Chapter 381. First Time Seeing Lia Acting So Bold... Oil Is Her Favorite.**

With fingers that still felt slightly clumsy from nerves, she began to change. Every movement felt foreign, as if she were stepping into someone else’s skin.

When she finally caught her reflection in the polished bronze mirror, she froze. The fabric clung to her curves in ways that made her feel exposed and dangerously powerful all at once.

She looked soft where she was usually hard; she looked inviting where she was usually guarded.

She looked like someone she didn’t recognize, and yet, for the first time in years, she felt utterly, terrifyingly alive.

She picked up the oil vial, her knuckles white around the glass.

"Okay," she whispered to her reflection, squaring her shoulders. "Here goes everything."

Lia stood outside the heavy curtain separating the dressing room from the bathchamber, her heart performing a frantic rhythm against her sternum.

Her skin felt hypersensitive, every inch of her exposed to the cool air, the thin fabric of the bikini offering almost no protection from the vulnerability she felt.

She could hear the faint sound of water lapping against the stone. William was still there, waiting, blissfully unaware of the storm she was about to unleash.

She pushed the curtain aside. The steam parted like a veil as she stepped back into the amber-lit sanctuary.

William was leaning back against the stone edge of the tub, his eyes half closed in apparent relaxation. But as the silhouette of her body cut through the haze, his eyes snapped open. The transformation in his expression was instantaneous.

The exhaustion didn’t vanish; it was overridden by something primal, something raw. His jaw didn’t just drop; it locked in a moment of pure, unadulterated shock.

His gaze traveled from her flushed face, down the exposed curve of her throat, over the daringly thin fabric that clung to her breasts and hips, before finally locking back onto her eyes.

"William Wade," she said.

The sound of his full name, spoken in that low, husky register she rarely used, cut through the humid air like a blade. It wasn’t the call of a student to a mentor; it was the claim of a woman to a man.

William found his voice, though it sounded strangled, foreign to his own ears. "Lia... what in the gods’ name..."

His gaze betrayed him immediately, darting down again, unable to resist the sight of her. "What are you wearing?"

Lia felt a surge of heat that had nothing to do with the bathwater.

"This?" she asked, stepping closer, the water sloshing softly around her ankles.

She held up the small, ornate vial, letting the candlelight catch the amber liquid inside. "It’s a surprise... a gift."

"For everything you’ve done for the training, for the protection, and for carrying the weight of this entire mess on your shoulders without breaking."

"Where did you even get something like that?" William asked, his voice rougher now, his pupils dilated until his eyes looked almost entirely black. "That... that isn’t something one simply finds in a merchant’s stall."

Lia offered him a small, triumphant smile, though her cheeks remained crimson. "Let’s just say I have my sources."

"A mercenary contact who knows the value of... specialized goods." She moved to the edge of the tub where he sat, her movements deliberate, swaying slightly. "I wanted to give you something that wasn’t about duty."

"Something that was just for you."

She could see it in his eyes, the way his breathing had become shallow, the way his muscles coiled beneath the water. He wasn’t just surprised; he was enthralled.

A fierce sense of pride swelled in her chest. She had done it. She had broken through the armor he wore so effortlessly.

"You’ve been exhausted recently, haven’t you?" she murmured, stepping behind him.

The heat of his body radiated against her bare skin as she leaned over. "So today... you don’t have to be the commander."

"You don’t have to be the investigator as well... You just have to be mine."

The soft pop of the vial’s seal breaking sounded unnaturally loud in the quiet room. Lia poured a generous amount of the oil into her palms.

The liquid was warm, viscous, and slick. As she rubbed her hands together, the sound was wet and rhythmic: shhh shhh, shhh shhh, a tantalizing noise that seemed to echo off the stone walls.

"Relax, William," she whispered, her breath hot against the nape of his neck. "Let me take care of you."

"I will call you William for today..."

The first contact was electric. When her oiled palms pressed against the broad expanse of his shoulders, William let out a sound that was half groan, half gasp.

His head fell forward involuntarily.

"Gods, Lia..." he rumbled, his fingers gripping the edge of the stone tub so hard his knuckles turned white.

Lia began to work the oil into his skin, her movements slow and circular. The sound of her hands sliding over his wet, muscled back—a wet, sliding friction filled the space between them.

Slick, sliding strokes.

As she pressed harder, kneading the knots in his trapezius muscles, she felt her own arousal building. The intimacy of the act, the scent of sandalwood mixing with the musk of his skin, was overwhelming.

"Mmm..." A soft moan escaped her throat as she pressed closer, her breasts brushing against his shoulders.

The sensation was too much. "You’re so tense... so hard..."

As she worked lower, her thumbs digging into the small of his back, she felt a wave of heat crash over her. "Ah!... William..."

The name broke from her lips as a breathless cry when his muscles suddenly buckled under her touch. The sound was raw, unguarded—a small scream of pleasure that echoed through the steam, mingling with the wet sounds of the oil and the rhythmic lapping of the water.

The sanctuary they had found was no longer quiet; it was alive with the sound of need.

The air in the bathchamber had grown unbearably thick, charged with a tension that made the very steam seem to vibrate. Lia felt as though she were standing on the edge of a precipice, and she had no intention of stepping back.

Her own body was betraying her composure; her nipples were peaked and sensitive against the thin fabric, and a low, constant hum of desire throbbed between her thighs.

Wanting to escalate the provocation, Lia lifted her oil-slicked hands. Instead of returning them to his shoulders, she brought them to her own chest.

With deliberate, agonizing slowness, she began to slather the remaining oil over her breasts. The liquid ran down the valley between them, glistening like molten amber under the candlelight.

Then, with a shaky breath, she uncorked the vial completely, pouring the remaining precious oil directly over her cleavage.

"I thought I would provide a full lotion massage..." she whispered, her voice cracking with need. "Starting from the source."

William’s breath hitched audibly. Through the thin, soaked fabric of the bikini top, the transformation was devastating.

The oil had rendered the material almost entirely translucent. His eyes locked onto the dark, rosy circles of her nipples pressing through the wet silk, their shape unmistakable.

He looked like a man starving, watching a feast laid out just beyond his reach.

"Lia," he warned, his voice a guttural growl that vibrated through the water. "You’re playing with fire."

"Then let me burn," she countered, her eyes blazing. "Stand up, William."

"Face away from me... Turn your back to me."

Her command left no room for argument. William rose from the water like a predator emerging from a swamp, water cascading off his defined abdominal muscles and down the powerful length of his thighs.

He turned, presenting his broad, muscled back to her, though his shoulders were hunched, his entire body coiled like a spring.

Lia took a deep breath, steadying herself against the overwhelming urge to simply collapse against him.

"Heave hoo," she teased softly, a playful, almost childish sound that contrasted sharply with the raw eroticism of the moment.

Then, she moved. She pressed her entire front against his bare back.

The contact was explosive. William let out a strangled noise, a sound somewhere between a sob and a roar, as the slick, oiled heat of her breasts crushed against his shoulder blades.

Lia could feel every ridge of his muscle through her own skin. The sensation of her soft, oil-slicked breasts sliding against his hard back was overwhelming.

"I have to use the softest part of my body to work out these knots," she murmured against his ear, her lips grazing his lobe. "The oil helps... it makes everything so much smoother."

William let out a rough, breathless chuckle, though it sounded more like a pained laugh. "You’re torturing me, Lia."

"You know exactly what you’re doing."

"Do I?" she whispered.

But she did. She pressed harder, grinding her chest against him as she moved her hands down his sides, using the full weight of her body to massage him.

Slick, squelching sounds filled the space between them, the wet friction of oiled skin meeting oiled skin.

Schlick... schlick... schlick.

"Ah!... Mmmph!" Lia cried out as she deliberately shifted her weight, sliding her breasts up and down his spine.

The friction was sending lightning bolts through her own nerves. "Oh gods, William..."