Chapter Thirteen
Thirteen
Margot
Pretty good might have been stretching the truth.
Fidgeting with my bracelet, I try to tune out the six other conversations that are happening around me so I can focus on the one I’m having with Riley.
It’s a struggle, not because she isn’t interesting, but because when more than two people talk at once my brain stops listening and absorbing in favor of surviving the auditory avalanche.
While I’d prefer the outside seat to try to avoid overstimulation, that would mean Caine sitting next to Riley, so here I am in the middle.
Suffering for the cause.
The cause is me being ridiculously territorial.
I don’t dislike Riley; in fact, as we talk, I decide that if she collected me as a friend, I wouldn’t be opposed.
She’s funny, and we bond over the fact that she also has a terrier mix with an attitude problem.
If she is interested in Caine—granted, I haven’t seen any sign of that—I can’t fault her.
She has good taste. That said, if she wants to sleep with him, she’ll have to do it the good old-fashioned way: by killing me first.
You’re being completely ridiculous, the voice in my head warns.
You have a crush and you’re acting like you have a claim to him.
Maybe I can drown the voice with Jack and Coke.
I take another gulp. That Caine remembered I like the outside of the booth is warming me more than the alcohol.
Nicholas called me picky, but I like to think of it as particular.
Picky sounds like I won’t even try things, and I will, but only in a certain way, under certain conditions.
Still listening to Riley fill Alondra in on gossip from her season, I sneak a peek at Caine.
One elbow on the table, his face is serious as he talks to a man across from him.
Instead of the sunshine I’m used to, he’s the sky before a thunderstorm.
Serious. Grim. Foreboding. It’s not bad, but it is different.
Caine’s conversation winds down, and he settles back against the booth. Turning, he gives me a curious look. “How’s it going?”
That’s when I realize I’ve been staring straight at him this whole time.
Whoops.
“I’m not used to seeing this side of you,” I blurt, then regret it. All the noise in here has rattled my brain-to-mouth filter loose.
Interested, he shifts closer, so we aren’t yelling to be heard.
A smile plays at the corner of his mouth.
Caine didn’t shave before coming out, and the faint stubble on his jaw is begging me to touch it.
I love stubble. I wish we were at the hotel, and I wish I were brave enough to ask him to rub it on every inch of me—
“What’s this side?” he asks, pulling my focus away from the fantasy.
“Broody. Serious.” I snicker into my drink, unable to resist. “Cool.”
Caine chuckles, moving in farther until our thighs touch. “Excuse me? I am always so, so cool.”
He’s right, but there’s no way I’m admitting it.
Holding up my hand, I wiggle it in a maybe yes, maybe no shimmy. “Debatable. You weren’t that cool tied up with a dog leash yesterday.”
He throws his head back and laughs, the action far too attractive. “I was attacked. That doesn’t count.”
Shrugging, I take another sip of my drink. “Why were you sneaking through the house anyway? I meant to ask.”
I regret the question when all the amusement leaves his face. “The back door was open. I thought you left it for me; I was looking for you to see if you knew why the generator wasn’t kicking on.”
That Nicholas was likely in the house while I slept is a horrifying thought, but I can’t let myself dwell on it right now.
Letting myself think about the situation when I’m not able to take action to address the worry is a surefire way to start a spiral.
Cozied next to Caine in a booth, I pretend that part of my life is too far away to touch me.
In an entirely uncharacteristic bout of optimism, I wonder if maybe Nicholas is on his way back to Texas right now, if maybe he only wanted to scare me.
Please let this be his version of getting the last word.
I know it isn’t, but maybe I can pretend for a few hours. Trying to salvage the mood I ruined, I find a positive. “It’s pretty funny that you both could have been creeping around at the same time.”
Caine goes full glower, leaning close to speak quietly. “There’s nothing funny about your ex-husband creeping around the house.”
Pinching my thumb and forefinger until they’re nearly touching, I give him my most convincing look. “But if the two of you had crashed into each other in the dark, that would have been funny. A tiny bit. Admit it.”
His sigh is long-suffering. “Fine. It would be somewhat funny if I crashed into him so hard he fell down the stairs and broke his neck.”
“Dreams, dreams,” I mutter.
That earns a laugh.
Starting to feel a teensy bit boxed in, I scan the overcrowded club. “I think I’m going to get some air.”
Caine rises from the booth to let me out. I start for the stairs, surprised when he follows, carrying my barely sipped drink.
“You can stay.” I’m nearly yelling so he can hear me. “I’m good. Catch up with everybody.” He shakes his head, easing by me to lead us through the crowd. “Nah. I could use some air.”
I almost press him to make sure he isn’t coming just to babysit me but opt to let it go.
For the moment I’m maxed out on yell conversations.
The distance from mildly irritated by the noise level to ready to fake my own death for some peace and quiet is very short for me, and I’d rather not take the journey tonight.
Lights. People. Sounds. There’s too much of all three, and unlike at the Abattoir, there’s no order.
When I have a goal, it’s easier to cut out the chaos.
Without the purpose of moving from room to room successfully to motivate me, I feel out of control in an awful way.
We travel down the stairs, through a throng of people, and out a side door onto a small patio between buildings.
There are a few metal tables with half-full ashtrays, and a handful of chairs.
The alley is well lit, so it doesn’t matter that low, full clouds obscure the moon.
When the door shuts behind us, sealing the noise of the club in, an almost giddy relief fills me.
The relative quiet might as well be a sanctuary.
“Oh, this is nice” slips out. It’s only after I’ve said it that I realize most people would not be so pleased by an alley.
Caine chuckles but doesn’t question it. “We could just stay out here.”
As if correcting him, the sky rumbles. A light rain begins. My brush with sensory freedom was short-lived, but better than nothing, I suppose. Resigned to going back inside, I move toward the door.
“Not yet—come on.” His hand is warm as he takes mine, interlocking our fingers.
Instead of into the club, he hurries me out of the alley and across the parking lot.
At his truck, Caine ushers me into the back seat.
I slide across the leather bench to the far side.
My pulse is higher than our scurry across the parking lot warrants.
He tugs the door shut, closing out the rain.
It feels like he’s closed out the world.
Sexy.
No.
Sexual interest stirs, and I want to put it back to bed.
The tiniest bit of guilt flares with it, but that’s easier to smother.
For all the less helpful traits I acquired during my raising, I’m grateful that our household was largely sex positive.
My marriage to Nicholas was less so, but I’ve worked through most of that since the divorce.
While I still occasionally find stray threads of shame clinging in unexpected places, I’ve accepted the fact that my sexual appetite is enormous.
Tragically, my drive and the frequency at which I feel sexual attraction to people are not aligned.
Not to mention the risk-to-reward meter in my brain is quick to vote in favor of a night in with myself instead of cozying up with someone else.
Caine is one of the uncommon, dangerous exceptions, as proven by the time at the haunt that’s fueled my fantasies for the last few years.
Our fingers brush as he passes me my drink. I take a sip because I don’t know what else to do, then put it in the cup holder. The truck is cozy, a comfortable temperature, though my body is running hot.
I glance around the space. “Great back seat. More legroom than I expected.”
Amused, he watches my imitation of a casual, completely unaroused person. “Glad you like it. You warm enough?”
I nod.
Rain plays a steady, soothing rhythm on the roof.
Roughing a hand over his damp hair, Caine turns toward me until our knees touch.
Tugging his sweatshirt cuffs over his hands, he rubs the fabric down my arms, drying them with a tense, touching-but-not-really-touching movement.
The sexy sweetness of the gesture nearly makes me combust. His body’s tight, muscles coiled. A rattlesnake before the strike.
“Just bite me already,” I mutter, realizing a second too late it was only supposed to be a thought.
He freezes. “What?”
Uncertain how to extract myself from Just bite me already, I blurt, “I was awake. Last night. When you asked to take me out.”
Really?
Bouncing back from an awkward moment with an even more awkward one?
Caine’s expression goes from confused to surprised to about to give me hell.
His smirk is wicked. “You faked me out?”
“I needed time to process.” I look everywhere but at his face. The Scream mask is about to fall out of the pocket of his sweatshirt. Pulling it all the way free, I rub an imaginary smudge from the pale plastic.
“And now that you’ve processed?” Trying not to laugh, he releases my upper arms. I try not to miss the feel of his hands.
Get it together.
He was drying you with his sleeves, for fuck’s sake.
I take a fortifying breath. “I think it sounds fun.”
“Oh. It will be.” Caine’s grin makes me believe him. “I’m thinking dinner for date one—somewhere with pasta, of course. Then for date two, Vegas.”
The utter absurdity chases away any awkwardness. “Vegas is really more of a date three activity,” I deadpan.
He smiles, flashing a dimple that’s so cute I’m ready to say How about we have date one right here in the back seat? when a realization hits.
Shit.
I need to tell him about Shane.