How’s that for communication, Axe wanted to say.

Instead, he simply let the female get a good hard gander at his little coward, which was neither little at all nor cowardly in the slightest. In fact, his cock was really damn bold, completely unapologetic, and seemed to be twice the size it usually was.

And Axe hadn’t been a grower to begin with.

But fuck him, this was not the way he’d wanted to start out with her—and yeah, you could rewind that empty wish right back to him showing up at her father’s mansion bleeding down his face. The problem was—well, one of his problems was—that he’d been so fucking riffed at Peyton’s criminal sense of entitlement, he hadn’t even thought about any injury—and then this female had taken him up here, where everything smelled like her, and sat him down, and stepped into his personal space and …

Yeah, he’d gotten hard.

The entire time she’d been doing her first aid thing, he’d been hoping, praying, to will himself back to flaccidity. No luck. It was like yelling at a pig. You looked like an idiot and the pig didn’t give a shit.

So here they were, standing in a bathroom that was like something out of The Devil Wears Prada— if Miranda Priestly had had a Jacuzzi scene—with him ridiculously aroused and Elise standing in front of him as if she couldn’t decide whether to cover her eyes and run …

Or find out what he felt like.

“This is a bad idea,” he muttered as he turned around, rearranged himself, and stalked out into her bedroom.

Great, all he could stare at was her bed … and imagine what she would look like naked on it.

“Wait,” she said. “Don’t go—”

He pivoted on her expensive carpet. “You need someone else.”

She kicked up her chin. “I don’t want someone else. I want you.”

Axe closed his eyes and tried not to read all kinds of bump and grind into that.

“Did you lose your mate?” she asked.

He shook his head to clear it. “What?”

“Your mate. Has it been … a while for you? Or something? And yes, I know that that’s a personal question, but come on,” she muttered dryly, “it’s not like we aren’t already there.”

For a second, he thought she had to be fishing for compliments … but her face was open, her eyes guileless, her affect as honest as a sunrise.

She literally had no idea why she affected him as she did.

Without meaning to, he focused on her lips—which had been the original problem for him: While she had been nursing him, doing so much better a job than he had with the cleaning and Band-Aid action, he had made eye-to-mouth contact and been instantly lost in wondering what she would taste like, feel like, be like. And not just with kissing—with everything.

As in naked bodies and desperate, hungry sex on repeat until they both passed out.

“The raids cost a lot of people their family,” she whispered. “It was a hard time for all of us.”

“No one needs to tell me that.”

She went quiet as if she were waiting for him to continue. When he didn’t, she shook her head. “Well, I’m sorry for whatever losses you had. I know … what that feels like.”

“Do you.”

“My cousin was murdered last month. It’s … been horrible. Especially as her brother had already been killed in the raids.”

From out of nowhere, and for no good reason he could think of, a fleeting pain lit off in his chest. “Death is always horrible. Unless it is your enemy.”

“I wouldn’t know … much about the war.”

“I’m going to go.”

After all, his head was now completely fucked, a debate raging between his rational side, which felt strongly that having sex with her on the job while at the same time confusing her with the ice-cold aristocrats who had killed his father would be totally unfair … and his bat-shit crazies, which were maintaining that sleeping with her while being paid for keeping her safe and tarring her with the same brush as those other glymera assholes was utterly logical.

“What exactly are you afraid of?” she murmured. “I find myself asking that again.”

He leveled a glare at her. “What?”

“Well, that’s just what I’m wondering. I mean, there’s nothing to be lost by sharing information and opinions and concerns as a means to a productive end—namely, you and I making it possible for me to go to school. You can ask me anything and I’ll tell you. I’m not afraid—and I guess I’m trying to reconcile this tough-guy, protective-exterior thing with how incredibly cowardly it is not to express yourself to someone else.”

Axe blinked.

Are you kidding me, he thought. Twice in one night?

“Let me ask you something,” he said.

Elise put her arms wide. “Anything. I’m an open book.”

“What is it about rich people that makes you believe you have a right to anything and everything? Not just material shit, but people’s lives, emotions, thoughts. You tell me it’s no big deal to talk about things? That I’m a fucking coward if I don’t reveal stuff about myself on demand?” He shrugged. “You don’t have any conception of my life or what I’ve been through, but unless I choose to give you that access, on your terms, on your timeline, suddenly I’m the one with the defect. You’re a stranger to me. I don’t know you. And I don’t have to get to know you. I don’t owe you any part of me.”

That shut her up.

And just as he was congratulating himself for putting her in her place, she pulled the rug out from under him. Again.

“God … you’re absolutely right.”

She walked across to her vanity, her graceful hand drifting over the silver brushes and the few compacts and lipsticks that were on it.

“I’m really sorry.” She looked over her shoulder at him and laughed awkwardly. “And to think I’m going for my doctorate in psychology. I should know more about interpersonal relating, right? Guess theory and practicality don’t always go hand in hand. I apologize.”

Annnnnnnnnd Axe blinked again.

Fuck. He hadn’t expected her to get his boundary. Much less respect it.

At a loss, he sat down at the foot of her bed.

Running his hand through his hair, he put his elbows on his knees and thought, Yeah, he really needed to get out of here and away from her.

But instead of leaving, he said, “I’ve never known anyone who’s gotten their doctorate before.”

All things considered, Elise thought, Axwelle had been right to call her on her shit: The thing that she had forgotten—and this was especially true when it came to new people—was that you had to meet folks where they were. Arousal aside, he’d never given her any indication that he was an open book, and she had pushed him too far because she had ascribed her own characteristics to him.

But she was encouraged that he hadn’t bolted out her door.

“Yes,” she said, clearing her throat. “My studies have been years and years of work. That’s why—well, that’s why I got ahead of myself just now. It’s been a huge investment of time and effort, and if I don’t complete my dissertation, I feel like it’s all been for nothing? And my father can be so hard for me to deal with. The fact that he’s given me this opportunity is a miracle, and I guess … I just don’t want to lose my shot.”

As she fell silent, he cracked his knuckles one by one. “I can’t help it.”

“Being defensive? Why wouldn’t you have been. I put you on the spot.”

“No. Being attracted to you.”

Elise tried to look calm as her heart skipped in her chest. But Lord help her, she nearly let out a giggle.

Straightening her spine, she decided to man up. “That’s okay. I can’t help being attracted to you.” As his head whipped up, she rolled her eyes. “Come on. It’s pretty damn obvious.”

Axwelle cleared his throat. “So you’re the psych pro. Don’t you think that means we shouldn’t work together?”

“At least we know what the issue will be instead of having to discover it.” There was a pause. “Okay, that was a joke. You’re supposed to laugh.”

When he didn’t even chuckle, she—

The snort he let out was probably one of the most unattractive sounds she’d ever heard in her life, part wounded gopher, part grizzly bear, part old car backfiring. And then he cursed and slapped a palm over his mouth.

“Oh, my God,” she blurted, “that is frickin’ adorable.”

Across the way, on her girlie bed, with its pretty coral bedspread and the framing drapes of fabric that hung from a medallion on the ceiling, the fighter in his black clothes and bandaged face and his kill-ya-soon-as-look-at-ya affect turned the color of a stop sign.

“I burped. That’s all.” He stretched his back and rolled his shoulder as if he wanted to remind himself he was packed with muscle. “Look, I’ve never done this bodyguarding thing before, so I don’t know what to expect with any of it. I think the question for you is, are you willing to bet your life on me? ’Cuz that’s what it all comes down to. We could go a hundred nights without anything happening, but it just takes one where something does. And then you’re not screwed—either in a sexual or a bad luck sense—you’re fucking dead.”

“Do you doubt yourself?”

He frowned. “You want the honest truth?”

“Always.” She held up her forefinger. “I want to go on record right now and say this loud and clear. I always want the truth from you. That’s more important to me than anything else—for reasons that you’ll no doubt come to understand.”

He cracked those knuckles again. Rolled his other shoulder.

“Personally, I think my attraction works for us—I mean, you. It increases my protective nature and will make me more lethal. I’m not bonded to you, and I won’t ever be, but I am male, and in fact, I’m so much more raw than the overbred pansies you’re used to dealing with. So, yeah, anyone tries to so much as brush the ends of your hair with their elbow, and I will kill them four times over before I light their corpse on fire.”

“Well, isn’t that something to put on a Valentine’s Day card.” Except he probably had a point. “And listen, I firmly believe we aren’t what we think, we’re what we do. You and I will keep things professional on a physical level and all will be well.”

Axwelle got to his feet in a rush. “Okay, text me when you need me tomorrow. I can work until one a.m., but then I have training.” He nodded, in a way that made it seem as if they had shaken hands, and then he went for her door. “I’ll show myself out—”

“Wait, so my schedule—”

“Just let me know.”

Boy, he’d had it with the conversating, hadn’t he.

“We can do this, you know,” she told his strong back. “It’s all going to be okay.”

“You say that now.” He opened the door wide. “Let’s hope at the end of it, however long it lasts, you feel the same.”

“Wait, I need your cell phone?”

He spoke the digits over his shoulder like an afterthought and then he kept on going through the jambs without seeming to care whether or not she caught them.

But he did care.

Underneath all that hard-as-nails exterior, he wasn’t as blasé as he wanted her to believe. Otherwise he wouldn’t have sat down and talked to her at all.

Heading over to the bank of windows that overlooked the front of the mansion, she pulled back the lacy privacy curtain and waited. A moment later, Axwelle emerged from the grand entrance, marching off down the slate walkway.

“Look at me,” she whispered. “Come on … you know you want to.”

In the back of her mind, she was oh-so-aware that self-righteous speeches about professionalism and self-control to the contrary, a part of her really wanted the male to pull a John Cusack on the front lawn.

Which was nuts.

And not as in clinically insane.

More as in a road she shouldn’t go down, given their circumstances.

The good news? As he continued to stride away from her house, he clearly wasn’t going to—

Axwelle stopped about fifteen feet past the third lantern on the walkway … and he stayed where he was for the longest time. Years, it seemed. Just before she was going to either give up or go down to see if that head injury she’d asked about had finally decided to make an appearance … he pivoted on one boot and glanced back.

His chin lifted as if his eyes were traveling up to the second floor.

With a squeak, Elise jerked back out of sight and let the curtain fall into place once more.

Her heart thundered behind her sternum and a hot flush made her take off her cashmere sweater like it was a medieval hair shirt.

As she turned away, she looked over at the sunken impression in the duvet where he’d sat on her bed. From out of nowhere, she wanted to go over and run her hand over the spot.

“What the hell am I doing?” she said into the silence of her bedroom.