to keep retreating. She could see a hint of danger in Rafe’s eyes and feared that the artifice of civility was about to dissolve between them. Her gaze darted around the room as she tried to decide what she would do if he came after her. He stood between her and the door. The bed blocked her only other route of escape.
She really didn’t want to get anywhere near that bed right now.
“Did you tell him about me?” Katie said. Though it wasn’t what she really wanted to know, she suddenly, desperately, didn’t want to push her luck. “I was just wondering…could he take me into town?”
Rafe relaxed slightly. “Yeah, he knows you’re here. He agreed that the roads are impassable right now, even by snowmobile.”
“And let me guess…he doesn’t own a phone, either?”
Rafe’s guard went back up. “No, he doesn’t.” He paused, then said, gruffly, “It’s a different lifestyle out here. We don’t rely on technology the way your kind does.”
“My kind?” She took another inadvertent step backward. His labeling her as some sort of other reminded her of the way his neighbor had spat out the word human.
He looked away. “City folk.”
“Of course.” She no longer cared about getting answers. She only wanted him to leave the room. “Okay. Thank you.”
But he didn’t leave. He didn’t even react. Instead he stood eerily still as some kind of internal battle seemed to play out, one that Katie could plainly see but didn’t understand. When he suddenly lifted his hand to reach for her, she gasped and flinched away.
He jerked as though she’d struck him. “You think I’m going to hurt you.”
She shook her head in weak denial.
“You do.” Rafe moved out of her space. As he did, Katie’s attention drifted downward, to the incredible bulge in his pants. He followed her gaze and scowled, covering himself with his hands. “I’m not going to hurt you.”
“Then why are you lying to me?” Katie’s hand flew to her mouth as soon as the accusation escaped. She hadn’t meant to say that.
“I’m not going to hurt you.” He stepped closer and she backed up until she bumped up against the edge of the mattress. “Look at my face, in my eyes. I could never hurt you.”
She did look, not that she needed to, because what she saw in his face was the same thing she heard in his voice. Utter and complete sincerity. Devotion. The scary part was that she believed him. But he still hadn’t answered her question. With courage she didn’t understand, she said, “Tell me why you’re lying to me.”
“What do you think I’m lying about?”
“What happened after you brought me home?” He claimed that he couldn’t hurt her, and at this point, she assumed she was about to find out. “You did something to me, didn’t you?”
Rafe turned and walked to the door. “Do you need anything else before I turn in for the night?”
“Are you just going to ignore me?” Somehow, his avoidance was almost worse than the anger she’d expected. Without thinking, Katie followed him for a few steps. “Rafe, please tell me what happened. Whatever it is. What did you do to me?”
“Nothing.” He swiveled around and glared at her. “Listen to me: you are going to stay in this bedroom. Use the bathroom if you’d like. I will bring you food and water and whatever else you need. Just ask. You can keep the door closed, and I’ll only bother you to cater to your every need. If I had some way to allow you to lock me out, I’d let you do that, too. All I can do is promise that I will not enter this room without your explicit permission.”
The genuine hurt in his tone reduced her to feeling like an ungrateful bitch. “Rafe—“
“I don’t know what you think I might do to you, but I promise that I will not touch you, hit you, kiss you, fuck you, or otherwise injure you in any way. When I brought you back here last night, all I did was try to help you. I warmed you up. That’s all I was trying to do.”
He sounded so genuine, but she knew what she’d heard. Disappointment burned in her chest, making it hard to breathe. She desperately wanted to believe him, to take comfort in his presence and view him as her protector, but she couldn’t trust anything he said. Not when he was keeping secrets. At the risk of insulting the man who’d saved