It’s cold as fuck out here given what I’m wearing and that I’m also dripping a bit from a cold shower.
It’s no surprise that my nipples are hardened little mountain peaks trying to poke right out of my shirt, and I’m shivering.
“That’s…” He blinks once, then twice, then drags a hand over the back of his neck like he’s trying to reboot his brain.
I catch his gaze dropping to my chest and cross my arms, a little embarrassed that I’m even out here. “Uh, so, your shower is broken.”
He blinks slowly, a muscle in his jaw flexing. “I’m sorry, what?”
“The shower,” I repeat, my voice catching slightly. “In the guest house. It’s freezing.”
He nods, but his eyes have drifted to where the hem of his shirt barely skims my thighs.
“Haynes.” I wave my hand in front of his face.
His eyes snap up, pupils dilated. “Right. Sorry.” He clears his throat, his voice rougher than before. “You’re…uh…”
“Standing here very annoyed about cold water,” I say, suddenly aware of how close we’re standing.
“Yes,” he agrees, then pauses. “And wearing my shirt.”
I glance down at it, the fabric clinging to my damp skin. “Well, I couldn’t exactly come over here naked, and I found it hanging over the chair in my room.”
His mouth twitches, the corner lifting in a way that sends heat spiraling through my stomach. “Hmm.”
For a moment neither of us moves. The early morning air pebbles my skin, and I rub my thighs together, trying to generate warmth. His eyes track the movement before he swallows hard and looks skyward, his chest rising with a deep breath. “Okay,” he says, voice strained. “Let’s fix the shower.”
He steps outside and closes the door behind him.
Still shirtless, by the way.
Still unfairly attractive.
“Lead the way,” he says.
As we walk back toward the guest house together, I’m painfully aware of three things:
I’m barefoot.
I’m wearing his shirt.
Shepherd Haynes is walking beside me shirtless and smelling like soap.
When we reach the bathroom, he leans into the shower and turns the handle, the water sputtering to life and flowing from the faucet. It immediately runs warm and all I can do is stare at it.
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”
Shepherd glances back at me, clearly trying not to laugh. “Did you turn it the right direction?”
I narrow my eyes. “Are you really mansplaining plumbing to me?”
I mean I think I turned it that way…
Did I?
Didn’t I?
He raises both hands in surrender.
“I’m just asking.”
“I turned it.” I nod. “I know I did.”
I don’t really know but I’ll be damned if I admit that to him.
He reaches past me to adjust the knob, his bare chest so close I can feel heat radiating off his skin. The hair on my arms rises. His forearm brushes mine, sending an electric current straight to my core. I hold my breath, afraid the slightest movement might break whatever spell has fallen over us.
“There we go,” he says, his voice a low rumble that I feel more than hear.
“Thank you, I guess. Though I don’t know what you did that I didn’t.”
Neither of us moves. His arm remains braced against the wall beside me, caging me in. I can smell his soap, count his eyelashes, see the pulse beating in his throat.
“You know,” he murmurs, fingers grazing the hem of my shirt, knuckles brushing against my bare thigh, “this shirt looks a lot bigger on you.”
My stomach hollows out. “That’s because you’re enormous.”
His eyes darken at the word. “Are you stealing my clothes?”
“No. It’s not stealing if you left it here,” I whisper, my voice betraying me. I lift my shoulder. “Finders keepers.”
“All good.” His gaze drops to where the thin cotton clings to my chest. “Looks better on you anyway.” His tongue sweeps slowly across his bottom lip and the bathroom suddenly feels ten degrees hotter.
When he finally steps back, the absence of his warmth is physically painful.
“Well,” he says, voice rough, “hot water works.”
I nod, unable to form words.
He gestures toward the shower, where steam curls invitingly. “I’ll let you…finish.”
I pause in front of the shower, feeling his eyes on me like a physical touch. “Why are you staring?”
“Because you’re wearing my shirt and you look…” He exhales sharply. “Breathtaking.”
The word hangs between us, charged and dangerous.
My nipples tighten against the thin fabric as his pupils dilate, turning his eyes almost black.
I should say something cutting. Something to break this tension.
Instead, I stand frozen, acutely aware of every inch where fabric meets skin, where skin could meet skin.
“You should go,” I whisper, but my body leans toward him.
“I should,” he agrees, but takes a half-step closer instead.
The steam from the shower envelops us like a cocoon, beading moisture on his shoulders, making the small bathroom feel like the only place in the universe.
His hand comes up, fingers brushing against my cheek with such tender restraint that I almost whimper.
The touch is barely there, like he’s giving me every opportunity to step away, but I don’t.
I can’t. My body won’t listen to the rational part of my brain that’s screaming about boundaries and complications.
“Sutton,” he murmurs, my name like a prayer on his lips.
“Yes?” My voice is a breathless whisper, embarrassingly needy.
“I should really let you get back to your shower.” His eyes hold mine, and there’s something there. Hunger, restraint, and something deeper that makes my stomach flip. “But I don’t want to.”
My heart hammers against my ribs so hard I’m certain he can hear it. “Then don’t.”
The air between us crackles with electricity. His thumb traces my bottom lip, and I part them instinctively. He’s so close I can feel his breath mingling with mine, can count each individual water droplet clinging to his shoulders.
“If I kiss you right now,” he says, voice rough like gravel, “I’m not going to stop.”
The words land between us like a dropped match. My breath catches and my entire body leans toward him before I can stop it.
“Maybe I don’t want you to,” I whisper.
For a moment something dangerous flashes across his face, raw and unfiltered. His hand tightens slightly around the fabric of my shirt and his chest rises and falls once, hard, like he’s fighting something inside himself.
I see it then.
The struggle.
The want.
And something else.
Control, maybe?
His jaw flexes. “Sutton…” he exhales.
My heart stutters. “Shepherd…”
His gaze drags slowly over my face like he’s memorizing it. My mouth. My throat. The edge of his shirt brushing my bare thigh. For one suspended second I think he’s going to do it.
I think he’s going to kiss me.
Instead, he closes his eyes just for a beat. When they open again the heat is still there…but it’s locked behind something steadier. Something immovable. He drops his hand from the wall and steps back. The sudden distance feeling like I’m under the cold water all over again.
“You should finish your shower,” he says quietly.
The shift is so abrupt it takes my brain a second to catch up.
“What?”
His eyes don’t quite meet mine now. They’re fixed somewhere just over my shoulder.
“I meant what I said,” he continues, voice calm again. Too calm. “If I kiss you right now, I won’t want to stop.”
A strange knot tightens in my chest.