“I’m working. Mookie asked for the night off again and Bryant didn’t have anyone else to fill in.” She shrugged. “So here I am, bored off my ass, and bugging you.”
“What time do you get off?” he asked, taking her by surprise.
“Seven,” she answered, thankful that was only another hour away.
He glanced over at the clock. “Do you want to go get something to eat after work?”
“Seriously?” she asked in excitement. Then, before he could change his mind, she added, “Sure, why not?”
He stared past her shoulder as if thinking before asking, “You’re living in Parker’s old apartment, right?”
“Yep,” she answered brightly.
“I’ve got to run home, but I’ll meet you up there in two hours. If that‘s okay?” he asked.
“That’s great. That’ll give me time to take a quick shower,” she told him while trying to stifle an idiotic smile. She had him right where she wanted him now. He just didn’t know it yet.
Why had he asked her to dinner? He’d been absorbed in his work out but when he had turned, there had been something in the way she had looked at him. Her curly brown hair and soft body had always been appealing to him, but that look, it had scorched him. She looked like a woman begging to be touched, but he didn’t want to be with anyone right now. He had the constant shadow of his father’s career to work his way from underneath, and a relationship would take his time away. He could sleep with her and get her out his system, but she deserved better. He also feared that wouldn’t be enough since she was a dangerous mixture of sexy and funny. That’s why this could only be dinner and never again.
He was on time and wearing a pair of thick soled work boots. One leg of his jeans was pushed up above the boot and she was pretty sure the other pants leg was tucked into the boot. His flannel shirt hung open exposing the white t-shirt underneath. He was unkempt and rough around the edges. He was the kind of person that people made a wide berth around in the street as they hugged their wallets closer. He was also the sexiest man she had ever seen and she wanted him with something akin to desperation. He showed no reaction to her obvious inspection of his body.
“I thought we’d walk down to the café on the corner,” he said, raising his eyebrow as if in question.
“Oh I love that place,” she told him, locking the door behind her. They walked side by side with their elbows brushing and when they reached the door, he held it open for her. Another couple stepped out as he opened the door, forcing her to take a step into him to keep from being run over. She took advantage of the situation by pressing closer than necessary. He sucked in a breath at the contact, causing her to hide a smile. He was not as unaffected as he tried to appear. She chose a booth in the back corner where they could have the most privacy. The café was brightly lit, taking away any sense of romance, but she didn’t care. Cupping her chin in her hand, she looked at him questioningly before saying, “I’ve seen you do odd jobs for Bryant, but what do you do full-time?”
He looked confused by her question.“I fight,” he answered carefully.
“Wow, you’re getting to do what you love. That must be awesome,” she said with longing.
On a nod, he asked, “What is it that you love doing?”
“Management. I know that it sounds boring but it’s what I’m good at, managing people.”
“Are you saying you're bossy?” he asked, stifling a laugh.
“I’m saying I’m good at managing people because I’m not bossy. People are a lot more likely to do something for you if they know why you’re asking it of them. Also, nobody works efficiently under a boss that they hate. Contrary to popular belief, you can be friends with the people who work for you because your real friends won’t take advantage of your position.”
He slid down in his seat, crowding her with his knees under the table. Instead of trying to move away, she pressed closer to them, silently daring him to be the first to back down.
She was beginning to think that he was oblivious until his foot began brushing hers.
“I don’t know anything about managing people, but I’ve had a few managers and what you say makes sense to me,” he said, still showing no signs of the struggle below the table.
While she was focusing completely on how to up the ante, the waitress showed up, breaking the spell, “What can I get you folks?”
While she ordered, Ace had his breath held as he waited for her next move. He wasn’t disappointed. She had removed her shoe and was trying to run her sock-clad foot up the front of his pants leg. He broke into laughter. He couldn’t help it; she looked so serious, but she was getting to a spot on his leg that was ticklish. At the sound of his laughter, she poked out her bottom lip pouting. “But I was getting to the best part.”
“Honey, you were nowhere near the best part,” he told her, bringing a blush to her cheeks.
He watched as she took a drink, entranced by the sight of her tongue darting out to lick a drop of liquid from her bottom lip. He was in trouble with this one, for sure. Needing to know more about her, he asked, “Tell me something about yourself that nobody else knows?”
She looked as if she were giving his question serious thought. After a moment, she said, “I won Miss Teen Washington Queen when I was sixteen.”
Ace didn’t know what that was. “Is that some kind of beauty pageant?” he asked.
“Yes,” she answered uncomfortably, then added quickly, “but that was a long time ago.”
He smiled brightly. “I can see it. Why did you stop competing? You could wipe the floor with all the other women I‘ve seen out there.”
Lucy blushed, dropping her eyes to the table. She began drawing circles on it with her fingertip. She cleared her throat uncomfortably, saying, “Okay tit for tat. What does no one else know about you?” He didn‘t fail to notice that she hadn‘t answered his question, but he let it drop.
“Hmm,” he said. “Alright, I‘ve got one, I graduated Magna Cum Laude with a 3.85 GPA from the University of Tennessee.”
“Wow,” she whistled through her teeth. “That’s really impressive.”
“Yeah, well, don’t go spreading it around. You’ll ruin my reputation.” He didn’t like talking about himself because everyone always looked at him differently once they learned anything about his life. He should’ve known she would be unlike anyone else he’d ever met. That bit of news was only a sliver of what she didn’t know about him, but she continued chattering on as if he had told her tomorrow's weather forecast. Ace didn’t realize they had finished eating until the waitress dropped the check on the table. The place had filled up with late night diners while he had been engrossed in listening to her talk. He paid for their meal, then made a path through the crowd for her. Out on the street, he linked his fingers with hers and they walked hand in hand back to her apartment. He saw her safely inside intending on leaving right then, but his feet stayed glued to the floor.
He wanted to tell her goodbye but all he could do was stare down at her, wanting things he shouldn’t want. She watched him in silence for once. When she finally spoke, her words came out in a whisper, “I know why your hair is green. It matches your gorgeous green eyes almost perfectly.”
With his hands still buried deep into his pockets he leaned down, capturing her lips with his. He told himself that it was only a kiss and that he wouldn‘t lose part of himself. He told himself it didn‘t matter, but he’d always been good at lying to himself.
He licked the seam of her lips, begging for entrance. When she opened for him, he leaned further into her, taking all that she was willing to give. He held a part of himself back, refusing to touch her with any other part of his body but his mouth. When he could stand no more of the temptation, he pulled away, breaking the kiss, but not the spell it had woven. Her eyes were glazed and her lips were swollen. Her chest rose and fell with each labored breath. It was a look he would remember forever, and he knew he would spend the rest of his life comparing everythin
g to this moment. “Lock this door behind me,” he told her. He left her alone and unmolested before he could change his mind.
CHAPTER TWO
The next week was hell for Lucy. She’d had a wonderful time at dinner with Ace, but either he was avoiding her or he had been out of town because she hadn’t seen him since.
Today was her worst day yet. She felt lost because she didn’t have any friends except for Ace and he was no where to be found. Spotting Paul, she waved him down. “Have you seen Ace?’ she asked without preamble.
Paul looked closely at her swollen bloodshot eyes and for once spared her his usual attitude. “I haven’t seen him around today, but if I do I’ll send him your way.”
“Okay, Thanks for that. I’m going to be pulling out old files and it’s going to take awhile if he happens to come in I‘ll be in the storeroom.” She didn’t know why she sought him out, except that she didn’t feel close to anyone else. Thankfully, Paul didn’t question her.
“Yeah, alright baby. I’ll let him know,” he told her.
Paul’s message was delivered, and it brought a concerned Ace to hover over her. He arrived so quickly, that Lucy was left wondering if Paul had called him instead of waiting to see if he came in today. She was down on her knees, digging for a file, crying unchecked when he found her. “What’s wrong?” he asked.
“Nothing,” Lucy answered, swiping angrily at her tears. She hated to cry, she hated to appear weak, especially in front of this man who obviously didn’t want her. On her knees, she continued to pull the files off the bottom shelf. She tried to ignore him but he wouldn’t leave. Now that he was here, she felt stupid for wanting him there. He had to think she was completely insane.
When she still refused to meet his gaze, he stooped down in front of her, placing his fingers under her chin. He lifted her eyes to his. A tear slid down her cheek but he brushed it away with his thumb. “Tell me what’s going on,” he begged.
“My mom had a heart attack this morning,” she admitted, sounding shaky to her own ears.
“Why are you here? Do you need me to go with you to the hospital?”
At his questions, she cried harder. Sitting down on the floor, he pulled her into his lap.
“Oh, baby, it’ll be okay. Just tell me what you need,” he told her as he was wrapping her into his arms.
Lucy buried her face in his neck, thankful for his strength. She had never seen eye to eye with her mother, but the thought of her alone in the hospital was killing her. “I can’t go to the hospital because she lives in Washington, and I don’t have any money. I have no savings left, thanks to being unemployed for so long. I have seven dollars in my checking account and I feel so fucking useless that I can’t even help my own momma when she needs me.”
She paused to take a breath and he held her tighter. “I’m sorry I didn’t mean to cry all over you. I really hate people knowing my shit,” she admitted miserably as she tried to wipe her tears from his shirt.
“Yeah, me too,” he told her as he set her away. He stood then, pulling her to her feet. “Come on let’s go,” he told her as he began tugging her from the room.
Lucy dug her heels into the ground, slowing his progress. She asked, “Go where? Haven’t you been listening?”
“You have to go pack a bag,” he told her.
“Ace, I can’t afford to go. I was deathly serious about that.”
“I know. I will get us there, Lucy. You don’t have to worry about a thing. Just go pack a bag,” he ordered as she followed him reluctantly, uncomfortable at being indebted to anyone.
Walking over to her apartment, she remembered that she should’ve told someone she was leaving. “Oh no, I forgot to call Parker,” she told Ace, dejected.
“You just go pack and I’ll make all the calls,” he said soothingly.
“I promise I will pay you back for this.” She prayed he could hear the honesty behind that statement. She would never forget his coming to her rescue.
Ace smiled ruefully. “Don’t worry about it. I think I got it covered.”
With her bag packed and calls made, they headed down to Ace’s vehicle. He stopped next to a Lexus X10, throwing her bag in the back seat. Lucy found herself checking her shoes, scared she might get dirt in the floor board of an SUV that easily cost ninety thousand dollars.
Lost in her own thoughts, Lucy didn’t notice they weren’t heading towards the Interstate, but were instead turning into the drive of a private air strip, until they were already there.
A uniform-clad gentleman opened her door, then pulled her suitcase from the backseat. A mid-sized jet sat waiting on the runway for them.
“What is that?” she asked, almost too horrified to speak.
“A Hawker 4000,” Ace answered her absently while listening to the other man speak.
Lucy looked closer at the uniformed man realizing he was the pilot. “Your bags are already on board, Mr. Sparks. Is there anything else you need before we take off?” he asked Ace.
Ace raised a questioning brow at her, but since she continued to be silent, he answered, “No. I think we’re ready to go.”
She followed him numbly on board, sitting where he told her to sit. They were halfway to Washington before she found her voice. “This is a really nice plane,” she told him, for lack of anything else to say.
Ace looked around him as if just noticing for the first time, “Yeah, I guess it is.”
For all his bad boy style, he looked comfortable amongst the luxury. Lucy felt like she was staring at a stranger. “When I asked you tell me one thing about yourself that no one else knew, you could have said, ‘I own a plane,’” she told him, aggravated.
One corner of his mouth turned up in that sexy way that never failed to make her melt.
“I don’t own a plane. My dad owns a plane.”
“Who is your dad? Anyone I know?” she asked jokingly.
“Sparky Sparks,” he answered.
“Really?” she asked, excited. “The pro wrestler who makes that juicer/blender thing you see on T.V.? I love him!”
Ace groaned inwardly; everybody loved his dad. The thing about it was that his dad really was great, and he deserved all the praise that was heaped upon him, but Ace wanted to be his own person, not just Sparky’s son. It never failed to happen as soon as people learned who his father was. He would just sort of fade into the background. That’s why he had decided to go into MMA instead of following in his father’s footsteps on the wrestling circuit. He’d had plenty of offers for the entertainment value alone. What could be better than a Father-Son tag team? His father had not been happy about any of it. Sparky had worked hard for his son to have every advantage in life, and he had desperately hoped for a doctor or lawyer. Instead, he had ended up with a son who fought professionally. Ace would forever be the bane of his dad’s existence. While his dad had been struggling to give him the world, he had failed to give Ace the one thing he really wanted: a father. So they had both ended up disappointed.
Lucy unlocked the door to a modest three-bedroom house that was nestled near the end of a cul de sac. “Here we are. I know it’s probably not what you’re used to, but you’re more than welcome to stay here with me,” she told Ace.
“What do you mean, not what I’m used to?” he asked, offended.
“I just meant you’re probably used to staying in much nicer places, but this is where I grew up,” she told him.
Ace snorted. “This is much nicer than any of the places I lived as a kid.” At her look of disbelief, he rushed to reassure her. “Really. Dad didn’t hit it big until I was a teenager. Up until then, we lived in some real dives, but this is nice. It feels like a home.”
“That’s because my mother’s not here,” she mumbled.
Now that he could believe. They had gone straight to the hospital after landing in Seattle, expecting the worst, only to find the dragon mother, as he was now calling her, sitting in her hospital bed like a queen screeching at every nurse in sight. She had
taken one look at Ace, curled her lip in disdain, and then commenced to browbeat her daughter with a finesse of which he had never seen the like. Lucy had endured it all with a grace that had impressed him beyond measure. It was also very telling. No wonder she loved to manage people. She had learned at the feet of the master.
He had also discovered where she’d gotten her talent for constantly talking from. From the very first moment Lucy had sat down with her mother, it had become twenty questions. "Who is he? Does he come from good people? If he comes from good people, then why do they let him look like that? Whatever happened to that nice lawyer you used to work for? Mike, wasn’t it?”
Lucy could have flaunted his family money, but she didn’t. She only said that they were nice people, and that nice people loved their children enough to respect their decisions. He hadn’t missed the insinuation that her mother did not fall into that category. The lawyer question, on the other hand, was the moment he saw a crack begin to form in Lucy’s mask of indifference. When she remained silent, her mother sensed blood and pounced. “I told you that you should have snapped that man up while he was still willing to have you. You know, before you let yourself go.”
“Let herself go?” Ace asked, confused.
“She sure did. Look how fat she’s gotten, and not a hint of a tan. She’ll never catch that lawyer this way.” Lucy looked as if she were going to be sick. Her face had gone white and her eyes were bright with unshed tears. The doctor came in while Lucy was enduring a lecture on proper lady-like behavior. His sudden appearance at Lucy’s back caused her to jump and place a hand over her heart. She moved to the opposite side of the room, still visibly taking deep breaths to calm her startled heart.
“Are you okay?” he asked her gently. When she only shook her head, he let it drop. Excusing himself, he walked out into the hall. He didn’t understand what was going on but he did know that this she-devil was hurting Lucy and that was unacceptable. Pulling out his cell phone, he made the call he never thought he’d make. It was obvious that Lucy wanted to help her mom, but it was just as clear to him that she did not have what it would take to do that. Caroline Worthington would eat her daughter alive if she tried. He wished he had the time it would require to break her but he had a fight scheduled in four days and he needed to get back. He dearly loved a challenge, but this situation required an expert.
Undefeated (Undefeated Series Books 1-4) Page 7