Chapter 21
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
MILLIE
“He pisses me off so bad,” I grind out as soon as I slam my car door closed and it’s just me and Heidi alone in my car.
“Because you want to fuck him?” Heidi asks.
I narrow my eyes at her, but she only grins at me. I want to slap her, too. I do want to fuck him. I don’t think I’ll ever not want to fuck him, but right now, I want to slap him first.
Maybe angry-fuck him.
Then all I can think about is the fucking part, and my anger instantly dissipates, which also pisses me off because I really want to stay mad at him. I want to ball my hands into fists and hit him, over and over.
Shaking my head, I force myself to get out of my own head. I need to focus and get home. It’s late, and I’m exhausted, both mentally and physically. This situation is coming to a head, and I’m at my breaking point.
Pushing those thoughts away, I look over at Heidi, who is sitting in my passenger seat, no doubt wondering what happened to her normally cool, calm, and collected friend.
“He’s following us home, and he’s staying at my place.”
“Oh my,” Heidi murmurs.
“Yeah,” I snort as I start the engine.
Shifting my car into Drive, I begin to head home. Axton is behind me, and as much as I try to ignore his presence, I can’t help but flick my gaze to the rearview mirror every couple of seconds. His pickup is there, comforting me, and that pisses me off, too.
Nothing about him should be a comfort. I’m mad at him. The fact that he claimed me, without even asking me, is too much. If he had just talked to me and explained things, I would have been fine with it, but he didn’t want to tell me shit… He didn’t want to ask me anything.
What he wanted to do was dictate and for me to fall in line.
Ten years ago, I would have blindly accepted that with gleeful excitement. In fact, I would have fallen to my damn knees about the whole thing. Not anymore. I want him to talk to me, to think of me as a person, as a partner.
I don’t want him to just do things and not give a shit about my input, as if I’m some little woman at home to just smile and nod.
That is not me, and I refuse to be that.
Parking in my assigned parking spot, I close my eyes and let out a heavy sigh. “It’s going to be okay, babe,” Heidi murmurs, and then I feel her fingers curl around my wrist.
I didn’t realize I was squeezing the steering wheel as tightly as I am. Releasing it slightly, I turn my head and open my eyes, my gaze finding hers. She’s smiling at me, and I can’t help but smile back.
“It will be,” I whisper. “But I’m not sure I will be.”
“Like hell you won’t,” she snaps. “You’re going to be fine, even if you’re not knocking boots with that sexy-as-hell biker. This doesn’t have to be your stopping point. It could just be a stepping stone, exactly like Vegas.”
“Or maybe I just go back to Vegas?”
Vegas.
Heidi snorts. “You’ve grown out of Vegas, babe. It’s not big enough for you anymore.”
I almost laugh in her face. My eyes search hers, and I try to keep the humor out of my voice, but I’m fairly certain I fail.
“But this is bigger?”
She shakes her head once. “Not in size, honey,” she whispers. “In a million different ways. But I’m not talking population, and you know it.”
I do know what she’s saying. I don’t say that, though. I’m not sure I want to admit it. Instead, I just nod a couple of times. “Let’s go inside before he starts knocking on my window or something,” I say.
“It’s going to be what it needs to be, in the end, that is,” Heidi says.
My smile curves up, almost as if it’s against my wishes, but I don’t try to stop it, either. “Yeah,” I agree.
Because she’s right. Forcing things never works. Just like I tried to force things with Axton before I left for Vegas all those years ago. And just like he’s trying to do the same to me now. It doesn’t work, and Heidi knows what she’s talking about.
It’s going to be what it needs to be in the end.
However that works. It’s going to play out the way it’s going to. And there is little a person can do to change that beyond pivoting and shifting trajectories in life—but at the end of the day, we must let the chips fall as they may.
Heidi and I make our way up to my apartment. I can hear Axton walking behind us, but I ignore him. At least I pretend to. I’m not sure anyone could ever actually ignore Axton. Even behind me, I can feel him. He takes up every ounce of space in the room.
PIGGY
I pissed Millie off good this time. I walk behind her and her friend, then slip into the apartment, locking the door behind me. I can tell by the expression Millie wears that she is trying very hard to ignore me… and it won’t last long.
“You ladies want a glass of wine or anything?” I ask.
They whip their heads around. Millie’s friend, Heidi, smiles. Millie frowns. My lips twitch into a smirk. I know Millie is forcing her pissed-off expression. It’s cute as fuck. Heidi takes a step toward me, just as Millie calls out that she’s taking a shower.
She stomps away dramatically, and then I hear the door slam closed behind her. Heidi laughs softly as she makes her way toward the kitchen. “I’ll have a glass of wine.”
I pull a glass out of the cabinet, unscrew the top of the bottle, and pour a glass for her.
Wrapping my fingers around the stem, I gently push it out for her to take.
I watch as her fingers curl around the base of the glass.
My eyes don’t look away as she lifts the glass to her lips, taking a drink.
“You’re the infamous Axton Colter,” she murmurs over the rim.
Picking up my beer, I lift it to my lips and take a pull from the bottle, my gaze connected to hers. “I don’t know if that’s a good thing or not,” I state as I bring the bottle down.
She shrugs a shoulder. “We’ll find out, I’m sure.”
“You came all the way from Vegas,” I state.
It’s not a question. It’s a statement. But I still believe she’s going to respond, so I wait. And then she does speak, and I’m not sure how I feel about what she says.
“I did. My best friend needed me. Even if she didn’t ask me to come, she needed me here. Dante came sniffing around my place in Vegas looking for her, and when she said he had been spotted here, I knew it was time for me to come to her.”
“You didn’t think I could protect her?”
She smiles, though this time it doesn’t reach her eyes. “Oh, I’m sure you can physically protect her.”
“But?” I ask.
“Can you protect her heart?” she asks. “Will you?”
We stare at one another in silence. She’s right. I can’t protect her heart, and I’ll never make a promise that I can. Because that would be a fucking lie. And I’m not the man who can make blind promises of any kind.
“I can’t,” I admit. “As much as I want to lie and say that I can, that’s an impossible promise. I don’t know what the future holds.”
She takes another sip of her wine, her lips twitching into a smirk as her gaze searches mine. Then she clears her throat slightly before she speaks. “I can respect that. More than you know, actually.”
“No other questions?”
Heidi takes another sip of her wine, then sinks her teeth into her bottom lip before she shakes her head once. “Don’t get me wrong, I have a million questions, but they can all wait. This was the most important one.”
“And I passed?” I ask.
She snorts. “It wasn’t pass or fail, but let’s just say I didn’t hate the answer.”
I watch as she drains her glass, then reaches forward and places it in the sink. She straightens, then flicks her gaze up and down my body, shaking her head a couple of times. She begins to walk away from me, then stops and looks over her shoulder at me.
“I love Millie. Truly. The last thing I ever want is for her to be hurt. Protect her, Axton…” Heidi’s words trail off, then she clears her throat. “All of her.”
She slips out of the kitchen, and I hear her move through the apartment and into Millie’s room. The door opens, then closes. I don’t hear the lock shift into place. I won’t be going in there, even if I wanted to. As much as I want to push it with Millie, I have a feeling it wouldn’t go over well.
I think in this case, I’m going to have to wait for her to come to me.
I know she will. If there’s anything I am certain about when it comes to Millie, it’s that if I make myself available, if I’m in her space—if I stay there and don’t go away, no matter how hard she pushes, no matter how pissed she pretends to be—she will fucking break for me.
And it will be glorious.