Chapter 14
Chapter Fourteen
Rational thoughts move like sludge, while a fast forward of Jaegerathon plays in Technicolor inside my head.
Drake gestures to a back door. “Shall we?”
I follow him numbly from the club. He’s been kind. Maybe I misjudged him. He could be as lonely as the rest of us, sitting in Gen’s lounge, searching for someone special to come along.
It’s not until the door to the club closes and cool air nips my arms that I realize I can’t leave without Gen. And that maybe leaving with someone I’ve just met isn’t such a great idea.
“Wait.” I stop and look around, my heartbeat quickening. I don’t recognize this part of the parking lot. “I came here with friends. We need to go back.” I reach for the door handle, but it’s locked from the inside.
“They keep these locked. We’ll have to go in through the casino.”
And see Jaeger with that lady? No, thank you. I wrap my arms around my middle, shivers vibrating my spine.
At my hesitation, Drake slips his jacket over my shoulders. “Do you have a phone?”
I left my purse with Gen, but my phone is in my back pocket. I pull it out.
“You can contact your friends from here and tell them I’m taking you home, or we can walk inside. It’s up to you.”
The slow cog that is my brain on alcohol filters this information, processing a slight sense of unease in the pit of my belly.
Probably not the best idea to go home with a guy I would have been leery of before tonight.
But the lights are bright in the parking lot, providing a sense of security.
And I have no desire to walk past Jaeger with his woman.
It’s a short drive to my place. I could call an Uber, but Drake’s right here. Besides, I don’t have my purse and money.
Drake works for the casino as an executive—recognized for stellar performance, no less. How dangerous could he be?
I shoot Gen a text.
Cali: I left the bar. Getting a ride from a coworker. Please bring my purse when you leave. See you back at our place. Get some digits, will you!
I don’t wait for her response. If she worries about me, she’ll check her phone.
Drake leads me to a dark sports car. I have no idea of the make—that kind of detail is beyond my cognitive ability at the moment.
He opens the passenger door and I ease onto tan leather seats, slipping his jacket from my shoulders and draping it over the center console.
“Where do you live?” he asks from the driver’s side.
Another twinge of uneasiness hits me, as if beneath the alcohol haze, common sense lies in wait.
I don’t like the idea of giving a stranger my address, but I really want to go home.
Besides, if Drake really wants my address, he could look it up at work.
I give him the information and he programs it into his GPS.
Within minutes, we’re pulling into my driveway. “Thanks for the ride,” I tell him, and open the car door to get out.
“You’re welcome.” He gets out of the car at the same time I do.
I shouldn’t worry. It’s dark out and he’s probably just walking me to the door, but I do worry. I’m worried I gave him the wrong idea.
I slip behind the fence where we hide the spare key. No way I can get around him seeing me do it. It’s either that, or I’m locked out. I make a mental note to change the location of where we put the hide-a-key tomorrow.
When I return, Drake’s waiting on the darkened doorstep.
Gen and I forgot to turn on the porch light before we left. This wouldn’t be a big deal, except that having the lights off sets a certain romantic mood I’d rather not encourage.
“Thanks again for the ride. I think I’m good from here.”
Drake sidles closer, resting his hand lightly on my hip. He flashes his charming smile. “How about a short visit?”
I step back, my shoulders brushing the door. “Not tonight.”
He nods slowly. I can’t see his eyes clearly in the dark, but I sense calculations going on behind the pregnant pause. “A kiss goodnight, then?”
He leans forward and my hands flash to his chest, urging him back. “I don’t—”
Drake dips his head, my arms no barrier when he’s half a foot taller. His mouth closes on mine even as I’m pushing him away. He doesn’t seem to notice, or care, since he’s too busy grabbing my neck and angling his tongue inside my mouth.
Every danger instinct goes off inside me, a fine sweat breaking out along my spine despite the evening chill.
My brain moves in rapid fire, registering each breath, a rough hand grabbing my wrist and pinning it behind me in a gesture meant to be sexy, or an assault—I’m not sure which.
Either way, it’s unwelcome. Drake’s body pushes me flush with the door.
The only sounds are the shifting of our feet, and the smacking of Drake’s rough mouth amid the struggle for control.
Rapid footsteps penetrate through the panic.
“Off!” a deep, familiar voice shouts a second before Drake is ripped away.
Jaeger stands between us, his back to me. I have no idea how he got here, or why he’s here. But the relief is unimaginable.
“Is there a problem?” Drake casually shifts his collar forward. Jaeger must have wrenched it when he grabbed him.
Drake saunters closer, careful to remain clear of Jaeger. “The lady came home with me. I don’t see how this is any of your business.”
“It’s her home and she asked you to leave,” Jaeger says. “Get. The fuck. Out!” He reaches back and drapes a long arm over my shoulders, pulling me close. My heart slows; my breathing calms.
The threat in Jaeger’s voice stuns me, but my body instinctively curls into him. Frankly, I’m surprised anyone managed to create this level of anger from Jaeger. He’s the gentle giant. But Jesus, is he scary when he’s mad.
“Cali—” Drake steps to the side and grabs my wrist, tugging me.
I twist my arm away. Does the man have a death wish? Or is he just so arrogant he thinks a guy twice his size can’t touch him? “Please leave,” I tell Drake.
His jaw clenches as if he’s refusing to give up a toy.
Jaeger lets out an angry sigh, pushes me behind him—what the hell?—and punches Drake in the face. Holy shit!
Drake lands on the ground, rolling, grasping the front of his face. There’s no blood, but that had to have hurt.
Jaeger leans over him. “Do. Not. Touch. Her. That was a warning tap. The next one won’t be.”
Drake hastily rises and brushes the powdery Tahoe soil off his trousers. He glares at me. “Not what I had in mind for tonight,” he says, and stalks away. He fires up his expensive sports car and tears out of the driveway in a spray of pebbles and pine needles.
Jaeger tilts up my chin with his finger, searching my face. “Are you okay?”
I nod, wondering what in the hell just happened. “What are you doing here?” Drake’s car rounds the corner at the end of my street, his taillights disappearing. “How did you know…?”
Jaeger rubs a hand down his face and lets out a tense breath. “Kerstin. She told me you left the club drunk with some guy.” His face contorts. “What were you thinking, Cali?”
This side of Jaeger, the angry, protective side, is something I’ve never seen before, and it’s totally hot—not that I wish to ignite it unduly.
I wasn’t thinking when I left with Drake. In fact, I purposely tried not to think. About Jaeger. But that’s not something I’m going to tell him. “I made a mistake.”
“You made a mistake? You—” Jaeger steps to the side and runs his fingers through his short hair. “Do you understand what that—that psychotic asshole could have done?”
Yeah, I kinda do, and I’m trying not to imagine it. The last half-hour has sobered me up.
I rub my eyes and move to the front door, unlock it, and walk inside, my fingers and arms trembling. Jaeger lingers on the threshold. “You can come in,” I tell him.
He walks inside and shuts the door.
I fill a glass of water in the kitchen and offer it to him, but he shakes his head. I take several gulps from the glass, cleaning the taste of Drake from my mouth.
“I’m sorry for yelling.” He lets out another strained breath. “But you can’t go home with people you don’t know. Matter of fact, don’t go home with anyone unless it’s a friend.”
I spin around. It was stupid to go home with Drake and I learned a painful lesson tonight, but where does Jaeger get off telling me what to do? “What about you? Did you take your lady friend home before you came here? It’s okay for you to leave with some random person, but not me?”
“I’m not a hundred-pound female,” he growls. “He could have hurt you, Cali.”
Before I dated Eric, I’d left parties a time or two with guys I had just met. But in those cases, I knew the guy’s fraternity brothers, or we had friends in common. There were dangers in college, sure, but we lived in a bubble where people knew each other. The risks were lower.
Jaeger’s right. I ignored my instincts tonight and treated Drake like I would a guy from school. It was foolish and dangerous, but that doesn’t give Jaeger the right to treat me like a child. “I said I made a mistake. I don’t recall having a second big brother. Why did you follow me, anyway?”
He sits in the center of the couch, taking up two-thirds of it, his legs spread wide the way guys do because they don’t wear skirts or feel the need to hide their private parts. He leans his head against the wall behind the cushions and stares at the ceiling. “I thought the guy could be bad news.”
I look around searchingly. “And you knew this how?”
He glares at me. “He’s a guy, and you’d been drinking. I wasn’t taking chances.”
My eyebrows pinch together. Jaeger’s reaction to Drake was rather heated for someone I’m casually friends with, like he was taking things personally. Why the hell would he leave his date to follow me home on the off chance Drake was a serial killer?
“What about your lady friend?”
“Client. She’s a client, Cali.”
“She’s pretty handsy for a client. Do all clients feel you up?”
Jaeger’s gaze narrows on my face. He sits forward and grabs my waist, pulling me between his knees until I have no choice but to shift and sit on his leg or fall into his chest. I choose the leg, slowly sliding off onto the couch beside him, my legs dangling over his lap.
His arm braces me from behind. “You scared the hell out of me tonight.” His green eyes are intense and worried.
“I’m sorry,” I say, surprised.
Jaeger presses my face to his chest, cradling my head. “Promise me you’ll never do anything like that again.”
I’ll promise him anything, as long as he keeps holding me like this. “I won’t. Totally stupid,” I mumble, nuzzling his shirt and breathing in his clean scent.
Jaeger leans back and our eyes meet for a long moment.
The intensity makes my breath quicken. He lowers his head slowly until a puff of air from his nose tickles my skin.
His lips graze mine, a delicate touch that is the total opposite of Drake’s mauling.
Jaeger’s gentleness speaks of heat and longing, and something deeper I can’t put my finger on. But I want it.
If I thought the attraction between us was powerful, the electricity his lips generate is coiled, sizzling need. My fingers clutch his shirt.
This is what I’ve craved. All night, all week—since we first met.
Jaeger pulls back, keeping an inch of space between us. His breaths fan my chin, thumb rubbing circles along my hairline. “Is this okay? After—”
I lean up and fasten my mouth to his in answer. Whether I acknowledged it to myself or not, I’ve been waiting for this kiss for weeks.
His fingers slide into my hair, angling my head for better access, and I’m drowning.
My belly tightens, body arching toward him. I wrap my arms around his broad back and pull him close until we fall backward onto the cushions with him on top.
His weight feels amazing. Not crushing or forced, but just enough to fire more need. I’m a sea of sensation and all we’re doing is kissing. My legs squeeze his hips, drawing him closer.
A short, guttural moan escapes his mouth and his hand drifts from my hair, down my throat, to my chest, wrapping around my breast. He pulls his mouth away and runs kisses along my chin and neck. “Cali,” he whispers, cupping my breast and rubbing his thumb over my nipple.
It’s not until he says my name again that the lust clears enough to register that he’s attempting to communicate with something other than body talk. I look into his eyes.
“When is Gen getting back?” he says.
Wha…? Gen?
Panic spears my gut, and not because I’m worried Gen will walk in on us, though she could.
I forgot all about Gen and Jaeger and the possibility that something exists between them.
After all the encouragement I’ve given Gen to get back out there, here I am making out with a guy she may actually like.
What am I doing? I squirm out from beneath him, my anger piqued at myself and the idea that Jaeger could be playing me. Gen is my best friend. Enough of this. I have to find out what’s going on between them.
I swallow and attempt to gather the rest of my brain cells that scattered the minute Jaeger loomed over me with his large, heated body. “I don’t know, but she was pretty drunk when I left. She’ll probably be home soon.”
“Maybe I should leave.” He stands and adjusts his pants, which I realize now house a very large, impressive bulge. I glance away.
If I ask Jaeger about Gen now, I’m not sure I’ll be able to tell truth from lie. The subject needs to be addressed soberly—when I’m not reacting passionately to my protector. “That’s probably a good idea.”