And my gain.
I’d foolishly thought that my need for Sam would wane once I left his house and the adrenaline from the night’s events had worn off, but if anything, being back in my small apartment had only served to make me more restless than usual. I’d spent several hours just walking the streets of Seattle, but it hadn’t done any good. By the time the sun had started to cast its rays over the horizon, I’d already been sitting in my car watching the neighbor’s house where Sam and his kid had gone to stay after the incident.
And I’d pretty much stayed there for the past three days.
Ok, well, maybe I hadn’t stayed there the entire time. I’d spent part of it lurking in first the neighbor’s backyard and then Sam’s in the hopes of getting a glimpse of the man.
I had.
Many.
Too many.
And each one had ratcheted up my need to have him. I didn’t understand it, nor did I care to. All I needed to do was make him mine for however long it took to work him out of my blood for good.
“What did you just say?” Sam asked. Just like that, something switched within him and his nerves were replaced with confusion, then what sounded a lot like anger.
I reached down and gripped his hand with mine, but only so I could run my thumb over his ring. I still didn’t know how I’d managed to miss the thing the night of the attack. “Can’t be too good of a marriage,” I observed.
I wasn’t really surprised when Sam pulled his fingers from mine. A strange ache pierced my chest, but I ignored it. “Most happily married people display their joy on the walls of their home. They don’t hide a single old photograph in their nightstand—”
I was caught off guard when Sam’s palm cracked against my cheek. It stung like a son of a bitch, but that was the extent of it. I was more taken aback by the fury in the man’s eyes as he got in my face and spat, “You don’t get to talk about him… ever! Do you hear me? Ever!”
He tried to shove me away from him so he could move past me, but I grabbed him and shoved him back against the door, then caged him in with my arms. I was so fucking turned on, my dick felt like it was going to blow right there in my pants. But I was also pissed.
And that didn’t make for a good combination.
I pressed my body against Sam’s so he’d know I wasn’t fucking around. “Do you know what I did to the last guy who hit me?” I asked coldly.
Sam was panting heavily, though I wasn’t sure if it was because he was mad… or something else. It took him several long seconds to answer, even though I hadn’t really been expecting one.
“Because of what you did for my son and because you’re Cruz’s brother, I’m not going to call the cops and have you arrested for breaking into my house. But make no mistake, Matias, this,”—he looked me up and down as best he could considering our positions— “doesn’t work with me and it will not happen again.”
His words should have dampened my ardor.
They didn’t.
“And what exactly is this?” I asked as I too looked him up and down, though I took my time doing it. I could feel a fine tremor moving throughout his body, proof that he wasn’t as unaffected as he wanted me to believe.
To his credit, Sam didn’t try to physically escape me. Instead, he stood his ground as he said, “Let me pass.”
“What’s his name?” I asked. “The husband who doesn’t give enough of a shit to come racing home when his husband and kids—”
“He’s dead, you son of a bitch,” Sam whispered. Tears filled his eyes, but he remained completely still and didn’t make a sound, not even when the first tear fell. There were no more commands for me to release him and he didn’t call me any more names.
Something beneath my skin began to itch and the longer I stood there, the worse it got. By the time I pushed away from Sam, my skin felt like it was on fire and I did the only thing I knew how to do.
I let my fist fly.
The unfortunate victim of my rage was the small window on the shed. As the glass shattered, I felt only a slight measure of relief, so I slammed my fist against the side of the small building. I was glad to find it didn’t give, but when I went to strike out again, Sam was stepping in front of me. I managed to stop my forward movement just as he grabbed my wrist.
“Stop!” Sam barked. His wet eyes almost set me off all over again, but when he softly repeated, “Stop,” I didn’t move. Shame instantly fell over me like a heavy shroud. It was a feeling I hated above all others.
I tried to pull my hand free of Sam’s hold so I could get the hell out of there, but to my surprise, Sam held on to me. “Stop it, Matias. Let me see.”
Shock resonated through me when instead of inspecting the damage I’d done to his window, he pulled my hand forward and up so he could get a better look at it. There was a little bit of blood on my knuckles, but the wounds were paltry as far as I was concerned.
Why the fuck was he looking at my hand when he should be kicking my ass to the curb? Okay, yeah, he’d already tried to do that, but I was actually ready to leave.
Only, this time, he was the one who was refusing to let go.
“You’re bleeding,” he muttered. “Come with me,” he added, then he wrapped his fingers around my wrist and led me toward the house. For the life of me, I couldn’t remember a single person ever taking my hand or any part of it and leading me anywhere, not even my mother. I’d held Cruz’s hand when he’d been little, but I’d always done the leading, the comforting. In the Army, I’d naturally led even before I’d become an officer.
I never followed.
Never.
Because following meant trusting someone else not to fuck up and get you lost or killed. I commanded my body to stop its forward movement and yank free of Sam’s hold, but my feet continued to put one in front of the other and my arm refused my bidding to pull away. I wanted to tell myself it was because I’d made Sam cry, but that was a whole other can of worms I didn’t want to open at the moment.
So that was where things stood. With me following tamely behind a guy I’d come here with the sole purpose of fucking, all while feeling like a piece of shit for having made said man cry.
What the fuck had I gotten myself into?
Chapter 4
Sam
I’d already figured the guy wasn’t a talker. But how had that translated into me turning into the chatterbox from hell? And what had possessed me to invite the man who’d so skillfully reduced me to tears with a cheap swipe at Mac’s memory inside my house and worse, into the inner sanctum that was my bathroom? As soon as we’d stepped into the room, I’d immediately sensed the jerk’s judgement as he took in the candles I had all around the huge soaking tub. Instead of calling him on it, though, I’d spent the last several minutes explaining every single thing I was doing as I’d cleaned his hand and examined it for glass.
And all the while, Matias had sat on the edge of my pretty tub silent as a church mouse yet still watching me like he was either waiting for the opportunity to attack or he was expecting me to do the attacking. In the bright light of my bathroom, I could still see the red imprint of my hand on his cheek, so I couldn’t exactly blame him for being on the defensive. I reminded myself that this man had saved Ryan’s life as I examined the cuts on his knuckles for any glass or debris.