Chapter Fourteen #3
He looked at her. “You wrote poems for my car parts? I’m disturbed and aroused.”
“That’s your resting state.”
He stepped closer, one hand braced on the open door above her head. “You called me your man.”
Lane’s throat went dry. “I was establishing boundaries with Shein Delilah.”
“You called me your man,” he repeated, softer.
Lane looked away. “Don’t make it deep.”
“Too late,” he smacked her round ass in the leggings that made it hard to focus.
“Robot.”
“Lavender.”
Lane studied him. The man was infuriating. Possessive. Brilliant. Overbearing. Tender. Ridiculous. Loyal in a way that kept sneaking up on her and rearranging the furniture in her heart. She climbed into the SUV.
Lennox smiled like he knew exactly what she was admitting by staying.
Lane settled into the seat as he rounded the SUV.
She should’ve been embarrassed. She had made a scene in a restaurant.
Blocked the man she was falling for. Orchestrated a luxury-car scavenger hunt.
Cursed out a woman on speakerphone and publicly declared Lennox hers before God, Cadence’s unborn twins, and a bag of Tariq’s chips.
Instead, she felt strangely lighter and arguably unhinged.
Lennox had stayed; even furious, he had come for her. Even wronged, he had apologized for the piece that belonged to him. Even with his car scattered around Stonebridge like a petty treasure hunt, he had looked at her like she was still worth the whole basket.
Lane watched him climb into the driver’s seat, jaw tight, eyes hot, shirt pulling across his shoulders, and sighed.
The ride to Lennox’s place was quiet for exactly four minutes.
Lane counted. Not because she was nervous.
She was a grown woman who’d survived public embarrassment, family trauma, corporate sharks, food bank politics, and several emotional ambushes from a man with cheekbones and a cybersecurity clearance. Silence in a car did not scare her.
But Lennox’s silence had weight.
Not coldness. That would’ve been easier to fight.
Coldness gave her something to sharpen herself against. This was different.
He kept one hand on the wheel and the other resting near the gear shift, his jaw set, his gaze steady on the road ahead.
His face wasn’t angry exactly, but it wasn’t soft either; it was controlled.
Robot had entered serious firmware mode. Lane shifted in the passenger seat and looked out the window as Stonebridge blurred past in streaks of streetlight and late-night traffic. “You’re doing that thing.”
Lennox glanced at her then, and the look stole the joke right out of her mouth.
Not because it was harsh. Because it wasn’t.
That was the problem with Lennox lately.
His restraint did more damage than his chaos ever had.
He could’ve yelled. Could’ve thrown her own recklessness back at her.
Could’ve made the whole thing about the car, the money, the inconvenience, the embarrassment.
A lesser man would’ve. A more foolish man definitely would’ve.
Lennox just looked at her like he saw past the petty and straight into the bruise. Then he returned his eyes to the road. “You hurt me.”
Lane sat quietly as his words sobered her. She’d been on his ass about not hurting her and handling her with care. Yet here she was hurting him while he was committing to growing and changing.
She swallowed. “Lennox—”
“No, let me finish.”
His voice was stern, but not sharp. Firm, but careful. Like he’d chosen every word before handing it to her, Lane’s hands folded in her lap.
“I know what you saw looked bad,” he said.
“I know I should’ve told you I was meeting her before I did it.
That part is on me, and I already apologized for it.
I’ll apologize again if you need me to, but you didn’t give me a chance to explain,” he continued.
“You made a decision about me and my feelings for you, and then you punished me for a version of the story you never let me answer.”
His voice softened. “Lavender.”
The nickname hit worse than her government name would’ve as Lane looked at him.
“I’ve earned some of your anger,” he said.
“I know that. I earned your caution too. I hacked you. I interfered. I got scared and acted like a man who didn’t know what to do with a woman who mattered.
I’m not pretending I came into this clean, but I’ve been trying,” he said.
“And I need you to try with me. If you’re scared, let me know.
If you’re mad, cuss me out. If you need distance, say that.
But don’t disappear behind a wall and make me fight a ghost version of myself while you go nuclear. ”
Lane let out a slow breath, knowing he was right and she hated that.
Not because she wanted to be right. Because being wrong meant looking at what she’d done and admitting the hurt hadn’t excused the harm; her feelings had been real.
The sight of that woman’s hand on him had ripped through something still tender.
But Lennox had deserved more than being blocked, tried, sentenced, and stripped of a custom hood without being allowed to testify.
“You’re right,” she said quietly, turning slightly toward him. “I should’ve let you explain. I saw her and went straight to the worst version of the story because that’s the version I’m used to being handed.”
“I know.”
“That doesn’t make it okay.”
“No, it doesn’t,” he agreed.
“I’m sorry.”
Lennox’s jaw eased, but he didn’t soften completely. “I accept that.”
Lane blinked. “You accept that?” she repeated.
“Yes.” He glanced at her again. “And when we get home, I’m gonna spank you for being a bad girl.”
Lane’s entire body forgot what it had been doing.
The air in the SUV changed as a low current slid through the space between them, making the leather seat beneath her feel warmer, and the sound of the engine seem farther away.
She turned her head slowly. Lennox still watched the road, but there was a flicker in his eyes she hadn’t seen in this exact shape before. This was controlled.
“I dare you,” Lane instigated.
“Bet,” was all Lennox said.
Her thighs pressed together before she could stop them. His eyes dipped for half a second, then returned to the road. “But only if you still want that when we walk in.”
Damn him. Damn him for the heat. Damn him twice for the care underneath it.
Lane faced forward, heart beating hard enough to annoy her. “You’re very confident for a man whose car spent a week in witness protection.”
She leaned across the console before she could talk herself out of it, her seat belt stretching with the movement. Lennox’s hand gripped the wheel as she pressed her mouth to the side of his neck. He inhaled sharply, making Lane smile against his skin.
“I am sorry,” she whispered near his ear, kissing the spot beneath his jaw. “I should’ve trusted you enough to ask.”
“Yes, you should’ve.”
Her hand slid over his chest, feeling just how muscular he was beneath his shirt. “And you were looking entirely too fine in that restaurant with your little former whatever sitting across from you.”
Her fingers drifted lower, over the hard lines of his stomach, and his breathing changed.
“Lane.”
She smiled. “Yes, Robot?”
“You’re making it hard to drive,” He said, cutting her a look so hot she almost forgot the road existed.
“Sit back,” he said.
There it was again. That quiet command that her body responded to before her pride could object, but she made sure to roll her eyes as she settled back into her seat.
His hand left the gear shift and rested palm-up near the console—an offering.
Lane looked at it for one beat, then placed her hand in his.
His fingers closed around hers. She stared at their joined hands.
When they turned onto Lennox’s street, Lane expected to see the space in his driveway where his car had been parked before the dismantling.
She expected evidence of the chaos she’d caused.
Maybe a tow truck or scattered tools. Maybe Tariq leaning against a fence with popcorn, because that man appeared anywhere mess had a scent.
Instead, she saw the car. Lennox’s custom luxury car sat in the driveway beneath the soft glow of the exterior lights, flawless and gleaming as it had never been violated by heartbreak, rage, and a woman who stopped at nothing to get her lick back.
The car looked expensive, whole, and deeply unaware of how close it had come to becoming a permanent installation titled Men Should Explain Quickly.
Lane sat up straight. “Oh.”
Lennox parked beside it and turned off the SUV.
For a moment, neither of them moved, and he finally spoke, “Lavender, I was never worried about that damn car because nobody in or out of this city is willing to cross me. I’m glad you were able to get your frustration out, but the car has been here for days,” he smirked.
She looked at Lennox with adoration in her eyes. He was the man who had corrected her without cruelty and made accountability feel like a hand held out instead of a sentence. Lennox got out, rounded the SUV, and opened her door.
When she stepped down, he didn’t touch her right away.
He stood close enough for the warmth of him to wrap around her in the night air.
Together, they walked past the resurrected car and toward the front door, and Lane had the inconvenient thought that maybe love wasn’t always about never breaking things.
Maybe sometimes it was about knowing how to repair what mattered before morning.