Free Conflicted (Undercover #2) by Helena Newbury Page B

shiver.
    “We need to get you inside and warmed up,” he told me.
    “We—” I shivered again. Now that I’d started, I couldn’t stop. “We need to t—talk about this.”
    He shook his head. “Later.” And he scooped me up in his arms, cradled me to his chest and carried me below deck.
     
    ***
     
    The stateroom had an attached bathroom and there was a huge corner bath. Luka started it running and then undressed me. I was shivering too much to do anything but stand there as he peeled my clothes off. It was very different to how he’d ripped and yanked at things before, in order to fuck me. This was like watching a giant undress a china doll.
    When I was naked, he lifted me and slid me gently into the tub. I gasped as the water covered me, numb skin prickling painfully. But it worked—I could feel the cold receding and I stopped shivering.
    We sat there looking at each other and the weirdness of the scene, of him sitting there watching me naked in the bath, made both of us smile.
    I glanced down at myself—at my hair, bedraggled and damp from the sex and the sea air and now the bath; at my imperfect body; at all the broken parts he couldn’t see, the nightmares and the fears and the insecurities. What the hell does he see in me? I wondered. And yet I’d glimpsed that need in him and now he’d admitted it. This wasn’t just about sex, anymore. This was definitely turning into something deeper. Maybe, in time—
    I suddenly caught myself. I’d completely forgotten who I was and why I was there. The moment we’d had out on the deck had let me get lost in a cozy little fantasy where I was a genuine girlfriend, and not doing all this in order to stab him in the back.
    Luka frowned, concerned. “Are you okay? You look worried.”
    It felt as if my heart was being wrenched out. The one guy I’d connected with, the one guy who’d made me feel alive again, and I was going to have to betray him.
    “Fine,” I said with a smile. “I’m fine.”

 
     
     
     
     
     

     
     
    I woke to the sound of a hard, heavy thumping that I couldn’t identify.
    As I sat up groggily, I saw that I was in the bed in the stateroom. I blushed as I realized I was totally naked. Things were hazy after the bath, but I dimly remembered crawling between the sheets, exhausted.
    I focused on where the sound was coming from and gasped.
    Luka was stripped to the waist and hitting a punching bag that hung from the ceiling. He was barefoot, wearing only a pair of loose drawstring pants, and his muscles were gleaming with sweat.
    I’d seen guys hitting bags at the gym, on the rare occasions I managed to work up the energy to go. But they hadn’t looked like this. They’d danced around the bag, hitting it in different places: nifty little crosses and uppercuts.
    Luka just hit.
    The bag was old and worn and, now that I looked, it swung from a hook. That explained why it hadn’t been there before—he must have had it stashed in a closet and only brought it out that morning. He was wearing hand wraps, but the material was worn, too, and they weren’t even the same color, one red and one black.
    I knelt up on the bed for a better look. Each blow was a powerful sweep of arm, terminating in a brutal impact that lifted the bag as if it weighed nothing. It looked as if he’d punch clear through a brick wall, given the chance. He wasn’t showy or fast. He was just strong. And he looked as if he could keep going all day. From the sweat shining on him, he’d already been at it for hours.
    I was embarrassed to feel a flicker of heat twist down to my groin. I squeezed my thighs together self-consciously, but couldn’t stop looking at his muscles. There was just something about that brutal strength, that danger. I shifted and the bed creaked.
    He turned suddenly and saw me. “Sorry,” he said. “Did I wake you?”
    I shook my head. “I didn’t know you boxed.”
    “I don’t box.” He looked at the bag as if embarrassed. “I hit