Chapter Ninety-Five
Blade
S ig already unholstered, I fucking pivoted.
“What are you going to do?” Broken fucking bottles of coffee at her feet, the shit spreading everywhere, she threw her hands up. “Shoot me? Go ahead.”
Holstering the weapon, watching to make sure she didn’t step in the mess, I served it right back. “Keep up the fucking temper tantrum, and I just might.” I’d shot people for far less reasons.
“Fine.” She swiped her arm across the counter. The chips went flying.
“Keep it up,” I warned.
“I will.”
“Great.”
“ Good .”
I crossed my arms. “Get it all out.” Because she wasn’t pulling this shit in my house again.
“Oh, oh .” She pointed at me. “You think I don’t know what that means? You think you can threaten me by telling me to get it all out ?”
Yeah, I fucking did. “You done?”
“What do you care?” She gestured wildly toward the door. “You were walking out anyway. So go ahead, Mr. Go Live Your Life .” Spitting out the insult, she stepped forward. “Do your—”
Already moving, my arm locked around her waist, and her feet left the ground as I effectively cut off her tirade.
Pulling her away from the broken glass, I set her back down and gripped her chin. Then I gave her fair fucking warning. “Watch your step.”
“Or what? You’ll use me? Take what you want? Then leave me?” She let out a snort of disgust. “Been there, done that, and newsflash, you weren’t the first. You weren’t even in the top three. So don’t threaten me with a good time.”
Red fucking haze coated my vision. “Who the fuck else used you besides that piece-of-shit dead junkie and his crew? That Army asshole?” I was going to end every fucker who’d ever touched her. Right after I took out November for withholding intel from me.
“Screw you.”
“Names,” I demanded.
“Why? So you can kill them too? Is that going to right some cosmic wrong? Bring your brothers back? Make you feel better about leaving me after you said you wouldn’t?”
“Watch it.”
The five-foot ball of fire stared at me for a full beat, then her fury went dark. “You know what I think? I think you got scared, but instead of facing that, you told yourself some lie about how you were doing right by me.”
Not having this conversation, I gripped a handful of her hair and fisted. “How many motherfuckers took advantage of you?”
She sucked in a breath. “How many tattoos do you have?”
“Don’t fucking go there, woman.”
“Go where?”
“Small talk, basic fucking relationships—not in my DNA.”
“Why? Because you’re a decorated SEAL who never expected to walk off the battlefield?”
“Because I’m a fucking pragmatist.” And she kept hitting her target.
“You know what I think?”
Yeah. She wanted to fuck. “Don’t care.” I tightened my grip because I was a sorry-ass motherfucker when it came to this woman.
Her pulse jumped. Her eyes darkened. She shivered. But her tone held. “I think you do care, and I think this is small talk. But I don’t think you’re being pragmatic right now, nor are you currently fucking. But whatever, semantics on that last one.”
Christ, the mouth on this woman. “Fucking doesn’t begin and end at penetration.” Already leaning into me, her tits pressed against my chest, the scent of her desire making my cock hard, my grip on her more dominant by the second—we were fucking with each other all right. “But go ahead, tell me why you don’t think I’m practical.”
“For one, you shoot a lot of people.”
I pulled her hair harder. “That’s what you want to talk about?”
Her eyes closed, her lips made an O, and she let out a slow exhale. “Mm-hmm.”
“Shooting is fucking practical.” I ran a thumb down her neck. “How were you used?” Because I was sick enough to want a list I could recreate, erasing every shit memory she had.
“How wasn’t I? And I don’t think shooting’s practical.” She opened those dark amber eyes and stared right at me. Then she crawled into my head. “I think it’s messy.”
We weren’t talking about blood or shooting. “You want me to fuck you, then we’re gonna have a conversation. You want to talk bullshit, go waste that pink-haired chick’s time. You want a normal fucking relationship with a desk jockey, find someone else.” I’d kill the motherfucker, but that was a different conversation. “You want real, you want me to make you come, then step back and we’ll talk.” I was man enough to admit my jealousy ran deep with this woman. I wouldn’t fucking touch her if she’d fucked some asshole in the past five days. I also wasn’t getting involved if she was intent on living a twenty-four-year-old’s life. She wanted freedom, she could have it. She wanted me, then I was making demands.
“Pretty confident in your abilities.”
I dropped my hand. “You know where the door is.”
“So that’s it? I play by your rules, or else?”
“No ultimatum about it.” I wasn’t playing at anything. “Giving you real, woman.”
“You mean you’re giving me your reality. Because that’s not actually real. You don’t get to say you’ll fuck me but only if we have a conversation .” She made air quotes around that last word. “That’s not how you avoid a relationship. That is a relationship. Because whether or not you fucked me after, made me come, washed my hair, or bought me stupid bottled coffee and chips, it all ends up in the same place you claim you don’t inhabit.”
This ought to be good. “And you’re gonna tell me what fucking place you think that is because you’re an expert at this shit?” I’d never fucking used the word inhabit with this woman.
“For once, believe it or not, I am an expert at something compared to you. And yep, I know exactly where that place is,” she taunted. For a fucking second. Then she couldn’t hold her shit back. “Emotions,” she enunciated sarcastically. “That messy place full of feelings you insinuate you don’t inhabit when you say crap like basic fucking relationships aren’t in your DNA. But spoiler, you’re the angriest person I’ve ever met, and that? Is a stupid fucking emotion.” She pivoted. “You’re right. I do know where the door is, and I’m going to use it.” She grabbed the purse she’d dropped when I’d put my hands on her. “Right after I do what I came here to do.”
Taking the bait like a fucking pussy, I opened my mouth. “Yeah, what’s that? Breaking and entering?” Too late. I’d already unlocked the damn door for her.
On her way to the entry hall, she altered course at the last second. “Sleep.” Her pink fucking boots hit the steps, and I got an eyeful of that ass as she stomped up to the loft. “And don’t even think about waking me.” Her head popped up over the top railing. “Also? For the record, when you have that much ink and show it off with those stupidly tight T-shirts, it’s fucking normal for people to ask about it.” She spun, and her hair whipped around. “But keep thinking it’s everybody else and not you.” She stomped across the loft. “Whatever. I don’t care.”
A thud sounded, then shit went quiet.
I fucking stood there for two beats.
Then I cleaned up the mess.