CHAPTER EIGHT
SUNNY
I stared at the remains of my father’s sparkling blue cobra as my heart rose into my throat. Air couldn't fit past the enclosed space because my stomach was already there. Glass littered the pavement, metal twisted into deformed shapes that a car should never make, Any moment I expected to retch on the walkway. The constant pressure of Hawk’s hand on my lower back alone kept me steady and sane.
“I’ll call—” Someone. Who? “Uh— The police. No, insurance. Hell, I can’t think—” I swallowed as the whole parking lot shimmered behind a veil of unshed tears. I didn’t even care if he saw me cry right now. “Who would?—”
“—Do this to you.” Hawk finished for me. He snapped pictures of my car with his phone one handed, though that comforting touch never left my back.
“Shouldn’t you be doing that with mine?” I dragged my gaze from the mess in front of me and stared at him.
Hawk nodded, pocket this phone and slipped mine from between numbed fingers. “Where’s all your details?”
“Glove compartment, like any normal person.” I tried for my usual level of sass, but any energy I’d had left after Hawk’s hot and heavy make out session in the lunchroom deserted me.
Hawk nodded and slipped his jacket off. The bundle of cloth was wedged into my arms as he yanked his shirt over his head, revealing a lean, ripped body that must have been years in the making.
Every ridge of muscle, every tendon stretched ripped and taut beneath tanned skin that gave his back a carved quality. I knew the drivers worked out. Endurance racers were fit in both mind and body—for the hours they were in the seat, they had to be. But being up close to Hawk like this, when he radiated power and fury… I was not prepared. Also, that rage wasn’t directed at me. Thankfully.
I swallowed through my numbness as a trickle of need lifted my heart rate. It might be as inappropriate as hell but right now, my eyes glued to the perfect body before me instead of the ruined one behind me, I’d take feeling anything over feeling nothing.
“Get a good eyeball in, Coops.” Hawk grinned at me over his shoulder, wrapping his shirt around his hand.
I frowned, my mouth open to protest as glass crunched beneath his boots. He reached through the shattered window, bending at the waist to fight with the glove compartment. Muscle stretched over ribs where a leaner man might have fallen into the skinny, weedy category, a teen who hadn’t grown into his body yet.
Hark had no such issues. At twenty-four—I knew every stat for every racer who threatened Benson’s title—KC Hawking fit into his frame in a way that left no doubt that he could own any room he chose.
He straightened, wiggled a wad of folded papers in his shirt-wrapped hand in a mini victory dance as he stepped away from the wreckage and back to me. Dusting the shirt off, he gave it up as a bad job and dropped the wadded material into the wreckage. One arm slid around my waist, drawing me into his side as he pressed the wad into my hand.
Warm skin contacted my body from hip to shoulder, and if I turned my head the slightest amount, my mouth would be pressed to his chest.
I blinked, my attention on the ridges of abs that ran the length of his lower torso and disappeared into his jeans. They made me want to turn him to face me so I could count the damn things properly.
“Eyes up here, Coops.” The warmth in his voice held a warning note as the papers waggled before my eyes again.
I dragged my gaze to his face to see heat warring with concern…and something I couldn’t quite identify in his luminous yellow gaze. Short curls draped over his forehead where his hair had grown longer in the off season.
“Thank you.” I took the sheaf from him and flicked through aimlessly. My over sensitized mind whirled and nothing in front of me sank in as I stared at the papers without reading the words.
Hawk’s breath hissed between his teeth above me.
Large hands covered mine in a gentle touch, the same tender touch he’d shown me in the lunchroom earlier.
“Here.” He thumbed through my insurance and service papers until he came to the right one. “Phone.”
“What? No.” I gripped my device as a lifeline. “I can do this bit myself.” Hawk watched me with hooded eyes, and I got the impression he was assessing my sanity. “But thank you.”
My limited conversational skills did nothing to alleviate his concern, though my gentle headbutt to his chest softened the tight lines around his mouth the smallest amount. His touch dropped away leaving a void of cold air that caressed my skin in his wake. Hawk reached into his car and shucked his leather jacket over his bare chest.
I managed to keep my eyes on his face, this time.
“I’m going to be right over there.” He jerked his thumb over his shoulder at his yellow Maserati parked right in front of the office building as he shifted me away from the wreckage of my own car. “I won’t be far. Make the call, Coops. I’ll leave you alone while you get everything sorted. Then…come back to me. Please.”
I stared into hooded eyes and got lost, but one truth stood out at me. What Hawk said was a lie.
He wasn’t leaving me alone at all.
Something warm blossomed in the empty pit of my stomach. I nodded, and typed in the number for the insurance on my phone. It took three goes for my shaking thumbs to enter the information, and in the quiet of the parking lot, Hawk’s quiet report to the police bounced off the pavement and ricocheted back to me.
A slow smile melted some of the numbness that consumed me. Hawk was nothing like Benson had led me to believe, or what the media showed. He was so different to what I had expected. There was so much about him that appealed to me.
But if I was seen with him…
The numbness wore off completely in a swell of panic that flowed over me in a nauseating wave. I swallowed back my rising nausea on two fronts and made the call. But the seed of fear sown over the warmth Hawk returned to me.
I stood alone after all, giving out the stark details of the wreck that held all the emotions of only one person.
Hawk stood at my back the entire time the police dusted for prints and did their job. After a while I stopped watching and let conflicting thoughts of Hawk and Benson roil around in my head. It was so much easier when I kept wondering what both the police and Hawk kept asking about who might have wanted to ruin my car. We all came up with the same, blunt answer.
I don’t know.
So instead I spent the time contemplating my career.
Either direction I headed in had death written all over it. Well, maybe not my death, just the end of my working life. That was all. Benson was clearly someone different to who I had thought when I signed up as part of his team, and Hawk…he was in a whole other category all of his own.
The dark-haired driver bolstered me through several hours of waiting without being asked, no expectations. He remained silent when I needed to process everything, asked the police all the questions that stuck in my throat. The rest of the information in my head swarmed until I could barely grasp onto one idea before he moved onto the next in a logical sequence that evaded me.
I hated being the damn damsel in distress, but knowing he was there became a comfort I wanted to rely on, at least in this moment.
“You look miserable.” Hawk poked an elbow in my ribs.
I turned from where we perched on the steps to the office building to stare up at him, my mouth flapping open. “Gee, thanks for that.”
“Happy to help. Tell me a story to distract me from the pins and needles in my feet. You said the car was your dad’s?”
I rolled my eyes. “Your idea of a distraction is to talk about the literal wreck in front of us? Your bedside manner is not your strong point, Hawk.”
“You can do so much better than that.” His fist nudged my thigh in a gentle bump. “Come on. Educate me.”
I stared at him for a long moment. “Are you taking the mickey?” Hawk’s eyes widened as he shook his head. I sighed. “Okay, fine. My father was a collector. Of…well, pretty much everything. Where I grew up there was a lot of unrest. Kosovo was a mess and we lived in a small town near the border.”
“So you immigrated to the US.”
I grimace. “That’s…one way of putting it. There was a lot of paperwork involved, and a lot of money changed hands. It wasn’t just one move, either. It—” I swallowed hard, trying not to recall the childhood torn from Honey and me. The family we lost. “My father—he sold everything to bring us across. I still don’t know if it was the right thing, whether we should have— could have stayed.”
“I’m sure he wanted you to have the best chance at life, and an unknown future is a terrifying thing for those you love.” Hawk gave me a barely-there smile when I gaped at him. “I’m not a guns blazing guy all the time, you know.”
“That’s good to know.” I pressed my lips together, collecting my thoughts. “Dad got a job managing a small branch of a big bank. He set us up with everything. School, the townhouse I live in. He never collected anything ever again. The cobra was the only thing he bought for himself and he never got to enjoy it. Mom couldn’t bear the thought of being away from her home, and she—” I swallowed back the tears that blurred my vision. “She committed suicide. Dad followed her a month later. Not suicide, just…I think he died of a broken heart. The cobra is—was—what I had left of him.” I sniffled. “So, cheery story, huh?”
“I asked for it.” Hawk turned a pensive gaze my way that pierced any barriers remaining between us.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have—” I swallowed again. A single tear broke free and tumbled down my cheek.
Hawk’s arm wrapped around my shoulders, drawing me into him for a long moment. “I’m glad you told me.” His knuckles brushed over my cheek, and he released me to shift his knees. “But seriously, Coops. You’re a cruel taskmaster, making me listen sitting here.” His mouth crooked up at one side. “My ass is numb from moving steps with you. We’ve gone up and down this row three times. As much as I know I’m an arrogant bastard, I don't really want Miss Police Officer over there to see me in my tighty whities.”
“You don’t like a woman in uniform?” I teased, my heavy mood evaporating as Hawk lifted the moment. My fingers brushed over my purse and laptop case I’d collected earlier, letting their solid forms anchor me as I tilted my head back to meet those dark eyes.
And was swallowed whole in a maelstrom that roiled below the surface.
“I like what I like, Coops.” Hawk reached out to wind a finger through the long curl nearest him and gave it a gentle tug.
He leaned forward, drawing me closer until my breath was as lost as the rest of me. Conflicting need and desire tumbled over me. His breath brushed my lips, and as my lips tingled at his proximity. Just as I thought he might kiss me, he drew back and left me floundering.
Hawk’s gaze flicked up, his face going curiously blank. “Ah. They’re done.” He stood.
I hadn’t realized his hand was wrapped around mine until he drew me up alongside him.
The police officer clutched his tablet, his gaze flicking between me and Hawk. “Uh, ma’am. Your car. It’s— we didn’t find any prints. Or anything much. Everything will be sent to forensics. We’ll hear back when we hear back.” A twitch seemed to have developed beneath one eye where he stared at me.
“Okay, thank you. So I have to get this cleaned up? I can touch stuff now?”
“Yes.” He stared harder at me. A sheen of sweat broke out on his forehead.
“Okay—”
“Officer.” Hawk’s hand on my back stiffened the slightest amount. “How long until we hear back on the reports? I’d like Sunny to get her life back together as fast as we can. And—” His fingertips dug into my back, “—I want to know she’s safe from whoever did this.”
“I’ll be fine—” I objected, but a third push at my back stilted my protest.
Hawk shot me a quick look and the slightest shake of his head. I caught the motion and held my tongue as he turned back to the cop, a smile I recognized from studying his—as my driver’s competitor—media campaigns. His public face.
After the hours spent understanding who this man was underneath all the pomp and bullshit facade, I kind of hated it.
The easy smile didn’t quite reach his eyes that dulled with too much practice, his smile too-wide, too damn bright. It was a very different face from the one he presented in private, from the one he’d shown me today, when I needed it.
The fact I knew that about him floored me for a moment, long enough for the conversion to flow around me.
“Yes, yes of course. I can have a car drive by her…” —Officer Red-Face checked his notes— “Miss Cooper’s house each night until we get a response. And we can try to hurry the results. Is that okay?” The cop stumbled over his words in his eagerness to answer Hawk, all smiles and nods, and not a single glance my way.
“I don’t think I exist next to you,” I murmured, half-turning to Hawk to keep my comment private.
Oddly enough, I wasn’t upset, or maybe it was a good thing that I wasn’t narcissistic enough to be upset.
Hawk’s eyebrow rose as he spoke easily with the officer, and I had to remember that the public man and the private could never be one and the same. Like Benson, Hawk was all show for most of the year and, despite the emotion he had shown me over the past few hours, the only time the drivers really cared was when they were on that track beating their personal goals.
I slipped out of Hawk’s hold to back up a few steps. He shot a furrowed glance my way but I shook my head and smiled, donning my own practiced PR mask. I needed space to think. And that was a ridiculously hard thing to do standing next to KC Hawking when he had kissed me stupid a few hours ago and knotted my heart in threads of his own making since then.
We’d gone from being at each other's throats to being in each other’s back pockets so fast I ached from whiplash. The biggest problem was that I had started to like the person I suspected Hawk was underneath, and that posed fresh problems I couldn’t deal with right now.
I wanted to walk away, catch a taxi home and never come back but I had my own broken baby to look after. Where my father had kept the windshield spotless, the glass lay crumpled, sagging inward. The paintwork twisted into a form unrecognizable as the sleek lines that made the brand so covetable as I struggled to remember the ruin the way Dad had kept it, how I had kept it after he had passed.
Spotless, polished regularly and when I was away, wrapped under its cover, not a scratch in the paintwork anywhere instead of the vandalism it had acquired while I was in the kitchen kissing Hawk.
Now that same prized memory looked like someone had taken to it with a novelty sized sledgehammer.
My hands flexed at my sides as I considered getting one of my own for when we found out who had done the damage. I tapped my phone, torn between calling the garage or a tow truck. Getting towed was the obvious option, but Benson—being the control freak he was—would have a fit if I didn't call it in and rely on him to ‘fix’ my problem.
And then he’d mansplain my issues to me, along with all the things I’d done wrong today.
No thanks.
I huffed out a half breath that could have been a laugh or a sob. My lips pressed tight together, I began to search for a tow company that wouldn’t cost me the earth.
“Hey.” Hawk jogged to my side.
His knuckle tilted my head back and despite my intent not to look at him, I did it anyway. It wasn’t like he forced the action—more that I wanted to take comfort from the company he offered.
We really had done a one-eighty in the last few hours. Or maybe we’d turned enough circles to confuse hell out of us both.
Yet he was still here.
“Hey.” I sent him a tight smile. “Your fan club left?”
“Only after a selfie and an autograph.” He grimaced. “I’m sorry. I felt like I was taking over but…it was the fastest way to get you what you needed.”
My brow furrowed. “What do I need?”
And who the hell are you to decide that for me? Maybe he was more like Benson than I’d thought.
“To be safe. Someone targeted you, specifically.” Hawk surveyed me with knowing eyes.
Oh. I gave him a mental apology even if I couldn’t say the words. “That makes sense, I guess.” I found a tow company that didn’t look like it would empty my bank account, and hit call.
Hawk’s hand closed around mine, and his thumb tapped the red button at the bottom of the screen. “Sunny. Wait.” He didn’t let go, didn’t speak until I looked up at him. “First, I can get you a free tow, if you’d like. No, I’m not trying to control you, but I want you to consider the budget option. I know the driver, and he’s a good man.”
My eyes narrowed as I held my chin up in faux defiance as his show of goodwill, stifling the smile that wanted to curl the corners of my lips.
He’s not like Benson after all.
“Is it Ryan?”
Hawk rubbed a day’s growth on his chin. “Maybe?”
I snorted. “Yes. Please get your lovely contact to tow my car. He might need to bring an industrial vacuum. There might be one inside?” I stared at the glass entrance to the office building and bit my lip.
It surprised me that Janie hadn’t come out and made a fuss. She was streamlined when it came to business, but not when it came to gossip. Hawk followed the line of my gaze, his brow dipping deep enough to give him the facade of his namesake.
“The other part is that you need to be safe.” Hawk didn’t look at me as he sent a message and pocketed his phone. He brushed my arm with the back of his hand. “You know, I expected tears from a princess like you. A tantrum, maybe.” The corner of his mouth quirked.
I rolled my eyes. “I’m pretty sure I put my big girl panties on this morning, Hawk. I’m good.”
“Mmm. ‘Bout as good as I feel when I lose a race.” His arm slid around me, drawing me into his side. I let out a long held breath as I leaned my head against the refuge of his shoulder and closed my eyes. “Coops, I know you said you couldn’t think who would do it but…Princess. Look at me.”
“What, Hawk?”
I tilted my head back and pried open tired eyes that wanted to stay shut. I got the feeling that the moment I sat down I’d be asleep, despite the turmoil swaying at the bottom of my stomach.
“I want— I need—” Hawk swallowed and halted on the broken words. “I want—ah, fuck it.”
He dipped his head, his mouth slanted over mine in a long, deep kiss that awoke every nerve ending and soothed me all at once. Hawk’s kiss softened, gentling as he drew back, his lips grazing my mouth.
“Oh.” Tingles erupted over my skin, already addicted to the feel of him and craving more. I sucked in a shuddering breath while my brain went on hiatus.
Hawk rested his forehead against mine. “Better?”
“Yes.” I whispered it, and kept my eyes closed.
“Coops.”
“Yeah?”
“Look at me, Princess.”
I tried to kiss him again to make him change his mind, as a distraction, anything. But Hawk drew back enough to stop me making contact.
“What, Hawk?” I let out a little growl that sounded slightly feral in my own ears.
He grinned. “Tell me who’s angry at you enough to ruin something you love?”
“Who says I love it?” The tremor in my voice gave me away but I held his gaze anyway.
“Damn, I love that you never back down. And I love the tiny noises you make. Do you make them in bed?”
If I’d been cold, his words doused my insides in steaming water. “When I snore? Why thank you.” I ignored his chuckle and tried to step back but wound his arms around me and refused to let go. “No, I can’t think of anyone. At all.”
“Those sorts of noises. Are you sure, Sunny?”
“Yes, Hawk,” I mimicked him. “I’m sure.”
“You give sass like that in the bedroom?”
“If we make it that far.”
My breath hitched as that last one sort of slipped out but damn, this boy brought out the worst in me. I pressed my palms to his chest and stroked downward, molding to the form of the tight abs I’d drooled over before. Maybe boy was underestimating him a bit.
My fingers skimmed lower without conscious thought. Hawk’s hands wrapped around my wrists, halting my progress. Warmth seeped from his flesh to mine. My breath hitched. His hold wasn’t tight exactly, but firm enough to stop me from pulling away.
“Let’s save something for later, huh?” His lips brushed the shell of my ear in an indisputably intimate gesture.
A shiver ran over my body raising gooseflesh in its wake.
Hawk’s gaze tracked the tiny movement. His hands dropped from my wrists to close on my waist instead. “Coops?—”
An enormous honk shattered the silence around us.
I looked around him to find a garish ducky yellow truck parked behind his equally lurid lemon sports car.
“Your friend is here. I don’t think I’ve ever seen so much testosterone in one place.”
“You’ve been at the track on race day. You can smell it.” Hawk grinned. He released me to jog to his car, extracting his keys from his pocket.
With a bit of clever maneuvering we managed to fit all three vehicles in the small parking lot, though I wasn't sure how exactly we were going to get them all out again.
Ryan waved at me, grimacing when he saw the wreck. “Yours?” he called, taking in the damage.
“It was.” I swallowed past the lump in my throat that sank to my stomach, a weight that moored me to the ground, helpless and hating it.
“Is.” Ryan yelled back from the top of his truck as he hauled on a pair of tattered leather gloves. “Don’t underestimate what Hawk’s team can do. We’ll get her fixed up, Miss Cooper.”
Tears pricked the corners of my eyes. Swiping at them under the facade of pushing my hair back, I ran into the building to collect whatever cleaning equipment I could find as the first tear trailed down my cheek.
Janie sat behind the reception desk and looked up with a bright smile. “Sunny! I thought you’d left for the day.”
I blinked at her, and it took me well over a minute to find my voice. A minute I spent dashing recurring tears away. “Um, my car got wrecked.”
“Oh.” She stilled, her gaze darting between me and her screen. “By who?”
Did she have something else to do that was more important? I banished the narcissistic thought from my head. “I have no idea. Didn’t you see the police out front?”
“I’ve been smashed with all this.” Janie hefted a stack of haphazard paperwork. “Seriously. I get stuck in my own little fishbowl space here.”
“Fair enough.” I managed to offer her a smile that didn’t slip off my face. “Be careful leaving the building and coming in early, okay? It looks like we have a vandal around.”
“Will do.” She waved a hand above her head which was already down as she clacked away at her keyboard.
I headed to the janitor’s cupboard and armed myself with garbage bags, a very old and broken looking vacuum I hoped still worked, leaving the newer one in its spot and grabbed a dustpan and brush.
Humming Sadie the Cleaning Lady under my breath I towed everything back to the parking lot.
My car was already on the back of the tow truck, the boys lashing the carcass to the flatbed. The spot my car had sat on left an outline of surprisingly little broken glass and twisted metal, and I had the whole thing cleaned up and the equipment returned to its home by the time the boys were ready to go.
Ryan left us with a wave and the address of the crew workshop, promising I could come by the next day to talk out repairs.
“He’s not going to take payment. You know that, right?” Hawk stood behind me. Heat rolled off him.
“You must be good company on a cold night.”
“Is that an offer, Coops?” He stood too close. Way too close.
I swallowed and made to step forward but he caught my arm, turning me in a small circle to face him. “No. And I’m not letting your crew chief fix my car for free. Though I am relieved it’s someone I trust.” Ryan had an excellent reputation around the track. I’d always been sad he had been paired with Hawk—until I got to know his driver.
Perspective .
I smiled a little.
Hawk traced the corner of my mouth. “What’s this for?”
“You’re not the arrogant asshole I thought you were.”
Hawk’s eyes sparkled. “That’s a relief. Come on.” His hand closed on mine and tugged.
I stood still. “Hawk?—”
He looked at me, one eyebrow raised. “I’m offering you a lift home, Coops. Not your own private peep show.”
I took a few steps in the direction of his car. “How disappointing.”
Hawk moved faster than I thought possible. In less than a second I was in front of him, pinned against his body in a cage of his own making. The world spun around me as the low roof of his car dug into my back. My spine arched in protest as he towered over me. He fisted my hair in one hand, the other at my back that pressed me to his chest, preventing me from moving in any direction.
The spark that lit his eyes before morphed into dark flame I doubted ever went out, as though he existed on a fine wire between rage and rest—not calm exactly—flickering from one to the other at will.
His will. A place where everything was controlled by him.
“Let me up.”
“No.”
His mouth slammed down over mine before I could draw another breath. I’d be damned if I couldn't form a coherent thought as his tongue thrust between my lips, devouring and teasing, drawing me into him. His heart pounded against my chest. Horns honked on the main road behind us, but even so the world seemed too far away to worry about.
I wanted to fight his brand of control but my body ached for more of him. Instead of pushing him back like I should have I arched, pressing my body flush to his. My fingers tugged at the material of his tee, sliding inside to curve over the muscle and sinew I’d been dying to touch.
He groaned into my mouth. “What happened to no , Coops? You’re supposed to be the strong one here.”
“You have to be kidding. Have you met me, Hawk?”
His soft laugh against my mouth did strange things to my insides. Worse, when his kisses grew lighter, softer. HIs touch drew back as I sank into a sea of oblivion, languished there for a moment longer. Something in my head clicked into place, followed by a wave of fear.
I shivered against his chest. “Was that a publicity stunt?”
“What?” Hawk gentled his grip in my hair and cupped the back of my head instead, though he reared back as though I’d slapped him. Maybe metaphorically speaking I had. “Are you insane? We’ve been flirting for four fucking hours. Every time I look at you I think of you naked in my bed, beneath me though I wouldn't object to seeing you ride me either, Coops. I see myself fucking you in the darkness, in the morning. I can fucking taste you on my tongue and it’s not enough. Now you think I’d do that for a stunt ?” The darkness in his eyes kindled into glowing embers, his rage never far from the surface.
Like someone else I know .
I shivered again, regardless of the heat that rolled from him where body still pressed my mine, thigh to thigh, and traced tiny, inconsequential patterns on his shirt. “No. I don’t.”
“Mhmm.” His chin grazed my cheek in a rough motion, drawing my focus back to him with a gasp. “Why would you think I’d do that, Coops? Have I scared you?” His eyes saw too much, so I closed mine, blocking him out but he already read the fear in me. “Or have you been hurt like that before? Is it Benson?”
“Yes? No .” I covered the condemning slip far too late and winced. “Please don’t repeat that,” I begged. Another wince. More like an internal cringe. Could today get any worse?
Hawk’s fingers curled around my cheeks, drawing my mouth back to his. This time he didn’t demand anything and gave instead. Light, sweet kisses dulled the sense of rising panic as though he knew chaos that churned inside me.
Which was a damn miracle because I could barely work myself out most of the time.
“Better?”
“You’re ruining me.” I pushed a little harder at his chest. “The bar is too high. Anyone else would fail the Hawk test.”
“Benchmark set. I like it.” He backed off a step, drawing me with him. “You don’t need to compare me with anyone else, Coops. I’m right here.” His thumb brushed over my lips in a too tender touch that left them tingling.
It took me a moment to get my head together. “Stop that. I can’t think.”
“Thinking is overrated.”
“Not right now. Hawk— I can’t. I work for— dammit. This is such a mess.”
“Work for me,” he purred.
Dammit, he’s too seductive. That’s not fair.
“I can’t.”
“Of course you can. I know there's a stigma with people in a relationship?—”
“We’re in a relationship?” When had that happened? It couldn’t happen.
“—In the workplace, but my team loves you. Hell, you’re probably our team mascot by now.”
“That doesn’t sound cringey at all.”
Hawk laughed and opened the passenger door. It flicked up like a wing as he pushed me gently down onto the black leather bucket seat until my knees buckled. “Trust me, I’m worse on Sundays.”
My purse and laptop case landed on my lap with a soft thud. “It’s Tuesday.” But I spoke to a closed door.
The leather interior of his car stole my breath. There was a hint of something else layered in the air beside the butter soft leather, like whiskey and woodsmoke. Something undefinable, but all Hawk.
He slid into the driver’s seat, closing us into the small pod.
“I feel like I’m lying down.” I pressed my hands to my thighs and tried not to clench them.
“Home, Princess? I’m going to need that address.” Hawk paused, sliding his fingers beneath my hands to interlace them. “You don’t have to be afraid of me, you know. I’ll take you home and leave you there, if that’s what you want. I’ll sit on your doorstep all night, or sleep in my car to make sure you’re safe.”
I frowned as he started the engine with a button. “Stalker much? Why do you care all of a sudden? You know I can’t— we can’t be—” Something hard lodged in my throat and I looked away from the darkened gaze that saw straight through me.
He saw far too much, and I should have hated it more.
But I didn’t.