Chapter 9
Nine
Ky
He followed me home.
Because of course he did.
But now, instead of idling at the curb, watching me climb the stairs to my apartment, he’s parked in a guest spot and he’s walking toward me, all easy, loose-limbed strength.
If only I ignore the look in his eyes.
Like he’s seen something he wants.
Like I’m the prey to his predator and he’s begun his hunt.
Maybe, given my past, that should be terrifying.
But I can’t ignore the hidden thrill coiling in my belly—nor the notion that to be hunted and caught by this man would mean to be held safely in the protection of him for the rest of my life.
Caught but not caged.
So no, I don’t bolt like a gazelle on the savannah.
I freeze…maybe like a gazelle on the savannah.
But maybe also like a woman who’s finally ready to grasp on to the future.
“You have dinner plans?” I ask when he’s close.
And get to watch the pleased surprise travel through his face. “Yes.”
“Oh,” I say, disappointment sliding through me. Is it possible I’ve misread—
A tug on my ponytail. “With you.”
Heat on my cheeks…warmth in my belly.
“Want me to order something?” he asks, snagging my bag from my shoulder and walking toward the apartment building, leaving me with no choice but to follow him. “Since you’ve had a day?” he tosses over his shoulder when I get close again, and my breath catches at the sparks of gold in his eyes.
They’re beautiful.
Kind of like the man himself.
A man I haven’t allowed myself to notice.
Because if I did, I might…
“My day wasn’t that bad,” I say as we climb the stairs side-by-side.
“It was bad enough to make you cry,” he points out and he’s not wrong.
“That was more of an adrenaline letdown from nearly skidding off the road,” I say dryly.
I expect him to chuckle.
Instead, when he’s silent and I look up at him, I find he’s scowling.
“What?”
His scowl deepens but he just nods toward my apartment door, silently indicating I unlock it. I input the code, hear the quiet whir as it disengages, then twist the handle and push it open.
“What?” I ask again when he just waves a hand, dispatching another silent order—this one for me to go inside.
I only listen because I want to know what’s put the scowl on his face.
But at some point (soon), he’ll need to cool it on the commands—silent or otherwise.
“That was really dangerous,” he grinds out, closing and locking the door behind him.
I feel something in me catch, a flicker of awareness that Colt is the first man I’ve been alone with in my apartment that isn’t my brother, that he’s the first man I’ve been alone with like this since I opened the door and let Dylan in all those years before.
Pausing, I wait for the panic to come, to flood through my nerves and overpower my thoughts, my place in the present, yanking me fiercely back into the past.
Instead…
I’m still here.
And now I’m left wondering why Colt has gone so still, so tense.
Curiosity has the knot in my belly loosening and I ask, “What do you mean?”
“The tire blowing, the winding road. Fuck the fucking trees.” He clamps his teeth together and shakes his head sharply. “What I did was fucking stupid.” Blazing brown eyes on mine. “I’m so sorry, Kylie. I wasn’t thinking.”
Phantom fingers wrap tightly around my heart and squeeze. “Colt,” I murmur. “That wasn’t your fault.”
“How do you know?” he mutters. “I’ve been fucking with your tires for months and—”
I move toward him, do something else that only Colt seems to unlock—I touch him and don’t feel fear.
“It was a brand new tire,” I tell him. “After your most recent…mischief”—I slide my hand from his shoulder, back up to his jaw, the spiky bristles of the stubble there grounding me in the now.
Or maybe it’s just that touching him is addictive—“the tire guys insisted on doing a full workup. I got four new tires.” A beat as I grin up at him. “With locking caps.”
His eyes come to mine.
Still blazing.
But not in fear and anger.
In…
Something else that I can’t name.
Because if I do, if I admit I’m feeling the same thing, I don’t think I’ll be grounded here in the present.
I’ll be right back in the past.
He covers my hand with his own. “You won’t need those for me.” Gentle bleeding into his eyes as he peels my hand from his cheek. “Not any longer.” A kiss to the center of my palm. “Not ever again.”
My lungs hitch.
“Now dinner, baby.”
Another hitch as his fingers wrap around mine and squeeze. He shoves his free hand into his pocket and I know he’s searching for his phone, ready to make good on that promise to order in dinner for us.
“Dinner is in the crockpot,” I say, tilting my head toward the kitchen. “I just need to bake off the bread and serve it up.”
He sniffs. “Is that the deliciousness I’m smelling?”
I grin. “Does it do something to your hockey street cred to use words like deliciousness?”
“Probably.” A shrug. “But there’s always something to be given shit about, so I don’t give a fuck if they tease me about the proper usage of words like deliciousness.” He winks at me. “Especially when whatever it is that I’m smelling is exactly that.”
“What else do the guys give you shit about?” I ask as I move into the kitchen, giving him a silent order—ha!—of my own (that being to hang my school bag on its proper hook).
(He does).
“How about I tell you after you tell me why your day was such a day?” He moves over to me as I pull the bowls down, snag the ladle from the drawer I keep it in.
“It really isn’t that big of a—”
“What temperature do you want the oven at?”
“Wh-what?” I ask, spinning from the sudden change in conversational topic.
“For the bread, what temperature?”
I blink. Then again.
“Never mind,” he says, snagging the loaf of grocery store garlic bread. “I can read.”
“I—”
He turns to the oven, fiddles with the knobs. “Now, talk to me.”
“I—” Then I shake my head. “You’re not going to let this go, are you?”
His mouth tips up. “What do you think?”
I think that if my brother is stubborn, Colt takes it to the next level.
“Food first,” I grumble. “Then I’ll complain to you about my boss.”