Chapter 23
TWENTY-THREE
TWIGGY
He does come back inside.
Eventually.
I know because sometime after the sky turns from black to deep, hazy blue, I surface to the smell of coffee and bacon. The space beside me is still empty, the sheets cool, but I hear pans clanking and low muttering from the other room.
For a second, last night feels like another nightmare—Bran’s hand between my thighs, his mouth on my skin, the way he whispered let go like it was a command.
Then I shift and my body reminds me: nope, that part was very, very real.
The running away was, too.
By the time I drag myself into the main room, he’s at the stove, T-shirt on, expression carved out of stone.
“Good morning.”
He doesn’t look at me. “Morning.”
I wait a minute, standing at the island while he keeps watch over the bacon.
“Sooo…I guess we’re not going to discuss last night?”
He tips his head to the side, picks up a plate, and very carefully spoons a helping of eggs onto it, followed by two neat strips of bacon. Turning, he meets my gaze for a brief flash before setting it down on the island in front of me. “Not right now,” he says.
I narrow my eyes, sit, and pick up my fork. Okay, then.
We eat. His shoulders relax, and he talks about security sweeps and check-in calls with Jack and Kael. I nod a lot and keep my eyes on my plate. The whole thing has the vibe of the world’s weirdest work meeting, except my boss is the man who made me scream his name into his pillow six hours ago.
After breakfast, he goes outside “to walk the perimeter.”
He does that a lot the rest of the day.
Two days later, I am losing my mind, one second at a time.
I’m not built for stillness. My brain likes projects, patterns, puzzles. Give me forty-seven contradictory witness statements and a corrupted hard drive and I’m in heaven.
Here? There’s TV to watch. Meals to prepare and eat. And…more TV.
I don’t even have my computer or anything sweet to munch on. No Karla’s donuts. No hacking challenges. Just static and Bran Kelly’s increasingly frayed self-control.
My arm itches.
The scrape from the panic-room hook is healing nicely, which is great and all, but the bandage is an affront to my nervous system on top of everything else.
“Stop scratching your arm.”
The command snaps across the room.
I growl under my breath and jerk my hand away from the gauze, where I’d been lightly scraping my nails over the itch.
I peek over the edge of the sofa, finding Bran where he’s putting something together in the kitchen. “You're not the boss of me.”
Bran glances over at me, expression mild. He went somewhere this morning before I woke up and came back with bags full of groceries. Now he looks like he’s chopping vegetables and pretending they’re serial killers.
I don’t need vegetables. I need donuts. Karla’s, preferably, but at this point I’ll take Krispy Kreme, a gas station bear claw, or honestly just a bag of sugar and a spoon.
Bran is managing to keep himself busy—cleaning guns, reorganizing the pantry, checking the doors like a tiger in the zoo—but even when he’s busy, he’s watching. His gaze tracks me constantly, as if me crossing the room to refill my water is a tactical maneuver he has to assess.
I can’t make a move without the awareness of his attention stalking me.
“Dramatic much?” he replies now.
“Yes,” I say. “I contain multitudes of personalities, one of which is drama queen.”
I flop sideways on the couch, legs hanging over the armrest, and stare at the muted TV. Some Hallmark Christmas movie plays silently, all fake snow and big-city-girl-returns-home vibes. I read the captions until my eyes cross.
I can’t take this.
I bolt upright, energy buzzing under my skin like a bad caffeine crash. “I need something to keep me occupied,” I announce, pacing toward the kitchen.
His gaze flickers over me as I approach, tracing my legs in their leggings and pausing on the swell of my breasts beneath my sweater before finally settling on my face.
That look—a sweep down, a deliberate rise back up—sets off every nerve ending I have. Then his shoulder lifts in a shrug, like I’m no help, sorry.
It’s the last straw.
I’m tired of him watching me with those relentless eyes. Tired of him acting like nothing happened, like he didn’t have his fingers inside me while I clung to him and begged.
Looking, watching, seeing. It makes me uncomfortable, puts me on edge, makes my skin itch more than this stupid scratch does. I feel like a rabbit in a snare with a wolf circling.
He needs to bite or find something else to prey on.
“Stop looking at me!” I burst out. “You’re always doing that—watching. Looking at me.”
Bran’s left eyebrow arches, just a fraction. With painstaking slowness, he sets the knife down and dries his hands on a dish towel, movements smooth and unhurried, like he’s giving me time to reconsider.
I don’t.
“What’s the matter, Tallulah?” he asks. His voice is calm, but there’s a thread under it, low and dangerous. “Afraid I’ll see something you don’t want me to see?”
He moves around the counter to stand in front of me—far too close—and suddenly he’s all I can see, all I can feel.
His heat.
His bulk.
His presence.
The cabin shrinks around him. Around us.
I cross my arms over my chest, shielding myself with attitude. “You’re looking at me like you want…”
“Want what?” His voice is velvet with rough undertones, making every nerve stand on end.
He reaches up and tucks a single piece of hair behind my ear, his fingers ghosting over my skin. The touch is barely there, but it sends a wave of something like electricity over the exposed area, down my neck, into my chest.
I swallow and fix my gaze on the wall of his chest in front of me. His T-shirt is stretched over muscle, warm and solid and entirely too appealing.
His touch shouldn’t make my heart beat faster.
It does, though.
And god, do I hate him for it.
“Just…stop. That’s all.” I try to hide the way he affects me, but it’s clear as day in the breathiness of my words.
I dig deep for a shred of boldness. “There’s no reason for you to be looking, anyway.
Even if my cousin wouldn’t kill you, there’s nothing here to drool over.
I changed my mind about wanting anything to do with you.
You’re too much bother. I haven’t even been shaving my legs. ”
That eyebrow lifts further. “Is that so?”
He takes another step, and reflexively I take one back.
He’s so freaking large.
The counter bumps the small of my back, locking me in place. His hands come down to grip the edge of the counter on either side of my hips, caging me in without touching me directly.
“Yep,” I say. “Armpits, either. Or…you know.” The lie slips out before I can stop it, stupid and frantic. Maybe if I paint myself as unappealing enough, he’ll back off, give me space, let my poor fried nervous system reboot.
Give me some breathing room.
A smile plays at the corners of his lips, like he’s trying not to laugh. He leans in incrementally closer, his gaze drifting down my length.
God-Jesus, what the hell is he on about? What is this complete and utter reversal from the other day? He’s giving me fucking whiplash.
“I don’t believe you, Tallulah.”
My next words are a whisper. “I swear it. I’m hairy as fuck. It’s very gross.”
“Mm.” His gaze drops to my mouth, then returns to my eyes. “You know, Tallulah, I don’t think I care.”
His head tilts, and he leans down so close I can feel his body heat through my leggings and sweater. I can taste his breath on my lips—coffee and something darker—and it just makes me want more.
“What if I told you only little boys with tiny little pricks give a fuck about a woman embracing her natural beauty?” That tiny smile widens, becomes a bona fide grin with an edge of wickedness. “And I think you and I both know there isn’t a single thing about me that’s little.”
Heat punches low in my belly at the same time my brain yells danger, danger.
His hands leave the counter, move to my waist, big palms spanning my sides. He slides them down to my hips, thumbs pressing into the curve there like he’s claiming the terrain.
“Bran…” His name is barely a whisper on my lips, and his proximity has my brain so muddled I don’t even know what I’m asking him for.
Wait. Yes, I do.
“Bran, I can’t keep doing this,” I blurt. “This one-eighty bullshit. You kiss me, and then you pull back and give me the ‘oh we can’t, your cousin will kill me’ spiel. I just…I’m tired.”
The last word comes out smaller than I intended. It’s not just physical. It’s the emotional lash, the pushing and pulling and the way he keeps putting my worth on a scale with his fear of Kael and acting like I won’t notice.
“Mm.” The sound rumbles in his chest, reverberating through his hands on my hips. “I have been an asshole that way.”
His eyes soften in a way that is infinitely more dangerous than his grin. He lifts me onto the counter like I weigh nothing, managing it with one easy flex of his arms.
Compared to what he’s used to lifting, I probably don’t weigh much. Still. My brain short-circuits at the casual display of strength.
“I’ve been doing a lot of thinking over the past few days,” he says.
I plant my palms against his chest, pushing at him more out of principle than actual desire to get away. “Is that a fact.”
“It is.”
“Wow. Break out the champagne,” I mutter.
His mouth twitches. “I’m thinking you might just be worth it.”
That shuts me up.
His voice drops, the smile fading as he steps closer, slotting himself between my dangling legs. He presses his forehead to mine, the contact intimate and steady in a way that makes my breath catch.
His hands move back up my body, sliding from hips to waist, then higher, stopping just before they reach my breasts. It’s an almost-touch, a maybe-touch, and every nerve in my body leans into it.
I arch toward him, helpless to stay away, needing more pressure, more contact, more him.
“Might be worth what?” I manage.
His eyes meet mine, dark and determined, pupils wide.