Chapter 14 #2
My face heated as my thoughts drifted back to our little game in the tub. The way he readjusted himself. I could swear his eyes dipped to my mouth for the shortest of moments.
A sudden flurry of dizziness had me grab the window frame I was leaning against.
John stepped closer, but then seemed to rethink and dropped his hand. Instead of a worried look, he watched me with annoyance. “You forgot to eat again, didn’t you?”
I wanted to bite back but then tried to remember the last time I’d eaten. “No. I ate.”
He made a whirly motion with his hand. “Anything after the tray of food I brought up?”
I focused on him warily. “That was you?”
“You think I'm incapable of human emotions?”
“No, not that.” I shook my head. “Actually, yes. I just thought it must have been May.”
“No. She and Jeremy were holed up in her room the entire day doing the devil-knows-what.”
My eyebrows scrunched together. Weird. “So instead of letting your competitor faint from lack of nourishment, you brought me breakfast to my doorstep?”
His shoulder made contact with the wall once more as his posture eased. “You’re welcome.”
I fought against the urge to clear my throat.
At that moment, the light above us flickered.
Once.
Twice.
Then died.
“What the hell?”
I heard him shuffle. Because yes, of course, the night sky in the middle of nowhere is beautiful sans light pollution, but also damn fucking dark.
I couldn’t even glimpse the fingers I was wriggling around in front of my face.
“The main power line must have been damaged.”
“So, what now?” I felt bubbles of panic rising inside me when the windows began to rattle in their frames. It wasn’t hard enough to play find-the-laptop-before-Nora-has-a-meltdown with the lights on? We had to level up?
“Nora,” John’s warmth surrounded me before my brain could even recognize the noise his boots made.
Or maybe it was the howling of the wind outside that had somehow increased in volume since we were plunged into darkness.
You know what they say. Some senses become sharper when others are taken away.
The scent of him grew stronger, too. Pine, leather, soap.
Masculine and clean. My head began to swim. My dizziness rushed back.
Large hands gripped my shoulders with gentle strength. “We will fix this.”
I wanted to protest, but I was indeed on the edge of a panic attack yet again. And he’d noticed before I did. What that said about the emotional intelligence of either of us, I didn’t want to put my finger on just now.
“In the pitch black?” I said to the approximate area where his face would be.
“There must be a generator someplace.” His breath caressed my face. I was glad he couldn’t see me right then, because I instinctively licked my lips.
“Ok. Where would that be? Not that I know what a generator looks like.”
“I’ll look. You...” He wrapped his hand around my arm, pulling me slightly with him.
This was like one of those terrifying trust games they make you do at theater camp.
You were blindfolded, and someone else guided you through the room.
I’d never been able to relax, always bracing myself for the impact of a wall or table.
Doing this with John Kater was the equivalent of being guided alongside an active volcano by your supervillain nemesis.
I was so tense I thought I’d snap in two.
Him leading me, the warmth of his hand the only sensory input, felt oddly intimate.
I only knew we crossed into another room when the floorboards beneath my shoes turned to soft carpet.
How was he navigating this in total blindness?
“You sit here.” Both his hands pushed me gently down into a cushy seat.
Then the warmth and smell were gone. A pang of panic shot through me at the thought of sitting in this void.
I craned my neck as a flash of lightning jolted through the room, illuminating John, who had retrieved a flashlight.
An icy cold hit my face as he opened the patio doors, and the howling wind went from a low rumble to a crashing cataclysm.
Moments later, he was back, towering over me, my head barely reaching his belt buckle.
I couldn’t remember the last time I felt this small.
His hair stuck in wet strings over his forehead, mouth forming a grim line.
“I need your help.”
“With what?”
“The generator.”
“These hands don’t know electric thingies.”
“Well, good for us, my hands know electric thingies. But my arms are too big to reach the lever.”
A bit of silence. Then two.
“You’re serious?”
“I mean, if you prefer to die of hypothermia, then be my guest.”
“Fine.” I agreed to help because what else was there to do?
The wind immediately slipped between my clothes, biting my skin, as I stepped into the freshly fallen snow. Sharp cold burned my cheeks, and I could swear John was angling his body in a way that took the brunt of it.
Behind a massive pine whose branches lashed out in the storm stood a small garden shed, the door ajar, a pile of snow holding it open.
John popped the light between his teeth, shining it at a metal box on the top shelf.
It was shoved against the slatted ceiling and probably housed dozens of spiders. I shivered.
He nodded towards it, opened his palms, then said something.
“All I got was gibberish,” I said.
John plucked the flashlight from between his teeth. In the dark, I couldn’t see his facial expression clearly, but I’d bet my ass it was exasperated.
“There is a small switch you need to flip at the back of it. I’ll hoist you up.”
My body went as tense as if someone asked me to sing karaoke. “You’re going to do what?”
“Unless you want to give me a lift?”
I shuffled my weight from one foot to the other. The cold was seeping in at my toes, making me miss the city more with every minute.
“And no, I don’t have a ladder.” He then slipped the flashlight back between his teeth, offering his palms once more.
I turned my face towards the shelf, hoping he couldn’t see my expression either. An expression along the lines of dread, misery, and the smallest amount of anticipation at the thought of him touching me. Which...gross, Nora! Not helpful.
I wondered if he wanted me to step onto his palms, and smugness filled me at the thought of ruining his fancy sweater.
But before I could wonder further, he stepped behind me, palms slipping underneath my thighs, moving me upwards so I could balance my boots on one of the racks but not put my full weight on it.
I was surprised, judging by the state of this shed, that it managed to hold up the generator without collapsing.
Trying to ignore the warmth of his hands, I fumbled for the switch.
“I can’t see it. Wait.” I shifted slightly, plucking the flashlight out of his mouth and putting it into my own. The metal was warm where his lips had been. A jolt of something we aren’t going to address hit me when I tasted him on it.
“Little higher.” I tried to say, but only a mumble came out.
“All I got was gibberish,” John deadpanned.
“Higher,” I said, more clearly.
“Yes, your majesty,” he said.
John’s hand slipped from my thigh, readjusting me. His other arm pressed my ass flat with his stomach. I totally did not notice his shallow breaths seeping through the back of my jumper. Didn’t notice the heat pooling at the bottom of my belly.
Instead, I focused the light on the gap until I saw the small red switch at the back of the shelf.
I reached for it, aware of every space where our bodies touched. And flicked it.
Nothing. No surge of electricity, no flickering of lamplight. The place stayed dark.
“It’s not working,” I said.
“Did you press the right button?”
“There is only one.”
John swore. “The fuel must be empty.” He loosened his arms around me just as I was preparing to climb.
I slipped. Instinct took over as I halted my fall by grabbing for his shoulder.
My sweater bunched up as his hands slipped beneath it.
John’s large palms spread over my skin as he pressed his body into mine, pushing me against the shelf.
With one of his legs nudged between mine, he stopped me from slipping further.
The flashlight tumbled from my mouth, thumping dully on the floor.
“Shit, sorry,” he gasped.
“It’s okay,” I gasped right back.
But I didn’t let go. Nor did he retract his hands. The heat of them singed my skin. John’s hard parts against my soft parts. His goddamn smell. It turned my brain into a spinning top.
I couldn’t see his facial expression, had no idea what he was thinking, but it took entirely too long for one of us to move.
The pressure of his thigh against my middle sparked…
something. My body… my treacherous body wanted to move against him.
Just then, his hand tightened on the small of my back.
I felt that little movement everywhere.
“What are you doing?” I breathed into the night.
“Not sure.” His voice was raspy.
A thought occurred to me then. What lengths would he go to secure a spot in the next round? Was he capable of theft? Would he seduce someone for his gain? While he had a smoking-hot fiancée waiting for him?
Maybe. Possibly.
The coiling heat in my belly turned to loathing.
Not for him, god, I wish. For my own reactions.
For the betrayal of my stupid body parts.
Reactions that I may not see on his face, but the reflection of the flashlight did, in fact, illuminate my own features.
And all the treacherous and confusing thoughts that must have played out like a picture book.
I slipped my hands from John’s shoulders and pushed him away. My breath came out ragged. “We better find fuel before I lose a toe.” I bent to retrieve the flashlight, ignoring my wobbly legs, when I noticed the reflection of rose gold metal.
“Nora—” John said from behind me.
“Son of a bitch,” I swore at the same time, pulling my laptop from behind a shelf laden with tool stuff.
“How the hell did that get there?” he said, shaking his head.
I looked from my laptop to him, shining my flashlight right into his face. “You tell me.”
He grimaced but didn’t turn away. “What do you mean?”
I took a step back, wishing I had Otis’s pepper spray. “I see you in the hallway, my laptop disappears, you volunteer to find it, the generator gives out, and oh… what a coincidence, there it is. Now Nora is all alone, vulnerable, and… and…” I trailed off, trying to find my point.
“Is that what you think? That I lured you out here to do what?”
My mind flashed with a hundred possibilities, ninety-nine of them involving naked bodies, and the vast majority not sounding too bad.
NORA.
I pinched myself. “Ouch,” I cried.
“Are you hurt?” He came closer, hands in the air.
I lifted the light back into his face as if it was a laser sword.
“Nora, if I wanted to murder you, I would have done so by now.”
For some reason, that possibility hadn’t come up in my thought process. “Why doesn’t that sound convincing?”
John sighed. “Let’s get this over with,” he said, plucking the light from my hands.