by Jo Raven
I stop walking. “Meaning what?”
“That you can’t know whether you have chemistry until you kiss.”
“Says who?” Then I narrow my eyes. “Did Quinn kiss you?”
“Now he’s Quinn, huh? Not Quasimodo? You seem rattled, Little Sis.”
I am. I feel rattled.
But not because of Adam. It’s a certain bad-tempered, bearded someone who’s occupying my thoughts day and night, even though I can’t figure out why.
“Well, come on.” Gigi shakes her long hair and winks at me. “Race you to the ice cream shop.”
“You’re crazy.”
“If you win, I’ll tell you if Quinn kissed me and how it was.”
“And if I lose?” I ask as I start running after her.
“Then you promise to give Adam another chance.”
With a curse, I push myself to go faster.
I can’t remember the last time I ran so hard. Gigi beats me by a few seconds, grinning as she leans against the wall outside the shop, acting cool and pretending not to be panting for breath.
Shaking my head at myself, I head inside the shop. That ice cream sounds even better now. My T-shirt sticks to my back with sweat, and my mouth is dry. Gigi giggles as she follows me inside.
“Is it really such a hardship to give Adam another chance?” She pores over the flavors as if she doesn’t have ice cream from this same place all the time. “You see him every night. I thought you liked him.”
“I don’t see him every night.” I huff. “And I do like him. He’s nice.”
“Hm.” She eyes me as I give our order to Jessica. “I see.”
Jessica has been running this joint since I was a toddler. See, I remember her, but not my dad. Isn’t it weird?
Just as weird as being unsure about Adam. I mean, I do like him. And he is cute.
Then why do I feel so defensive when Gigi asks if we’re dating?
Maybe she’s right. If he made his move and kissed me, I’d know what he wants, too. I’d know he wants me.
I just have to have patience. Gigi is right, instant chemistry is a myth, like insta-love. Besides, what if he’s unsure himself? It’s not like I’m helping things by refusing to even hold his hand, sending off confusing vibes, feeding the loop.
“I’ll give Adam another chance,” I say and glare at Gigi who’s grinning widely, showing her sharp incisors. “Happy?”
“Delighted,” she purrs and grabs her cone and the tub for Merc. “Now let me tell you about Quinn on the way home.”
The next day I walk the short distance from the bus stop to Matt’s house, my stomach knotted up. I blame it on the time of the month, and the heaviness on the air, sign of an approaching storm.
Until I ring the doorbell, again and again, and decide something is really off.
I think of the threatening messages, and the kids, and I panic. I bang on the door, then step back and pull out my cell phone to call 9-1-1.
Hesitate.
What if he’s in the bathroom? In the shower?
Well, better safe than sorry, right?
But before I dial the number, the door handle turns.
Phew. I fluff up my hair that I’ve let loose today, then force myself to stop as the door slowly swings open.
My gaze drops down to the little girl standing there. “Mary? Where’s your dad?”
“Upstairs,” she says seriously. “You should stay away, Tati.”
Way too seriously for a five-year-old. And what does she mean? That knot is back in my stomach and it has nothing to do with the time of the month.
“Why, sweetie?” I take her hand and step inside, letting the door close behind us. “What’s wrong? And where’s your brother?”
“Cole’s in the kitchen,” she says and tugs me that way. “I made him some cereal.”
“That’s great. Did you make some for yourself, too?”
“Ah-huh.” She nods emphatically, and I smile even though I’m so worried.
“Good.” We enter the kitchen and Cole looks up with a milk mustache and splashed mushy Fruit Loops around his plate.
“Tati,” he says in his cute baby voice, and I lean over to kiss his sticky cheek.
“Hey, baby. Why don’t you guys sit here and have your breakfast while I look for your daddy?”
“Told you, Daddy’s upstairs. He made a mess,” Mary says sadly.
“A mess?”
A crash comes from upstairs, and she winces.
A chill goes through me.
Shit. “I’ll be right back. Don’t you worry about a thing.” I flash them a quick smile and hurry up the stairs. “I’ve got this.”
Let’s hope I’m right.
I don’t know what to expect. A full-blown psychotic episode? Violence. At least there hasn’t been another crash since I came upstairs.
Still. Fear is a touch of ice in my veins as I peek into Matt Hansen’s bedroom for the first time. His door is open—also for the first time.
Taking a deep breath, I enter.
He’s sitting on the edge of his bed, elbows braced on his knees, his hands over his face. As I watch, he rubs them up and down, then as if feeling my gaze, turns to look at me.
“Tay,” he says in his deep voice, and I freeze.
Not just because of the unexpected nickname. I like the sound of it, though nobody else calls me that.
No, it’s the raw pain in his dark eyes, bared for me to see, that takes my breath away.
Then he turns away and curses, breaking the spell.
“I thought I heard a crash.” There are things strewn on the floor. Books. A broken gadget that looks like a tablet. There’s a small dent in the wall. “Are you all right?”
“Peachy.”
I pick up the tablet. The screen is cracked through. “Bad morning?”
“Bad… night.” His voice catches on the word, and I swallow hard.
“Want to talk about it?”
“What is it with you and asking me to talk all the time?”
“If you talked to me, I wouldn’t be asking.”
“Christ, you’re like Emma,” he whispers, still not looking at me.
“I look like your wife?”
“No. But you are like her,” he says after a moment, softly. He’s quiet, and I think he won’t speak again, but then he says, “She was your age when I met her. So pretty. Innocent. Kind. With a core of steel after the foster system had spat her out.”
I wait for more, but it’s as if he’s run out of steam. He also looks much younger from this close, his gaze vulnerable, his eyes red-rimmed, his mouth soft and uncertain.
God, I’m so sorry for him. And for his kids. My heart’s breaking for them. I want to ask more, about her, about her death, when it was and how it happened, but I hold back.
Not a good time. But how can I ever help him, or his kids, without knowing?
“Are the kids okay?” he asks, his voice raspy, and I wonder what his nightmares were about. If they change, or if the same one returns to haunt him.
“They’re fine. Having breakfast. Worried about you.”
He grimaces and shakes his head. “I keep fucking up.”
“You don’t.”
I don’t trust myself around him when he’s like this. Not to open up and let him hurt me when I don’t expect him to.
How weird. I don’t trust this truce to last, and yet I can’t stay away and save myself.
I approach him slowly and sit down beside him. I put a hand on his thigh, over the thin cotton of his sweats, shocked at the thick muscle shifting under my palm, and feeling strangely hot and excited.
Warmth wafts off his body. I can smell his shampoo, his soap, and underneath it all, his scent of powerful male.
I feel drunk.
I feel disconnected. Is this what they call an out of body experience? Although I can feel my body, kind of distantly, aching sweetly, throbbing. Needing.
It’s his touch I need. On my skin. His mouth. Skimming over my
lips, over my cheeks, down my neck, and lower.
“You’re so damn young,” he mutters, his gaze on my hand. I slide it up, toward his groin, and his breath catches.
I can’t seem to draw a proper breath, either. I think the bulge between his legs has grown larger, but I’m not sure.
“You’re not that old,” I whisper.
“I’m turning thirty this year.”
I nod, too absorbed by the way his solid flesh shifts under my hand. I trail my fingers toward that fascinating bulge.
He catches my wrist, stopping me. His cheekbones are flushed. “Did you hear me? I’m almost twelve years older than you.”
“I heard you.” And I don’t frigging care.
Is it a bad thing? It only makes me more excited. He’s older, hardened, grounded, and so hot. He’s not a boy. He’s all man.
I lift my hand to his arm, tracing the dark ink he has winding around his thick biceps. What am I doing? What are these thoughts? I shouldn’t be sitting here, touching him. I should be downstairs with the kids, looking after them, doing my job.
But I can’t tear myself away. I’m in a trance. Can’t ever remember feeling this way before. It’s like I want to climb on him, plaster myself all over him, lick his skin, bite his flesh.
Jesus, Octavia.
“What are these tattoos?” I trace them. “They look like barbed wire.”
“Zane Madden did them for me,” he says, glancing down at them. “He was my wife’s adopted brother.”
“Was? He died?”
“Fuck, no.”
“But she did,” I whisper. When he doesn’t speak, I say, “I know about your wife.”
He shoves away from me and gets up, scowling, his gaze going stormy. “The fuck you think you know. You know nothing.”
I recoil as if he slapped me. “Matt…”
“Get out.”
Tears sting the back of my eyes, but I won’t let then fall. I don’t know why, but I’d do anything to hide them from him.
“Fine,” I say unsteadily and stand up, then turn blindly toward the door. “Whatever.”
Not gonna let him see.
I hope he’ll call my name, stop me. Explain. Apologize.
He doesn’t.
Not that it matters anyway. I don’t know what I thought I was doing back there, touching him, letting myself want him. Letting myself fall for him.
What an idiot I’ve been.
Chapter Fifteen
Matt
The piece of paper in my hand reads “Remember who you left behind,” the hole left by the knife that was used to stick it to my door almost taking out the word “you.”
Nice touch.
“And you said you have no idea who this person is talking about?” John Elba, the young cop I talked to last time, says over the phone. “These people you left behind?”
“No fucking idea.”
This is messing with my head. Last thing I need with my state of mind right now. Who the fuck did I leave behind? My parents, my brother. They were fine without me. It’s not like I left the country, or the planet. I visited. They visited me, too.
“All right.” He’s quiet for a moment, and I think I hear the clacking of a keyboard, but it might be the wind. “No forced entry, no other sign of this person’s presence on the premises?”
I frown. “What do you mean… like vandalism?”
“Yes. Or anything indicating she or he attempted to force entry into the house, or your car, or left any other message somewhere.”
“Didn’t notice anything.”
“You checked?”
“Hell yeah, I checked.”
“Calm down, Hansen.”
I lift the phone off my ear and shake it.
When I return it to my ear, John is saying, “The officer we sent didn’t find out anything useful from your neighbors. No suspect person wandering close to the house, no suspect activity in the area.”
Figures.
“That doesn’t mean much, of course,” John goes on. “Someone obviously stuck those messages to your door. We got some partial fingerprints from this last knife, but nothing conclusive. Most probably the perp isn’t in our system.”
Yeah, he said that before.
“What about Ross Jones?”
“The garage owner’s son you told us about?”
“No,” I snap. “Some other random Ross Jones. What do you think?”
“I think that you have quite a temper, Hansen.”
Unruffled. You got to hand it to John. He’s cool as shit.
And he’s right about the temper. I think of how I went off the rails with Octavia the other day when she said she knew about Emma, and wince.
I hear myself telling her to get out.
Rubbing at my eyes, I glance at where my kids are watching cartoons on TV. Octavia left without a word when I let myself inside, and I didn’t tell her about the message.
She didn’t ask. She didn’t ask how I am, didn’t even look at me as she kissed the kids goodbye, gathered her things and left.
I shouldn’t give a fuck.
I don’t, okay?
“Mr. Hansen. Are you still there?” John asks in my ear, and I clench my jaw.
“Yeah.”
“Maybe you should get a security system for your house. A camera will catch whoever is doing this, or at the very least make them think twice about doing it again.”
That’s an idea. I wonder why I didn’t think of it. “I’ll do that.”
“Good. You take care now, and be sure to lock the house at night.”
I grunt in agreement, and disconnect the call.
Security systems. Cameras.
What the fuck.
Or I just shake goddamn Ross until his teeth fall out and get him to stop harassing my family.
Ross isn’t at the garage when I arrive the next day, and asking around I find out he’s off today.
Goddammit.
I’m already in a foul mood, because Octavia didn’t say a single word to me this morning, and how pathetic is it that I’d been hoping to hear her voice?
Fucking pathetic, that’s how.
And it has to stop, this… need. Right the hell now.
But instead I get to work on an old Honda Civic that is as good as scrap and seethe in silence. I attack the faulty engine with a vengeance, checking it thoroughly, wrenching out cables and reading the gauges.
A bit too forcefully, maybe. After I stab myself in the hand for the second time with the screwdriver, Evan hauls me out from under the car and straight to the coffee machine as I curse a blue streak.
He pulls out a first aid kit from a corner and slaps a Band-Aid on my lacerated hand. “Hope your tetanus shots are up to date.”
“Fuck you,” I grumble, flexing my hand and fishing in my pocket for loose change to buy some goddamn coffee.
“Someone’s grumpy.”
“Now you sound like my mom.”
He laughs, leaning against the coffee machine.
And I don’t have enough coins. Figures.
He drops a coin into the slot and grins. “There you go.”
“Why the fuck are you so happy?”
“To piss you off.”
“Asshole.” But I shake my head.
“Someone else holds that title around here. Speaking of whom…” He straightens and loses the grin. “Why were you looking for Ross?”
Taking a sip of my scalding, bitter coffee, I debate whether to tell Evan. I trust him, as much as you can trust someone you’ve only known for a couple of weeks.
“There’s something I wanna ask him,” I say.
“Not gonna punch the living daylights out of him?” Evan asks casually.
I make myself stay perfectly still. “Depends. Why?”
“He’s been shooting daggers at you since the day you confronted him over Octavia. And I thought he might be worse than usual, since Octavia got herself a boyfriend.”
For some reason, my first thought is that
he’s talking about me.
Then I think, Jesus F. Christ, Matt. Are you fucking nuts?
And then what he said hits me in the gut.
“What boyfriend?” I ask, the word a weird shape in my mouth.
“This young guy. Her neighbor, I guess. Adam something or other. They often go for ice cream together in the evening.”
Images of Octavia with another guy unfold in my brain’s eye, playing like a movie—his arms around her, his mouth on her, his body moving between her legs.
Red mists my vision.
Fucking shit.
I chuck the plastic cup at the wall where it leaves a dark smear, and stalk back into the garage.
“Matt. Jesus.” Evan huffs, starting after me. “What now?”
“Shut up,” I say and go back to pull the engine of the Honda apart until my hands bleed and my mind stops writhing like a wounded animal.
What do I care? Why am I so angry? What the hell do I want?
I’m so fucking pissed it takes me forever to ask myself why, if Ross is upset with Octavia getting a boyfriend, he’d post mysterious messages on my goddamn door.
After work, I know I should head straight home so that Octavia can leave.
Leave and go to her fucking boyfriend.
Instead I cruise through town, going in circles, trying to work off some of the stupid anger and adrenaline still coursing through my veins.
Trying to clear my mind and think.
Yeah, it makes no sense for Ross to target me.
Then again, you can never tell how psychopaths think. And there is the fact Octavia is at my house every day. I confronted him, told him she works for me. That she’s mine.
No, I never said that last bit. Fuck. And there’s no mistaking the hot rush of pleasure at the words as they echo in my mind.
Mine.
She’s not mine.
Back to Ross. He has access to basic information about me. He knows Octavia works for me. He’s obviously interested in her in some fucking twisted way and thought up this weird-ass plan to scare her.
Or scare me into firing her?
Far-fetched, much? Where’s the connection to Octavia in his messages? How was I supposed to figure this out?
Then again, nobody said he’s the brightest bulb in the box.
But why wouldn’t he go after her boyfriend instead of me? Unless he has, and I don’t know about it.