Traipsing after him, even more perturbed than before, I headed into the bathroom and watched him wade under the rainfall showerhead.
“Eoghan, I want to know what’s wrong.”
Did he know the level of courage I needed to face him with this? After the shaving disaster that Cammie had helped me with, we’d grown closer, but it was still hard approaching him with these things.
He never disrespected me, always celebrated me, applauded my strengths and did his best to shore up my weaknesses, but he’d never been like this before.
Not since we were married at any rate.
Even that night when Aela had come into our lives, when she’d asked for help from the O’Donnellys in freeing a man who’d been kidnapped by the Famiglia, and when Declan had been injured in the fray, Eoghan had opened up to me.
I knew he’d done some bad things that night, knew he’d taken some lives, and he’d broken down, but I’d been his soft place to land. Why wasn’t he letting that happen now?
Staring at him, I started to strip off and I wandered under the water too. I grabbed the shower pouf he never used, splatted some body wash on it and then started to take over for him.
He heaved a sigh, grating out, “Inessa, I don’t have time for this.”
“You make time,” I insisted, staring up at him as I smoothed the sponge over his shoulders.
His mouth tightened, but he held his tongue as I washed him.
He was so tense it was a wonder he didn’t cramp up, and the distance between us felt like an ocean, but with every moment that passed, I felt him come back to me.
Dropping to my knees, I moved the sponge over his legs, careful to clean him how I knew he cleaned himself—he was anal in the shower too—and when I looked up at him from my position, his dick was in the way, and his eyes were on me.
Then he stunned the hell out of me by intoning, “Run.”
Pretty certain that I’d misunderstood him, that he was asking me to bend over so he could launch himself at me, I muttered, “What?”
“Run, Inessa. Run.”
His nostrils flared when I didn’t obey, and then he started to count, and I had no idea why, but his somber tone had me releasing a nervous chuckle.
I got to my feet, staring into those wildly frigid eyes of his, and that was when my heart started to beat faster.
“Eoghan?”
He pushed his forehead against mine, his breath brushing against my lips as the heat and the steam from the shower curled around us.
“Run.”
From him?
Never.
He must have seen the answer on my lips because he rasped, “Please.”
I could never be scared of this man. My man. But I could see that, for whatever reason, he was scared.
Of himself.
Around me.
There was a plea in his eyes as he begged me silently, and while I didn’t understand, I did as he bade.
Darting out of the shower, being as careful as I could on the tiles, I took off. The only trouble was, I had no idea where I was running to.
Was this role play?
It wasn't the first time he'd chased me, but it was the first time he'd acted so weird beforehand.
Starting for the kitchen, I rushed inside only to hear the shower cut off. Ears pricked, I heard him leave the bathroom and then he whispered, “You can run but you can’t hide from me, Inessa.”
Instead of feeling sickened by his words—if that was his intent—my nipples tightened, and I felt the blood rushing in my veins as he approached the kitchen.
Lungs burning, my fight-or-flight instincts kicked in. He watched me as he moved around the island, but it was different than usual.
I felt… hunted.
I veered the other way, rushing off and through the door into the dining room.
His hand snapped at mine, and he almost caught me. I let out a shocked laugh as I sped up, rushing around the table.
As I made it to the doorway, my mind raced with the peculiarity of what was happening, and it keyed me further into the fact that my husband was not okay.
Hearing his heavy footsteps behind me, I rushed inside the living room. I made to run between the sofas, but he followed me, cornering me, until I was backed up against the window.
My heart was pounding like crazy from the run and the weird adrenaline rush this had triggered, and because windows and I were friends, I'd admit, my core started to ache.
Standing there, in my birthday suit, completely naked as I stared at my also naked husband, I had no idea what was happening when I found myself getting turned on, but Eoghan wasn't similarly afflicted—his cock wasn't even hard as he approached me.
This wasn't about sex.
So what the hell was it about?
I felt the glass against my spine, so cold against my heated flesh, and I slid to the side as he came nearer.
This was Eoghan.
He'd never hurt me.
Pissing me off was another matter entirely.
Whatever this was, it was about him.
Whatever it was that was keeping him up at night. That had him flinching at sounds and wearing sunglasses outside even though it was getting dark at six.
“Eoghan. What’s going on?”
“Inessa,” he crooned, like I was the wild beast here, not him.
Something flickered in his eyes, some warmth, like he was coming back to me. As if he’d been somewhere else.
I knew he had PTSD—whether he thought he did or not was another matter entirely—but this was the first time it had manifested like this.
It spoke of my confidence in him that I took a leap of faith.
Literally.
I hurled myself at him, and while he jerked in surprise at the move, he managed to steady himself but it was too late.
We fell backwards thanks to my tackling him like we were playing a goddamn game of football, with the only consolation being that there was a soft landing as we collided with the sofa.
Then, he was on top of me, looming over me, his face an inch away from mine.
Brennan had taught me enough self-defense moves that I could reverse this position if need be, but Eoghan whispered, “Imagine being at the end of my crosshairs. Imagine not knowing that your life was about to end. Imagine not knowing that I see every move you make.
“Instead of landing on a sofa, you get a bullet to the chest or worse, to the head.” His mouth tightened as he pressed his forehead against mine. “Can you imagine that?”
So that was what this was about!
He was scared of losing me.
My husband was beyond intelligent, but where emotions were concerned, he was a Neanderthal.
Love filled me, concern and need warring with it as I tried to figure out how to help him.
How to reassure him about something that was entirely out of my hands.
That wasn't an impossible feat, was it?
I went limp under him then let my legs come up to cup his, lifting my arms to embrace him as I asked, “Why do you want me to imagine all those things?”
“Because I…” He sucked in a breath, and as I looked into those beautiful eyes that had graced me with so much affection over the length of our marriage, I saw the way his pupils were constricted.
They were so tiny, it was like he’d done drugs, but I knew my husband. As much as this situation was an anomaly, he didn’t do drugs.
The physiological response was out of his control, and it made me think about all the other stuff he'd been doing recently.