CHAPTER 53: CHAPTER-53. (SMOKING HOT HUSBAND OF MINE- II).

The cold, distant, smoking-hot husband of mine stood there in all his glory.

He wore just a towel tied loosely around his waist, water still dripping from his hair, sliding down the lines of his chest and disappearing under the cotton like some cheap romantic movie scene that suddenly came alive to torment me.

I blinked. Once.

Twice. Three times. Nope.

Still there. Still towel. Still... way too much skin.

My mouth moved faster than my brain."Why are you just in a towel?" I blurted out, voice embarrassingly squeaky.

He raised one eyebrow, calm as if this whole situation wasn’t completely inappropriate. "The robe got soaked."

I frowned. "Soaked? How?"

He shrugged, like it wasn’t worth explaining. "It was hanging too close to the shower spray. Got drenched. This was faster."

Oh. Okay. Logical reason. Normal reason. Totally fine.Except nothing about this felt fine.

I was suddenly hyper-aware of everything....the way the towel clung a little too well to his hips, the way a droplet traced the sharp cut of his collarbone before sliding lower.

The faint steam still curled off his skin like the bathroom hadn’t been able to contain the heat.

My face heated so fast I was sure smoke was about to come out of my ears. "Well, you...you could’ve, I don’t know, brought another one from the closet or something," I muttered, crossing my arms so tightly across my chest it almost hurt.

He smirked. Of course, he smirked. "You’re very concerned about my wardrobe choices all of a sudden."

I almost choked. "I am not concerned. I just...people don’t walk around in towels like this, okay? This isn’t a... a locker room!"

His eyes flickered with something I couldn’t name, like he was watching a freaking idiot who did not know any better. "Relax. It’s just you here."

Just me.

Yeah, as if that made it better. If anything, it made it ten times worse because now I was the one trapped with him like this.

If it had happened back in between those three years, I would have agreed with him, but now..? When I caught him with that Becky...Becka, whatever that stupid shameless name was.

When I want nothing to do with him or anything concerning him, when I want to go far away from him as fast as possible, but cannot.

I was tied with the promise I gave to Grandpa Albert to take care of this fool, who also happened to be a total hottie, but a bigger a*s for God’s sake.

I spun around, pretending to fuss with the pillows on the bed. "Whatever. Do what you want."

But even with my back turned, I could feel him moving across the room.

The soft shuffle of bare feet against the carpet, the faint rustle of the towel. My brain screamed at me not to look, not to risk it, but my traitor eyes still darted sideways.

And, yep. Big mistake.

He was leaning down, picking up his phone from the nightstand, which meant the towel slipped just a little lower on his hips. My heart straight-up stopped.

I whipped my head forward again so fast my neck cracked.

God. This was not okay.

"You’re staring," he said casually, like he was commenting on the weather.

My head spun around, horrified. "I was not!" I tried to gather as much courage as possible not to look bothered, but Holy Lord knows how I was holding out.

He gave me that look...the unreadable, annoyingly calm one that always made me want to throw something at him. "You were." His simple words set my whole body on fire.

Holy Jesus, when will I escape from him and his one or two-word replies?

My cheeks flamed harder. "Shut up."

"Didn’t say anything," he replied, but there was definite amusement tugging at his lips now.

The third almost-smile today. Was it Christmas, or God just wanted to give me a heart attack by making me shock again and again?

I threw the pillow I’d been clutching at him. "You’re insufferable."

He caught it easily, like it weighed nothing, and tossed it back onto the bed. "And yet, you’re still here."

Ugh. Touché.

I sat down on the edge of the mattress, burying my face in my hands, groaning. "Why is this my life?"

For a moment, the room was quiet again, except for the faint creak of furniture as he finally sat down on the couch across from me.

When I peeked through my fingers, he was leaning back, one arm draped over the backrest, still in that towel, still infuriatingly relaxed, scrolling through his phone like none of this mattered.

Meanwhile, my brain was doing cartwheels.

I wanted to scream at him to put some damn clothes on.

I wanted to demand why he’d touched me like that at the table earlier.

I wanted to ask what we even were...husband and wife on paper, sure, but in reality?

Strangers?

Pretenders?

Something more dangerous than neither of us wanted to admit?

Instead, all that came out of my mouth was: "You’ll catch a cold like that."

I internally snapped at myself for making such an idiotic move.

He looked up, deadpan. "From a towel?"

I squirmed. "From... from not wearing enough. The air conditioner is on."

He tilted his head, that faint, almost-smile returning. "So you are concerned."

And that was it. My brain fried. My dignity died.

My only defense mechanism left was glaring at him as if that could burn a hole in his stupidly perfect face.

But the truth?

I couldn’t stop thinking about how close that towel was to betraying him.

And worse....how much I wanted it to do that. Seemed like that towel daydream was about to become a reality.

I instantly shook my head. Nope. No. Not happening. Brain, stop. Stop right now. Bad thoughts. Evil thoughts.

Go think about... math. Taxes. Grocery shopping. Literally anything else.

But of course, my brain was like, Nah fam, we’re staying here.