Sucking in a noisy breath that fractured the quiet, I clung to the metal poll that spanned vertical from the sloping roof to the thin carpeting under my bare feet. Either I was dizzy from the drugs…or the floor was moving. A staircase called to me, daring me to climb and see what lay beyond, but I couldn’t get my hands to let go of the bar. The floor swayed again, and I heard his steps an instant before his fingers curled around my bicep.

“What are you doing out here?” His voice traveled down my spine, and for several moments, silence blared through my ears like a reprimand. My limbs stiffened, muscles tensing to keep from shaking. He pried my fingers from the metal and turned me around to face him. Water dripped from his hair, running down his chest, squiggling down the lines of his tattoos. His green eyes drank me up, and the weight of that stare wrapped around me like a blanket, entrapping me in the cocoon of his ire.

“C’mon,” he said, tugging me back into the stifling bedroom.

“Can you stop for a minute?” My heart pounded in my throat as I fought his grip.

“What part of naked did you not understand?” He whirled me around and abruptly let go. I stumbled backward and plopped onto the bed.

“The part where you let me think you were dead! That’s the part I don’t understand.”

He swung his arms out to the sides. “What do you want from me, Alex?”

“I want to know how you could walk away like that? How you could say you love me one minute then fucking disappear the next!”

With a sigh, he lowered his head. “I can’t give you an explanation.”

“Can’t or won’t?”

He peeked up through thick lashes. “Won’t. You begged for my fucking darkness, well here it is, sweetheart. You’ve got it.”

I studied him, struggling to catch my breath. He was holding something back, something he didn’t want me to know. Because he was scared? I folded my arms, all too aware of the sound my jacket made with the movement, and how he wanted it gone along with the rest of my clothing.

“Whatever you’re hiding—”

“Who says I’m hiding anything?”

I held his gaze. “The way you’re looking at me is telling me you’re hiding something. Please, Rafe. I need you. All of you.” Like he’d promised, with no walls standing between us. No secrets.

“Please,” I begged again in a whisper. “Why’d you do it?”