Chapter Eight #3
I was on my way home afterward when an engine thundered to life nearby. A headlight flared in my rearview as the bike emerged from a side street and settled into the lane behind me. It followed me all the way home.
My hand was in my purse as I got out of my car, fingers gripping my gun.
The motorcycle pulled up next to me, and I immediately recognized Jakob.
He turned the bike off and strode over. The night clung to his large form as if welcoming back a lost son.
Crickets chirruped in the nearby trees. Heat hung heavy around us, despite the fact that the sun had set hours ago.
A bougainvillea vine wrapped up the wrought-iron staircase of my apartment building, and the heady bouquet of its flowers perfumed the air.
“What are you doing here?” I asked.
“Making sure you got home safe,” he said.
I let my gun go and slung my handbag over my shoulder. “I don’t need you to be my bodyguard. You might not think I can defend myself in a fight, but I can sure as shit still fire my weapon without your assistance.”
He stared at me for a long moment. “I didn’t say you can’t defend yourself. I said your knee makes you vulnerable.”
Heat crept up my neck. “Are you serious right now? Verbatim, I said, ‘I can take care of myself,’ and then you said, ‘The fuck you can,’ which made it pretty clear that you think I’m nothing but a helpless victim.”
He gave me a flat look. His tone was just as lifeless. “I don’t think that.”
“All evidence to the contrary,” I said. “And I don’t appreciate you making me out to be hypersensitive to my grandmother.” I dropped my voice in imitation of him. “‘I told her a hard truth she didn’t want to hear.’”
My anger had a hold of me, and when he opened his mouth to try to get a word in, I barreled right over him.
“There’s a difference between being straightforward and being an asshole, and telling me in anger that I can’t take care of myself was a dick move, and you know it.
And it wasn’t a hard truth, by the way. Trust me, I get reminded twenty times a day that my leg is my weakness, but it doesn’t make me helpless.
You’ve never seen me in a fight, Jakob. I’m vicious.
Go for my leg, and I will rip out your jugular with my teeth if you come close enough. ”
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“And I also don’t— Wait. What?” I stared up at him, my anger deflated. Did he just apologize to me?
He met my eyes with unflinching focus. “It was a dick move. I’m sorry. I was pissed you were ashamed of me, and I snapped.”
You could have knocked me over with a feather. I had hurt Jakob Larson’s feelings. And now he was apologizing for how he reacted. I could never tell Nina about this. Her head would get so big that she wouldn’t be able to fit it through doorways anymore.
“I’m not ashamed of you,” I said.
He scowled. “You said they were going to treat you differently and you shouldn’t have brought me there.”
“I know what I said. It came out wrong, and then you snapped at me about my outfit before I could apologize.” I took a deep breath and pushed my stupid, stubborn pride aside.
“I’m sorry I made you feel like that. I’m really not ashamed of you.
I just know that people there will probably get shitty with me about who they think I’m dating, as if it’s any of their business, and my big mouth means I’ll pop off and make it worse. ”
“You looked good,” he said.
I blinked. “Huh?”
“In the outfit,” he clarified, stepping closer. His massive frame momentarily blocked out the nearby streetlight, dropping us into deep shadow. “You might have looked like a church mouse, but you were a highly fuckable one.”
My mouth popped open in surprise.
Jakob leaned down like he was going to kiss me but came to a shuddering standstill an inch away from my lips, like he’d stopped himself for some reason.
Fuck that.
I grabbed his jacket and pulled.
Our mouths collided.
My back hit the car door.
Jakob’s big body shoved against mine.
I let his jacket go and wrapped my arms around his neck, squeezing hard enough to pull him flat against me.
Any tighter and I’d be choking him. One of his hands fisted into my hair and held me in place.
His mouth bruised mine. I bit his lip and tasted copper on my tongue.
I didn’t know if we were about to fuck or fight.
Jakob broke away suddenly, pushing off the car, and I was forced to let him go before I face-planted onto the pavement. I swayed where I stood, head spinning from lack of oxygen. Damn it, I forgot to breathe while he’d been kissing me.
His chest heaved like he’d forgotten to breathe too. “Call me tomorrow after you hear from Perez?”
I didn’t trust my voice to answer, didn’t trust myself not to invite him up, so I just nodded.
He stood there another minute, gaze raking over me, shoulders held in a stiff line like he was fighting some sort of internal battle. I was half afraid that if he came at me again, I would tackle him and we’d end up fucking in my car in a well-lit parking lot where anyone might see us.
I opened my mouth.
“Tomorrow,” he said, and turned away. With his voice gone low like that, it came out sounding like some sort of sinful threat.