Page 86 of The Blonde Who Came in from the Cold
The largest clawfoot tub she’d ever seen was half full of sudsy water, and the air was thick with steam.
“Those bandages are watertight, but it’s probably best not to soak too long.”
Alex knew it was silly, but nothing had ever looked as good as that warm water, so she slid off the counter and tried to walk toward it.
“Easy,” he told her, hand on her elbow, his chest at her back.
She was wearing one of his white dress shirts. It hit her at midthigh and the sleeves were rolled up. She must have looked like death warmed over, but that’s not how he was looking at her.
“Do you want me to...” He made the universal motion forturn around, but Alex didn’t even have to think about the answer.
“No.”
She was far past modesty at that point. He’d already seen her. Dressed her. Cleaned her wounds. He’d saved her.
“Good,” he blurted. Alex started undoing buttons, but her hands didn’t want to work right. “I mean...” He was blushing. “I don’t want you to fall. Head injuries are...” The fabric parted. “Worse. They... bleed. And... bad. They’re bad. And...” Alex was stepping toward the water. “Here.”
He held her as she sank slowly in, watched her settle against the rolled lip of the tub like he knew he was supposed to leave but his feet weren’t taking orders at the moment.
“Sit up.” She didn’t even want to argue, and that’s how she knew she’d almost died. When she heard the water turn on again, felt the gentle spray from a handheld nozzle, it felt almost sinful, the way the warm water sluiced down the line of her spine.
“Close your eyes,” he told her, and then the warm water brushedagainst her scalp and down her filthy hair. “Lean back against me.” She let her head fall back and rest against the palm of his left hand while he gently worked shampoo through the strands with his right, and Alex forgot about nudity and wounds and mortal enemies. She wasn’t thinking about Russian bad guys or missions or feelings that were too dangerous for the CIA.
There was just King and the hot water and the feeling of big, strong hands that had no right to be that gentle. The water seeped into her battered bones, and it felt like coming clean in a way she’d never been.
“I’m okay now.”
It took a long time for him to whisper, “I’m not.”
Chapter Forty-Seven
Alex
The apartment was, in fact, art deco. Lovingly restored and preserved by King’s grandfather and then his father and now by King himself. High ceilings with ornate moldings and glossy hardwood floors. Tall windows with no curtains and rooms with no furniture. It was the apartment of a man who had everything he needed but nothing he wanted, and Alex tried to reconcile that with the man she thought she knew. Not for the first time, she tried to make King make sense.
There was only one closed door, so, of course, once she was clean and dry and steady on her feet, she opened it. She wasn’t prepared for what was waiting.
“What’s all this?”
It was probably supposed to be a guest room or maybe—in another life—a nursery. But King’s version had nothing to do with art deco. Instead, there were long metal tables and walls of monitors. The lights were off but the whole room glowed red and green, like Technology Christmas. It was a maze of devices and wires and whiteboards covered in scrawl.
Some might have wondered if that was what the inside of King’s mind looked like, but Alex knew better. King’s mind was straight rows and laser-printed labels, alphabetized shelves and color-coded files. King’s mind was perfect. This room, though—this was where King could let his mind go free.
She was just starting to tell herself that she shouldn’t be there when she saw it—a stone that was small and green and precious. Andthen, instead of feeling cold in Berlin, she was hot in Cartagena. She was watching Merritt hand King a little bag full of emeralds. She saw him dump them out on his palm and then examine one small stone.
Thatsmall stone.
“I dropped one. In the hotel room that first day,” a voice said from the door. He’d put on a pair of jeans and a dry shirt, but his socks were still mismatched and that one detail made her want to cry, but she didn’t have any idea how to explain it, so she just pointed a finger at him.
“No, you didn’t. You palmed it. Youstoleit!” she accused. Or teased. Even she wasn’t sure of the difference.
He gave a guilty grin. A little shrug. And then the shy confession of, “I tinker.”
The words didn’t make any sense—at least not at first. But then she watched the way he scanned the room. It was his domain, but it was like he was seeing it for the first time because he was seeing it through her.
Alex ran a hand over the glossy shelves. “I love what you’ve done with the place.”
“It clears my mind. Working with my hands. Doing things. Building things.”
