Chapter 11 #2
He looked at me the way so many of my teachers in elementary and middle school had looked at me after I scammed my classmates out of their lunch money in three card monte. Suckers.
“Not a chance in hell. Don’t move. I’ll be right there.”
God, he was bossy. Usually a trait like that would drive me absolutely insane.
Jason had been a little bossy back when we were together, and if I hadn’t been so desperate to ride his coattails right out of the world I was living in and into a life of normalcy, I probably would have shaved his eyebrows off in his sleep.
But there was something about West’s bossiness that actually made me a little, well . . . hot.
It wasn’t coming from a domineering, controlling place.
I got the distinct impression that his bossing me around was strictly out of worry.
Back at the hospital, every time I moved in a way that caused me pain, he’d get on me to lie still.
And when the doctor was poking and prodding parts of me that had already been poked and prodded by that nice nurse, I thought West was going to rip his head off.
I’d never had anyone outside of my family try to take care of me.
It was nice. However, I knew I couldn’t get used to it.
When the driver side door opened, turning on the overhead light, Jason spotted me sitting in the passenger seat and slowly rose to his feet as West came around to help me out.
“Jesus, baby, what the fuck?” He rushed the truck as soon as West threw my door open and reached in to lift me out.
“I’m not your damn baby,” I seethed. “And it’s the middle of the freaking night. Go home, Jason.”
“What the fuck happened to you?” he asked, ignoring my order.
With me tucked in his arms like a bride about to be carried over the threshold, West turned and kicked the truck door closed, pinning my ex in place with a glare that even I found a little scary. “Back off.”
“Fuck that!” Jason crowed, turning his attention to me. “Did this asshole do this to you? I’ll kick his ass. Just say the word.”
West gently lowered me to my feet with more care than a man his size should have been capable of. Once I was steady on my own, he turned and put himself between me and my ex. “You can try, motherfucker. But you won’t succeed.”
I let out an annoying puff of air. This was the last thing I wanted to deal with at the moment.
Well, second to last. The absolute last thing I’d want to deal with right now was my skeevy landlord.
Placing my hand on West’s side, I applied pressure so he’d step out of the way.
“Not that it’s any of your business, but no.
It wasn’t him. Look, Jason, I’m tired, and every inch of me hurts.
I don’t have the bandwidth to deal with this shit tonight. Just go home.”
“No way.” He looked at me then with such longing in his eyes that I almost felt sorry for him.
Almost. I squashed that niggling of pity down by remembering how he’d ended things with me.
We’d been talking about moving in together and getting married, for God’s sake.
You would have thought that warranted more than a lousy text that said This isn’t working for me anymore.
If you leave my stuff in a box on your front porch, I’ll pick it up after work tomorrow.
“You shouldn’t be alone right now, Stell. Let me take care of you.”
I would have laughed if it wouldn’t have hurt so damn bad.
“She’s not alone,” West said in that gravelly voice of his. “She’s got me to take care of her, so you can go now.”
A little thrill worked its way through me at that declaration, then I remembered he was just pretending in order to stick it to Jason.
But then I remembered what he’d said back at the bar earlier about not being able to get me out of his head.
And that was after he’d busted me picking two different guys’ pockets.
If only I had the time or inclination for any kind of relationship right now. But I couldn’t focus on how my girly parts fluttered every time he looked at me. Not with this threat against my family looming over my head.
“Stella, who the hell is this guy?”
“That’s not your concern. All you need to know is that I’m hers, and you’re not fucking welcome here, so I suggest you leave in the next five seconds, before I make you.”
Uh oh.
I’d never seen Jason turn such an unnatural shade of reddish-purple before. He looked like he was about to breathe fire at any moment, which was totally out of character for the Jason I’d known when we were together.
Then, just when I thought his head was at risk of popping like a balloon, he let out a bellow and launched himself at West. “I’m gonna kill you!”
“Oh my God, Jason, stop!” I cried as he swung a left hook at West’s face. West dodged the blow easily enough, his expression remaining one of boredom as Jason geared up for another swing.
“Jason!” I shouted, then cursed when the pressure from my lungs pressed against my ribs. I’d have stepped between the two men if not for my injuries. But given the circumstances and how utterly useless I was, I might as well have had a bucket of popcorn for all the good I was doing just then.
Jason attempted to land three more blows, none of them coming close, and apparently, after the last one, West had gotten tired of watching my ex skip around like Rocky Balboa, because he cocked his arm back, and with one jab, sent Jason ass-first into the concrete.
“You’re done,” he informed my ex in a cold voice. “Don’t come back here again. I find out you did, I’m not walking away after one punch.”
With that, he moved back to me, plucked me right off the ground, and started carrying me toward my front door.
A woman could really get used to this.