She stormed toward my garage, and even though a ridiculously large pair of sunglasses covered a majority of the top half of her face, I could tell she was pissed about something.
I’d seen her flustered, nervous, shy, heartbroken, and upset, but I’d never seen her pissed. Maybe there was something seriously fucking wrong with me, but for some reason, I found it hot as hell.
All that long hair was piled on top of her head. Her long, slender legs were encased in tight yoga pants that were really fucking working for her, and even though the T-shirt she was wearing was baggy and hung low, the white material was very thin, nearly see-through, and the collar draped off one shoulder, revealing a soft girly pink bra strap.
I expected her to stagger to a halt when she spotted Chief sitting next to me—most people did. If you didn’t know him, he looked menacing and scary as hell—but she didn’t. Instead, she stopped a foot away, those sunglasses pointed right at me, and extended her hand, almost like it was second nature for her to let my dog give her a sniff, doing it without a single thought. She barely seemed to notice when Chief stood and gave her palm a happy lick because she was too busy snapping at me, “I want my car back, now.”
The urge to reach out and touch her was so damn strong, I had to cross my arms over my chest to keep from reaching out. “It’s not done yet.”
Something told me that fire was flashing in those sky-blue eyes of hers just then, and I was a little pissed I couldn’t see it for myself because of those stupid sunglasses.
She slammed her hands down on her hips and curled her top lip up in a snarl that looked too cute for words. I bet her nose was scrunched up too, but again—stupid sunglasses. “Only because you’re working on a lot more than you initially told me you’d be doing.”
Well shit. Apparently she’d stopped at the garage and talked to Cannon. The betraying bastard.
“It needed to be done,” I grunted, lifting my chin higher. I wasn’t going to apologize for going behind her back and fixing every problem that piece of shit had. “It was a goddamn death trap.”
“It was just fine!” she exclaimed, losing control in front of me for the first time ever. There was no nervous stuttering, no blushing, no hiding behind her hair. Apparently anger overrode all those nervous ticks of hers.
That’s something I’ll have to keep in mind for the future, I thought before I could stop myself.
“I can’t afford all these repairs you’re making—”
“I’m paying for it, so it’s nothing you need to worry about.”
She let out an adorable little huff at being cut off. “No the hell you are not,” she gritted. “I don’t need your handouts. And while we’re on that particular subject, I know the truck is yours.” Fucking Cannon. I was going to choke the bastard to death. “I don’t know why you felt the need to lie to me about that, but I’m not some sort of pathetic charity case. I’m a grown woman more than capable of taking care of herself.”
That was a direct hit to that place deep inside me where my protective instincts were locked away.
“Is that right?” I asked menacingly, uncrossing my arms to prop my palms on my hips as I took a step closer to her. The longer we stood there arguing with each other, the more I hated those fucking sunglasses, because they were preventing me from looking into those baby blues. “That why you’ve been driving around all this time with airbags that don’t even fuckin’ work?” I growled.
When I’d been taking shit apart and discovered that malfunction, I’d seen red. She could have been in an accident, and the one goddamn safety feature in that rust bucket she called a car would have been worthless. She could have been seriously hurt. Or worse.
“Well, I didn’t know the airbags didn’t work!” she defended, throwing her arms out at her sides.
“Doesn’t matter, because now they do.”
“Then give me my car back. I’ll work out some sort of payment plan with Cannon so you and I don’t have to speak to each other.”
Okay, now I was well into pissed, and quickly starting to lose my grip. “You’re not paying for shit,” I grunted. “You’re not getting that car back. And will you take those goddamn sunglasses off? Yelling at you while you’re wearing them is really fucking with my flow.”
“Well, suck it up!” she shouted. “And if you don’t give me that Honda back today, I swear to God, I’m going to sue the shit out of you!”
“When I finish fixing it, I’m going to sell it for a fair price. Then I’m going to help you get a great deal on a dependable car and use the cash as a down payment.”
Her chin jerked back and I had to assume her eyes had gone wide. “Have you lost your mind?” Each word of that sentence rose a decibel until she was practically shrieking.
“Goddamn it. No!” I barked. “I haven’t lost my mind!” I reached for the sunglasses just then. “And take off those fucking glasses.”
“Stone, no—” she started to shout in panic, but it was too late. The moment I saw that black eye, I did what she’d just accused me of and lost my mind.
“What the fuck is that?” I hissed so quietly the hairs on Chief’s back stood on end.
With her eyes unobscured now, I could see the panic swimming in the blue depths. “Don’t worry about it.”
“Someone hit you?” I asked, that deadly low tone turning into a rumble.
She steeled her spine and narrowed her eyes at me, but now that I could see her whole face, I could tell it was all an act. “It’s none of your business.”
“Like fuck it’s not!” I boomed. “Someone fucking hit you, Willow, and you’re gonna tell me who it was!”
“Why?”
“So I can beat the shit out of them for putting their hands on you!” Something primal and savage was building up inside me, boiling over. It was something that screamed mine. Someone had put their hands on what was mine, and I was going to kill them for it.
“All the more reason not to tell you,” she replied, her voice beginning to tremble with fear at the shift in me. “Besides the fact that it’s none of your business.”
“Everything about you is my business,” I snarled. “Fucking everything. And if you don’t tell me, I’m going to tear this whole goddamn town apart if that’s what it takes to get a name.”
With each word I spoke, her eyes got wider and wider until the panic on her face was all I could see. Then she did something I didn’t see coming; something I thought would never happen again.
Instead of giving me the asshole’s name, she lunged at me, wrapping her arms around my neck and slamming her lips against mine.
And just like that I snapped.
Chapter Twenty-One
Stone
That primal force inside me took over the moment her lips touched mine. There was no hesitation this time. I didn’t freeze. I might not get another chance at this, and I’d be damned if I wasted this one. There was no way in hell.
She might have been the one to initiate, but I’d taken over before my arms had finished closing around her.