This was not good.

He took the coldest shower he could tolerate. He didn’t shut off the water until his dick had gone limp. By the time he emerged she was asleep again. She hadn’t bothered to put her shorts back on and he got an unfettered view of her beautiful ass (which woke his dick back up) before he turned the bathroom light off.

He dared to get back in bed with her. He had promised to stay the night, after all.

North shifted uneasily as Faith slept beside him, her breathing slow and even. She rolled close and flung an arm over him. Fucking misery. He could feel the hammer of her heart against his side and all of him pulled tight as a wire about to pop free.

Not good. How he came to be in this position, this role of comfort giver, he couldn’t fathom. He didn’t do this.

In prison, after Knox and Reid left, he kept his head down. He never played hero. A guy would get himself killed at the Rock trying to be a hero. He’d learned to turn a blind eye. To look away and ignore the cries for help. He’d gotten really good at that—he’d killed his humanity to survive. And yet now here he was . . . rescuing women and giving comfort and solace. Pleasuring her but taking none for himself.

Oh, he’d enjoyed it. He could still taste her sweetness on his tongue. But his cock ached. His balls burned from lack of release.

What he should do was roll her over and do what he’d been fantasizing about since he first spotted her getting out of her car.

She wouldn’t resist. She was too vulnerable right now. And the way she had screamed and responded to him, he knew he aroused her. Traumatized or not, he could have her climaxing and clawing his back in no time.

Dawn tinged the sky, lightening the room as his conscience (what was left of it) battled against his willpower. He closed his eyes tightly, forcing himself not to look at that ass, at the pussy his mouth knew so well now. His cock wanted to know it, too.

He couldn’t take her. Not like this. There was some humanity left to him, after all, he supposed.

With a muffled curse, he climbed out of the bed, moving stealthily, careful not to look at her, not to wake her as he slipped from her bed.

“North?” Her voice sounded fuzzy and still half asleep.

He hesitated at her door before turning to face her.

She sat up, rubbing at one eye. He wished it was still dark so that he didn’t have to see her like this. “Where are you going?” she asked.

“It’s morning now.”

“Barely.”

“You asked me to stay the night. I did.”

She stiffened, dropping her hand. “I’m sorry it was such a chore for you.”

“That’s okay. You had a rough night. You needed someone with you.”

She nodded stiffly. He knew he’d made it sound like he didn’t want to be here with her, but that was for the best.

“Thanks,” she said, her voice cold, distant. As though she were totally unaffected by him. “I appreciate you taking such good care of me. It must have been torture.”

She would never know the extent of his torment. Touching her, tasting her and then turning away practically killed him.

“No problem,” he reassured her as though he hadn’t caught her sarcasm.

“Don’t worry. I won’t trouble you again.”

He hesitated. She hardly seemed like a traumatized victim this morning. Even with the bruises marring her throat, she looked strong. Composed as she sat in the bed staring at him coolly.

He wanted to crawl between those sheets with her and finish what they started, wrecking that perfect composure. Except she was still the sheriff’s sister and a white-picket-fence kind of girl—exactly the type of trouble he had vowed to avoid—and he was still North Callaghan.

He would never say the right thing. Never do the right thing.

Never be the kind of guy she deserved.

Without a word, he turned and walked out of her house.

Three days later, Faith was finally having that second date with Brendan. She’d seen North once in the few days. Only from afar. When she’d been checking her mail, she watched him pull into the driveway and go inside the house.

So the sudden text from him caught her off guard. Why was he reaching out to her? Was he feeling guilty about the way he’d walked out on her?

She stared down at that text on her phone. Just seeing that single word, knowing he was texting her, thinking about her, made her stomach pitch.

Sucking in a bracing breath, she replied. Hey. How are you?

Was this his way of alleviating his conscience and verifying that she was okay after Grimes’s attack? Or was he concerned that making out with her and then walking out on her had devastated her?

Honestly, he’d flipped a switch inside her, waking a part of her that had been long dormant. She dreamed of him, waking up panting, her sex aching and clenching.

Last night she had actually resorted to taking Mister Right out from her drawer. He’d gotten the job done, but just barely. Her O had been elusive. She’d finally gotten herself off by visualizing North. By remembering his mouth and hands on her. She channeled that memory and that had done it, brought her to shattering release.

Shaking off the thought, her fingers flew. I’m doing really well. Getting ready for a date.

Rage burned through her. Who was he to make that judgment? You don’t know that.

Faith didn’t even know that. Not yet. Maybe tonight would be the night that nice grew into stupendous.

He was daring her? She narrowed her gaze and marched upstairs. At her dresser, she opened the drawer and riffled through it until she found her matching black bra and panties. Not the most comfortable lingerie she owned but definitely the sexiest—and the most color coordinated.

She snatched up her phone again and typed: Challenge accepted. Happily.

She attacked the keys on her phone, stabbing them with her fingers. I will. I’m picking out my sexiest underwear now.

He didn’t reply to her goad.

She stared down at her phone for several moments, her temples pounding.

Her doorbell rang. She glanced at the clock. Two minutes before the hour. Brendan was punctual, of course. She hurriedly stripped out of her clothes and swapped lingerie.

Dressed again, she smoothed a hand down the sleeveless blouse she wore, willing her stomach flutters into submission. Flutters, sadly, that were not a result of her impending date despite the avowal she had just made to see if Brendan could get her rocks off.

Touching up her lipstick, she nodded at her reflection one final time before heading downstairs.

Let the night begin.

North didn’t know what was worse. Faith being on a date with Fancy Pants or Faith entertaining him privately at her house.

Okay, at her house where they were alone with a bed in proximity was definitely the worse-case scenario. No doubt about it. And daring her to get intimate with the guy was about the dumbest thing he had ever done short of landing himself in prison.

He stared down at her texts, rereading the messages.

Fuck that.

He charged to the door and yanked it open, only to see the Audi already parked neatly in the driveway directly behind Faith’s car.

He was already here.

North shut his door. Hard.

He paced his living room, thinking about her next door with some guy that North had all but told her to go ahead and fuck. What if she thought he didn’t care what she did? What if that made a difference for her?

What then?