"Then tell me which one you usually sleep in, and I'll take the other."
Hunter's flat stare didn't change one iota. "They are furniture. I have no attachment to either one."
"No attachment," Brock muttered around a low curse. "You can say that again, man. Maybe you can give me some pointers on that don't-give-a-damn-about-anything attitude of yours. I'm thinking it would come in real fucking handy from time to time. Especially when it comes to women."
With a growl, he tossed his gear onto the bunk at his left, then scrubbed his palm over his face and the top of his head. The groan that leaked out of him was ripe with frustration and the pent-up lust he'd been stifling since he'd forced himself to walk away from Jenna and the temptation he sorely didn't need.>He was in pain.
Staggering pain--just as she had been, not a few minutes before his touch had seemed to ease her agony away.
Realization dawned on her then.
He wasn't just calming her with his hands. He was somehow pulling her pain out of her. He was siphoning it, willingly drawing her pain into himself.
Offended by the idea, but even more embarrassed that she had let herself lie there and imagine that his touch was something more than pity, Jenna flinched out of his reach and scuttled into a seated position on the sofa. She breathed hard with outrage as she stared into his dark eyes, which flashed with specks of amber light.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?" she gasped, leaping to her feet.
The muscle that had been ticking in his jaw gave a tight twitch as he stood up to face her. "Helping you."
Images crowded into her mind in an instant--a sudden vivid recollection of the aftermath of her captivity with the creature who'd invaded her cabin in Alaska.
She'd been in pain then, too. She'd been terrified and in shock, awash in so much confusion and horror, she thought she might die from it.
And she remembered the warm, caring hands that comforted her. The face of a grimly handsome stranger who'd come into her life like a dark angel and kept her safe, kept her sheltered and calm, when everything in her world had been thrown into chaos.
"You were there," she murmured, stunned to realize it only just now.
"In Alaska, after the Ancient was gone. You stayed with me. You took away my pain then, too. And later, after I was brought here to the compound. My God ... did you stay at my side all of the time I was in the infirmary?"
His eyes remained fixed on her, dark and unreadable. "I was the only one who could help you."
"Who asked you to?" she demanded, knowingly harsh, but desperate to purge the heat that was still traveling through her, unbidden and unwanted.
Bad enough he'd thought it necessary to coddle her like some kind of child through her prolonged ordeal. All the worse when he seemed to think it was necessary to do so now, as well. She'd be damned before she let him think for one second that she had actually welcomed his touch.
His expression still pained from what he'd done for her a few moments ago, he shook his head and blew out a low curse. "For a woman who doesn't want anyone's help, you sure seem to need it a lot."
She barely resisted the temptation to tell him where he could shove that sentiment. "I can take care of myself."
"Like you did last night in the city?" he challenged. "Like you did just a few minutes ago in the tech lab, right before my arms were the only thing that came between your stubborn ass and the floor?"
Humiliation stung her cheeks like a slap. "You know what? Save us both some grief, and don't do me any more favors."
She spun away from him and started walking toward the door that was still open onto the corridor outside. Each miraculously painless step she took only heightened her anger at Brock. Made her all the more determined to put as much distance between them as possible.
Before she got within a yard of the threshold, he was standing in front of her. Blocking her path, even though she hadn't seen or heard him move.
She stopped short. Gaped at him, astonished by the preternatural speed he evidently had at his control.
"Get out of my way," she said, and tried to move past him.
He sidestepped her, putting his immense body directly in front of her.
The intensity of his gaze told her he wanted to say something more, but Jenna didn't want to hear it. She needed to be alone.
Needed space to think about everything that had happened to her ...
everything that was still happening, growing more terrifying all the time.