Chapter Eight
And the hits just keep coming.
At this point it felt like the universe was punishing me.
For what, I didn’t know. I tried my best to be a good person.
Sure, I slipped up every once in a while and got snippy when some jacknut was a rude asshole in public, but who didn’t.
The world was filled with temptation. But this .
. . I’d done nothing to deserve the day I was having.
Not the way it had started, with a fantasy come to life, dangling in my face, but not being able to reach out and touch it. That right there was enough to mentally torture me for years—Ryan in my bedroom looking sleepy and sexy, waking me up not to have wild sex but to tell me my phone was ringing.
Gah.
And that brought me to the next cosmic fuck-you, and this was a big one—lunch with my mother.
Honestly, it had taken longer than I thought it would, but the mask had slipped and the truth had poured out.
She was crumbling under the weight, emotionally and financially.
Like me, she’d drained the savings my parents had fastidiously contributed to throughout the years to ensure their retirement would be comfortable.
Investments accounts were now being cashed in.
But it wasn’t the money, it was the utter devastation she could no longer hide.
No one talks about the emotional havoc of grieving for someone who is still alive but . . . not.
The sadness that turns into irrational resentment.
The why-mes and why-hims that batter your heart.
Then there are the outbursts—the frustrated, angry tirades about .
. . nothing. I’d read all I could read, I thought I was prepared, but nothing—absolutely nothing—could prepare a daughter to witness her father’s downfall.
To listen to her mother’s sobs. To watch a wife make the unthinkable decision to place her beloved in a home, to have to admit she was no longer capable of caring for the man to whom she’d vowed her life.
My once-beautiful life was now shit.
And now this . . .
I’d already called work to tell them I’d be late.
And I’d called the police to report the fender bender.
Yes, I made those calls in that order since I was due to work in five minutes and after last night, I figured I was skating on thin ice, and more than ever I needed both of my jobs.
A no-show or late walk-in would surely get my ass canned.
So I made that call. Thankfully the hostess, Grace, answered and assured me she’d let Ryan know.
Sigh.
Now I was standing next to the mangled front end of my baby, trying to figure out this dumb insurance app while traffic was crawling around the accident.
That’s when my shitty day took a turn for the worse.
“You rear-ended me!” the aforementioned jacknut yelled in my face.
Breathe.
“Are you fucking stupid, or are you one of those stupid bitches who think they can use the rearview mirror as a makeup—”
I tried. I really did. Maybe it was him calling me stupid or a bitch or maybe it was that I could take no more, but I snapped.
Between the options available to me—karate chop him in his throat to shut him up or dish it back verbally—I chose the one that wouldn’t land me in jail.
Because I didn’t think I could hack county lockup.
“Listen up, you jerk! You pulled out in front of me. So it should be me asking you if you’re fucking stupid or if you’re just one of those dudes who thinks they can pull out into traffic and hope for the best.” I leaned in deep and screeched, “Blinkers were invented for a reason, asshole.”
The man stepped closer, and really he was huge, so maybe name-calling wasn’t the best choice.
Like I said, I tried to be nice, but sometimes my mouth got the best of me.
“Step back.”
That directive didn’t come from me.
No, now my day had gone from shitty to worse to the absolute worst.
Mr. Jacknut looked over my shoulder, his eyes flared, then he proceeded to prove not only was he an asshole, but he had a death wish.
“Is this your bitch?”
“Step. The. Fuck. Back.”
After that I found myself manhandled behind Ryan, making his demand moot since Mr. Jacknut was no longer in my face but instead nose-to-nose with a very pissed-off Ryan.
“Step back. Your bitch rear-ended me!”
Ryan moved so fast, I couldn’t be sure exactly how it happened. One second I was staring at his black tee up close and personal, the next he was three feet away from me with Mr. Jacknut pinned against my Mustang.
“Watch your mouth,” Ryan growled.
The timing was wholly inappropriate, but it couldn’t be denied the grit coupled with the ferocity in his tone had me fighting back a shiver.
“Is there a problem here?” I turned to see a police officer making her way toward the men.
Mr. Jacknut glanced at the officer with a dismissive look I’d venture to say she didn’t miss. “Yeah, there’s a problem. This asshole. And that-that—”
“What’d I say?” Ryan cut him off, giving me the opportunity to explain without blood being drawn.
Not that I wouldn’t mind Ryan popping the asshole in the face.
What? I said I tried to be a nice person. Not that I was one.
“This guy pulled out of the Pelican.” I pointed to the restaurant we were stopped in front of. “Right in front of me, and I rear-ended him,” I admitted. “But, again, he just pulled out in front of me. Then he went on to call me stupid for hitting him, when he pulled out in front of me.”
When I finished my rant, the officer asked—but really it was more of a statement than an actual question—“Sir, can you please step away.”
Ryan instantly complied. Which I thought was a display of respect and control. Unfortunately, thinking on that meant I wasn’t paying attention to the direction he was moving until it was too late.
Really too late.
His arm went around my waist, he pulled me close, and he belatedly asked, “Are you hurt?”
I was not proud when my voice came out breathy.
But seriously, there was only so much a woman could take—and a man getting in another man’s face in an effort to protect your honor and maybe even physical safety was enough to make any woman weak in the knees.
But it was more than that, it was concern that bleached out the anger.
It was the way he had his chin angled down, looking me straight in the eyes.
It was the way he was staring at me that stated plain he’d strangle the life out of Mr. Jacknut if my answer wasn’t what he wanted to hear.
“I’m fine.”
He nodded.
“Do you have Triple A?”
“Huh?”
“You need a tow truck, Chloe.”
Oh right.
My car.
“I haven’t gotten that far.”
“Get on that, baby, then we’ll deal with the police.”
We’ll deal with the police.
We?
Oh no. Hell no. I was on Ryan overload. I needed him to leave. Which begged the question . . .
“Why are you here?”
Something unreadable flashed across his face. It was there, then gone, and all that was left was the concern.
“We’ll talk about why after you get your car sorted.”
Nope.
I’d changed my mind; I didn’t want to talk about why.
So, I moved on to different question. “How’d you know where I was?”
I hadn’t told Grace exactly where I’d gotten into the accident, just that I was close to work and I’d be there as soon as I could.
“We’ll talk about that after too.”
“After, I’ll be at—”
“Make your call, Chloe.”
And there was that shiver again.
Damn him for rumbling my name all sexy-like with a hefty dose of authority mingled with a richness I only heard while he stared in my . . .
“Baby, if you keep looking at me like that, I won’t be responsible for what I do next.”
“How am I looking at you?”
Ryan leaned closer, his forehead gently touched mine, and I’d swear to it under penalty of perjury that alone made my pussy clench.
But when he said, “You know exactly how you’re looking at me, Chloe.
And it’s about damn time we stop dancing around it,” it was the husky rumble that made me clench tighter.
But it was the words that had embarrassment washing through me. “Now make your calls.”
He pulled away.
I made the call to my insurance company, which confirmed I had roadside assistance and that a tow truck would be sent.
We dealt with the police and Mr. Jacknut, whose name turned out to be Ken—not Kenneth, just Ken, because of course it was.
We waited until the tow truck arrived, but it was Ryan who talked to the driver while I sat in his truck, watching my mangled prized possession get hooked up while also having a mild panic attack about how I was going to pay my deductible and still help my mom pay this month’s invoice for my dad’s care, not to mention how I was going to get to the Vault tomorrow night.
Thankfully, I could walk to the Plank, but it was the walking home after dark that gave me pause.
I was still in mid-freakout when Ryan drove us away from the scene of my latest drama.
“Chloe?”
I blinked. My knees, along with the hem of my jean skirt, came into focus, and I looked out the window.
I didn’t know where I was, but we sure as shit weren’t at the Plank. We were in the driveway of someone’s house.
“Where are we?”
“My house.”
His house. Thankfully my screech was in my head, or I would’ve been paying to replace his cracked windshield.
“I need to get to work,” I unnecessarily told him, since he was the boss and made the freaking schedule.
“First we’re talking.”
“This is kidnapping.”
“You got into my truck,” he reminded me.
“Yes, Ryan, I got into your truck so you could take me to work. Not abduct me and bring me to your house. What’s next? Are you going to cuff me in your red room of pain and torture me with your flogger?”
Sweet holy mother of my Lord and Savior, please tell me I didn’t say that out loud. Pretty please with whipped cream and cherries.
That prayer was in vain. Ryan’s lips twitched. “That was oddly specific.”
Someone please put me out of my misery.
“Take me—”
“Oh, I plan on taking you, Chloe, though my room’s beige, not red. But don’t worry, baby, by the end you’ll be seeing colors. Maybe even tasting them.”
The air in the cab charged. He had no idea I’d been harboring a fantasy-rich crush on him for a long time and just how cruel it was to plant new ones where he whispered dark-and-dirty sweet nothings in my ear.
Or maybe he did know. He’d alluded to something similar earlier.
On that embarrassing thought, with my panties wet and the need to flee before I did something regrettable—like throw myself at him—I demanded, “Take me to work.”
Thankfully, he switched back to his earlier claim. “We’re talking first.”
That wasn’t happening. If I entered that house, we’d be doing more than talking, and it would be me who instigated it.
“Ryan. Please. I’m begging you, just take me to work.”
“That’s asking nicely. Begging is something altogether different.”
Holy hell, the man was lethal. And I really double extra didn’t need to know his mental foreplay game was top notch.
“I need to get—”
“You’ve got two choices. You either walk in, or I carry you in.”
“You wouldn’t—”
“Try me.”
I held his gaze in an attempt to decipher if he was serious. I decided he was—deadly serious. Instead of being smart and ending this insane back-and-forth that had clearly gotten out of hand and needed to end, I raised a brow in challenge.
“You’re sure this is how you wanna play it?”
“Are you sure you’re up for the—”
I didn’t get out the rest of my taunt before he leaned over the center console, used his left hand to hook me around the back of the neck, and brought us nose-to-nose.
This wasn’t the first or even the hundredth time I’d admired his rich, dark-bourbon irises.
But it was the first time I noticed the gold flecks.
And he had really long eyelashes. And right then his eyes were smoldering—not just ablaze.
We’re talking a three-alarm-fire smolder.
Not to mention, his lips were right there.
Right. There.
Finally.
Just a hair’s breadth.
I leaned closer.
“You have no idea how close you are to getting fucked in the driveaway of my house.”
I’d never had car sex. Thankfully, I didn’t tell him that.
“Is that a threat?”
“Christ.”
Then he was no longer close. As a matter of fact, he was out of the truck completely, leaving me to replay the last few moments.
Though I’d barely gotten to the part about getting fucked in his driveway when he opened my door.
Ryan reached in to unbuckle the seat belt.
It snapped free, then he yanked me out of the truck and set me on my feet.
I was still off balance when his lips gently brushed over mine on their way to my ear. “You talk a big game, baby,” he rasped, his voice full of arousal. “Time to pay up.”