I threw a finger out at Gypsy and Marco as I passed them, ignoring the fact they were both cracking up. “You keep that handsy little toddler away from my girl, or he and I are gonna have some words.”
That only made them laugh harder.
“Well, how old do I gots to be to kiss boys?” she asked, making my stomach sink like a rock.
“Seventy-two,” I answered quickly, making her blue eyes go big.
“But that’s forever away!”
“Exactly,” I grunted under my breath just as we reached her mom’s side. “I’ll be dead by then so I won’t have to see it.”
“Think you might have over reacted just a bit?” Hayden asked as she took her daughter from me and balanced her on her hip.
“No. That boy’s trouble. I can already tell.”
“Mommy, Mike owes me two dollars!” Ivy declared excited. The she proceeded to snitch on me. “He said damn and hell!”
Instead of giving me a reproachful look, her head fell back on a long, loud laugh that worked wonders in unfurling the knot that had formed in my chest as soon as I saw that dirty rat’s lips on Ivy.
I watched her for a second before I felt a pair of eyes on me. When I looked across our group I saw Leo watching me with a smug-as-hell grin on his face.
“You’re so screwed,” he mouthed.
I was. I so was. But I didn’t care one damn bit.
Chapter Eighteen
Micah
Walking into the station Monday morning, I felt better than I had in months. Now that Dalton was sticking to Charlie’s back like a leech, I could rest easier knowing she was safe. And after weeks of walking around in a near-constant state of arousal, all because of a certain redhead, that nagging ache in my gut—and groin—had been alleviated . . . at least temporarily.
I was counting down the minutes until I could slide back inside Hayden, but the pressure building inside me was no longer at risk of erupting at any moment.
I moved through the bullpen, not noticing that the noise all around me had dropped to a lull until I reached my desk. Leo was already at his, leaned back in his chair with his feet kicked up, grinning like the cat that caught the canary. I glanced over at the desk clump beside ours and noticed Hayes and Trick were watching me as well, both wearing expressions similar to my partner’s.
“What’s goin’ on?” I asked, my voice coated with suspicion.
“Nothin’,” Hayes replied, bringing his arms up to lace his fingers together behind his head, the picture of relaxation. “Just thinkin’ of all the shit I’m gonna buy with my half of your paycheck.”
My chin jerked back into my neck. “What the hell are you talkin’ about?”
“The bet, asshole,” Trick answered, looking way too pleased with himself. “We told you you’d find a woman one day and go ass over elbow for her. Your cocky ass was so sure that wouldn’t happen, you bet your paycheck.”
Goddamn it. I’d forgotten about that. “If I remember correctly, that bet was about getting married.” I collapsed into my chair and sucked back a big gulp of coffee that I’d gotten earlier at Muffin Top. “And that’s not on the table, so you guys can fuck off.”
“It may not be on the table yet,” Hayes said. “Did you forget we were there Saturday? We all saw how you acted when you thought Cormack was encroaching. You just quit runnin’ in the middle of a play! Cost us the game and everything. All so you could whip your dick out and piss a circle around your woman.”
“Jesus, man,” Trick jumped in. “I thought for a second, if you’d had your gun on you, you’d have shot him.”
Chances were, if I’d had my gun, I might have at least stopped to consider it. Especially knowing what I knew. I shared a quick, private look with Leo where he silently communicated he’d have considered the same damn thing.
“And we were also there when you two came back more than half an hour later, lookin’ way too damn pleased with yourselves, and you couldn’t keep your hands off her the rest of the night,” Hayes added.
“Well, it’s not an issue anymore.” Not that it ever was. As far as I cared, Hayden had been mine since that night in Richmond. “Not like that asshole stood a chance.” And soon it would be moot, because Leo and I were going to make goddamn sure that prick never breathed free air again.
Leo glanced at something past my shoulder, and whatever it was had him fighting back a grin. “Looks like word about you and Hayden’s PDA fest the other night made its way through the whole town.” He stopped fighting it and grinned full on as he turned his focus back to me. “Someone’s pissed.”
I turned to peer over my shoulder and saw Cormack was standing with a couple other uniforms at the entrance to the bullpen. They might have been engaged in conversation, but his focus was on me, and he was not happy. I didn’t have it in me to give a single fuck.
“I gave him fair warning she was mine and he needed to back the hell off. Not my fault he didn’t listen.”
If it was the last thing I ever did, I’d make sure he never got anywhere near Hayden Young ever again.
Hayden
The trail of sweat starting at my scalp leading to the waistband of my fitted yoga pants probably looked about as sexy as I felt sliding down the pole. As soon as my butt hit the ground, I collapsed, my arms and legs spread wide as I desperately sucked in air.
McKenna’s sleek blonde hair hung around her face as she stood over me. “You alive down there?”
“Barely,” I wheezed. “I’ve got one foot in the grave right now, and it’s all your fault.”
“Well, if it makes you feel any better, you actually did pretty good today,” she said on a laugh.
I peeled myself off the cool tile and sat up, taking the water bottle she was holding out for me and chugging half of it down in a few gulps. “It doesn’t, but thanks anyway.”
She sat down on the floor beside me and took a drink from her own bottle. Today was my first pole dance lesson with McKenna, and the woman was the devil in a pair of boy shorts and a sports bra. Several times throughout the hour, I loudly questioned our friendship, but she didn’t seem to care, laughing it off each time.
“Does that mean you aren’t coming back for a second lesson?” she asked, looking far too pleased with herself.
I shot her a killing scowl. “Right now I’m more concerned that you may have broken my body, so I’m not really thinking that far in advance.”
She rolled her eyes at my dramatics. “Oh, you’ll be fine. Just go home and soak in a hot bath. Or, maybe you can ask a certain next door neighbor to massage away all your aches and pains.”
“You’ve been waiting all afternoon for me to set you up like that, haven’t you?”
She spun on the floor to face me full-on, tucking her criss-crossed legs in close to her body. “You know it. And now that it’s out there, it’s time to spill. What’s going on between you guys? I want to know everything.”
Honestly, I was surprised it had taken her this long to bring it up. It had been two days since the cookout. Two days since Micah and I had angry sex against my bedroom wall. Two days since he went all over-protective-dude on poor little Raleigh. And two days since we rejoined the party and he spent the rest of the time touching me in some way, whether it was holding my hand, casually draping his arm around my waist, or grabbing my hips in order to pull me against him whenever he felt like it.