Ruth.”

She sucked in a breath at the sound of his voice, a smoky caress. Evan filled the kitchen doorway, his face shadowed for a moment. Then he stepped into the light, and stole the air from her lungs.

He was so fucking gorgeous.

He moved towards her, so slow and deliberate that she should have panicked. She should have felt clumsy or awkward or uncomfortable. Instead, she looked at him and remembered comfort and laughter and contentment, and somehow those memories short-circuited all her defences.

Ruth turned to the sink and dropped their mugs into the waiting water. She was suddenly and unreasonably outraged, because this wasn’t supposed to happen. It didn’t make sense. There were friends, and then there were men you’d shag senseless. He couldn’t be both, and yet somehow, he was, and if she blew up from the pressure of wanting him it would be all his fault.

She certainly wasn’t making him any more tea, the inconvenient bastard. He could survive on fresh air for the rest of his life, for all she cared. What the bloody hell did he think he was doing, looking at her like that? Being all gorgeous and smouldering and… ugh.

While she scowled at the sink, he moved closer. So close that she could feel his presence, even as she refused to look up. His face—his beautiful bloody face—would only make things worse.

“You do realise,” he said, “that you’re talking to yourself.”

She blinked. Finally, foolishly, looked up at him. “I beg your pardon?”

He was closer than she’d thought. His eyes were almost electric, heavy-lidded, his lips parted. This was how he looked when he wanted.

“You’re talking to yourself,” he repeated, his voice a gentle rasp. “And I heard every word you just said.”

Ruth swallowed, forcing moisture into her suddenly dry throat. “You can go now.”

“No thank you.” His voice was low, husky, raw enough to make her stomach flip and her heart rate spike. “I think I’ll stay here.”

Every night, there came a point when she gave him the option to leave. Every night, he took it. And now, all of a sudden, he was… not.

Oh, dear.

“You don’t like the way I look at you, Ruth?”

“I don’t know what you mean.” She stared down at the bubbles in the sink and licked her lips.

“That’s what you said. I heard you. Do you want me to leave? Because if that’s what you want—”

“It’s not,” she blurted out. Who the fuck said that? It couldn’t have been her. Except, it definitely was.

“I didn’t think so.” His strong fingers reached out to cage her wrist, and sensation soared through her. His skin was warm against hers, the heat of his body pushing into her like a tidal wave. He was right there. She couldn’t ignore him.

He wouldn’t allow it.

“You ran away,” he said, his voice softer now. “Why?”

She swallowed, forcing herself to look up at him. “I… I don’t know.”

His lips quirked, full and soft beneath that thick, sandy beard. She’d spent too many nights this week wondering how that beard might feel against her skin.

“I do,” he murmured.

Desire bloomed between her legs—not like a flower, but like the mushroom cloud of an explosion. She knew what Marjaana would say right now. Talk.

Meeting his gaze, she asked, “What are you doing?”

His thumb skated over the inside of her wrist. “This is called flirting.”

“This is not flirting.”

He smiled. “Too much?” His hand slid from her wrist to her palm, their fingers locking together. Beneath the heat in his gaze, she saw that ever-present concern. “Tell me to stop, and I’ll stop. You know that, don’t you?”

Silently, her pulse thundering in her ears, Ruth nodded. His hand tightened around hers.

“There’s something I’ve been wanting to do,” he said. “And I know you don’t take hints well.”

Ruth bit down on a smile. Somehow, in the middle of all this shimmering tension, he managed to make her smile.

“So I’ve decided to ask you outright,” he murmured.

His hands moved to her waist, tightening before she could process the sudden touch. He lifted her, just slightly—enough for her to perch on the edge of the sink. Then he let go. But she still felt the ghost of that unexpected pressure, the heat of his palms burning through her clothes. Bubbles soaked into the seat of her pyjamas, and she didn’t even mind. Her underwear was already wet.

“Ask me what?” Ruth whispered. Now they were face-to-face. She allowed herself, for a moment, to float into the sky of his eyes.

He leaned in, his hands resting on the counter either side of her. She held her breath as he lowered his head to her throat, his nose grazing her racing pulse. “You always smell like chocolate,” he said. His beard tickled, and so did his whisper. “Chocolate and coconut. Why is that?”

“Is that what you want to ask me?”

“No. I’m just curious.” He shifted closer, and she opened her thighs, and he slid between them like it was home.

Ruth swallowed. “It’s cocoa butter. And coconut oil.”

“What does that mean?”

“Evan,” she said, her hands gripping the edge of the sink. “Ask me what?”

He relented, a smile teasing his lips. “I wanted to ask if I could kiss you.”

She didn’t reply. It seemed both difficult and unnecessary. Instead, Ruth raised her hands to his face, sliding her fingers into that rugged, blonde beard. Holding him in place. She didn’t want to fuck this up, because this was Evan, and somehow, Evan was everything.

She leaned forward, inch by inch, until she could see the silver-gold of his eyelashes. He was so still that, if she hadn’t felt his gentle breath against her lips, she might’ve thought he’d stopped breathing at all.

And then, because he was Evan, he spoke.

“I think,” he murmured, “you’re supposed to close your eyes.”

She whispered, “You first.”

“Would that make you feel better?”

“Yes.”

He closed his eyes. “Can I touch you?”

Fuck. Why did he have to ask that? Why did he have to be the kind of man who needed an answer, who needed to know what she wanted?

Because he was Evan, and he cared, and that was why she liked him in the first place. Ruth knew that. But it didn’t stop the panic clawing at her chest, and suddenly she realised with startling clarity that the panic never really left, and she was absolutely fucking sick of it.

He was right there, and he was beautiful, and he wanted her, and she wanted—

A bell rang.

Ruth yelped and fell into the sink.

“Shit,” Evan laughed. His eyes were open now. His face was calm and lovely and barely intimidatingly sexy at all. Except for all the ways in which it was.

But Ruth didn’t have time to think about that, because she was dying of embarrassment.

“What the fuck was that?” She gasped, clapping a hand over her heaving chest.

He gave her a strange look, even as he pulled her gently from the sink. Just the firm grasp of his hands around her biceps made her breath hitch. How embarrassing.

“It was your doorbell,” he said when she was safely on two feet, her backside dripping.

Oh. Right. The doorbell. Ruth had kind of forgotten how that sounded.

“Um…” She looked down, as if a code of conduct was written on the kitchen lino.

Evan pushed her chin up gently, until she looked at him. She shouldn’t be as aroused by the sweetness of his smile as she had been by his touch, but somehow she was. “Want me to get it?”

“Oh, would you?”

He went without another word, and Ruth sagged in relief. It was silly. She knew it was silly. After all, she hadn’t always been so… anxious. She’d grown up confident. With a mother and sister like hers, how could she not be?

Then again, all it had taken to destroy that confidence was one hard knock. So maybe she’d been faking all along.

With a sigh, Ruth hurried off to her room. If she was quick, she could change her pyjamas.