My hand hesitates on the lock. I take another breath, then slide the door open just a crack, peering out.
Vega has his back to me, pulling a black tee shirt over his head. And there they are. My breath catches in my throat. Four parallel scratches, angry and red, rake down the taut muscles of his back. A vivid, brutal signature left by my own fingernails. A fresh wave of heat, this one pure mortification, washes over me. I did that. In a frenzied desperation, I marked him.
He pulls the shirt down, covering the evidence, and turns as if he sensed me watching. "Did you like the view?" he asks, that infuriating, knowing smirk back on his face.
I step out, trying to act nonchalant. "What view? I didn't see anything."
"Really?" His smirk widens. In one fluid motion, he grabs the hem of his shirt and pulls it back up, past his stomach, past the defined ridges of his abs, stopping just below his chest.
