Chapter 11 #2
What happens next is a blur. As Maguire grabs my arm to steady me, Tate snaps a fist to punch the obnoxious man, but he misses because Sean yanks the man out of the way.
Then the bartender literally jumps over the bar to help, shocking the bystanders into frozen awe.
After a beat to thaw from the shock, everyone snaps into action.
Foley and the bartender join up to drag the half-drunk guy, who shouts but doesn’t have much fight in him against the two men, seeing him to the door.
I notice lots of cell phones raised and flashing as I process the scene, returning my gaze to Tate.
Standing before him, looking up at his blazing eyes, I realize that he risked a lot going for a punch to protect me, that if he’d been successful in hitting the bastard he would have gotten in deep trouble, arrested and sued and probably put on probation by the team.
The scenario of consequences flashing through my head makes my knees weak.
“I’m ready to go now,” I whisper.
Taking my arm, Tate nods at Louie, who says under his breath to follow him to the back door.
I toss my keys to Duff and he and Sean Patrick block for us as we leave, covering our flank. Outside, Tate still has my arm as he hustles me to his car, something low and sleek that I can’t identify in the dark. Opening the passenger door, he unceremoniously shoves me inside.
As I fall into the seat he shuts the door, and my heart starts pumping like I just swallowed a bucket of crack.
I seriously worry, putting a hand to my chest, not about having a heart attack, but about the fact that I’m so turned on by Tate Fontanna right now that I might do something so forward, so bold, that I’ll actually regret it in the morning.
And I’m not in the habit of regretting much.
Owning your actions is key when you have the kind of chip-on-your-shoulder boldness that I do, a kind of us-against-the-world, take-no-prisoners attitude that I’d been raised on.
Between my father’s larger-than-life persona and my pinup girl looks, I’ve had to perfect the bravado until it wasn’t bravado anymore.
Until the bombast took root in my personality, right alongside the gracious Southern charmer my grandma had taught me to be whenever she had the chance, the persona that flourished during my time at Georgia State.
I feel like I have two people inside me, one of two personas I can bring out to accommodate any occasion, handle any situation. Except this one, right now, as Tate gets inside the driver’s side, slams the door closed, and faces me.
Holy shit. His dimples aren’t showing and I find this intense, crazed, worked-up version of the man even more attractive, more exciting than the affable dimpled version.
I clutch the seat, curling my fingers over the sides until I have to force them to relax before I puncture the leather upholstery with my red fingernails.
I know he’s going to say something, probably swear at me, so I don’t wait, don’t think or question my instinct for even a breath.
Leaning over the stick shift between us, I wrap my arms around his neck and press my mouth to his in a hot, seething, hungry kiss that’s been waiting all night to devour him.
He’s surprised at first, but he goes along.
Big time. Kissing me back, his tongue is like a hot explosion in my mouth.
He bunches his fist in my hair and punishes me with a hard, passionate response until my head spins from lack of oxygen, my breathing unable to keep up.
Then he lets me go abruptly, pushing me away from him.
“Damn you.” He turns away, punches his ignition button, and pulls away from the curb. I’m surprised he doesn’t leave rubber, but he’s totally back under control now, ignoring me like he’s a taxi driver.
After a minute, when we get to the turnoff to the highway on-ramp, he stops at the stop sign and, without looking at me, asks, “Where do you live?”
I give him my address in Chelsea and he instructs his navigation system to direct us there.
Since he’s clearly still cooling down, I don’t bother pointing out that I could have given him directions.
Even I know I’ve pushed him too far tonight.
Or maybe not. Do I really need to mollify him?
Hell no. I didn’t invite him to the bar. Not exactly.
“Quite a car,” I say. He ignores me and it seems like it takes only another minute before he’s pulling up in front of the old triple decker house with the ramshackle garage where I live.
“Is this right?” he says, giving a dubious look at the house and neighborhood.
“Home sweet home.” I don’t push my door open because I know he has more to say.
“I can’t believe you live in this part of town. I know you have the money to live somewhere better than this.”
I shrug, feeling the defiance in me kicking up, the pleasure along with it. Then he turns to me and the way he looks deflates all that cool defiance, but not the pleasure.
“I don’t care how tough you are, you don’t have any business living in this neighborhood, looking the way you look.”
“You like how I look then?” He doesn’t answer, just simmers.
“I can take care of myself. No daughter of Oscar Smith would ever go through life without being well versed in how to take a man down if she had to. You know that right?”
“Not exactly, but I should have guessed,” he says.
I sigh because he doesn’t look happy. He’s really worried about me and that sends my pleasure meter up a few hundred notches. Even though I have no business being pleased.
“Look, I had Duff with me for backup tonight. We were okay. We were about to leave when you came in.” I lie my ass off to placate him and now I furrow my brow because that is plain silly.
And unprecedented. Since when do I need to placate a guy, especially a guy who’s a player, not my boyfriend?
It’s a waste of time anyway, because his face takes on a darker look than ever.
“I don’t give a shit if you had Duff with you. And you’re a liar because you weren’t close to leaving. Those guys weren’t going to let you leave easy. You put Louie in a tough position. He was seconds away from calling the cops and that would not be good for business.”
Listening to him, watching him, it strikes me he’s not thinking about the trouble he could have gotten into, he’s thinking about me and about Louie.
“What about you?” I say. “I’m sorry you almost got into a brawl—you could have gotten—”
“Don’t even pretend you’re sorry for one minute,” he says.
He punches the engine off and that makes my heart tumble around, gives me a flutter in my gut, the kind I’ve only heard of in fairy tales.
Oh my God. I’m in such trouble, the kind I don’t want to be in.
The kind where I start thinking too much about a man, so much that it throws me off course maybe.
But my throbbing center forces me to acknowledge it’s something I definitely want. How close to the edge can I get and stay on this side of the line?
“You want to come inside and talk about it?”
“Talk? Is that seriously what you think we’ll do if I come inside with you?” He leans close to make his point scaldingly clear. In spite of the tremble in my voice I keep my chin up and lean in to meet him.
“So? Are you coming inside?”
He stares and I can see the war inside his head, in his gut, and probably in his pants though I refrain from glancing down. The tension radiates from him and it feels delicious, making me itch to touch him, touch his skin, feel it against mine, feel his hands on me—
“No.” He shoves his door open and gets out, comes around and opens my door.
I barely have enough time to regroup, emotional whiplash taking its toll.
I get out of his car, careful not to touch him as if he’ll incinerate me if I do.
I’m afraid to lose my cool, to lose any more of my pride than I already have.
He dogs me up the drive to the door and stands behind me while I unlock it. I don’t ask him again to come inside when I turn to face him, before I push the door open.
“Suit yourself, Fontanna,” I say, the automatic bravado defense kicking in. He smiles—it’s laced with irony, but the dimples are there so what do I care? The lift of my heart is automatic.
“There’s no good outcome for us, Chloe. We’d be a train wreck before the season ended—and that’s the best-case scenario.”
“What’s the worst case?” I return his smile, more mischief in mine, more flirtation. I don’t care what his answer is, I just want to hear him say it.
“One or both of us gets destroyed.”
I don’t bother pointing out that’s what a train wreck is because he’s made his point, made it too serious. I also don’t ask if he’s thinking we’d destroy each other purposefully, because I know the answer to that. He thinks I’m out to get him.
Too bad there’s an argument to be made that he’s right. Except I know I’m not purposely trying to be destructive to him. I’m purposely trying to be constructive for me. And that just makes me a selfish bitch, doesn’t it? Yes. No. Fuck.
Pushing the door open, I turn away from him and go inside without another word. I run up the stairs and look out my window to watch him get into his car and pull away from the curb, slowly. I watch him drive until I can’t see him anymore.