His hand had wandered to my ass, his mouth came to mine.
“You’ll survive.”
“No I won’t!”
His mouth slid passed mine to my ear.
“You’ve done it before.”
“That was before I knew what I was missing!”
His head came up and he grinned at me.
Fucking Lee.
“I’ll uncuff you if you promise me you won’t go off looking for Rosie with Tex.” I opened my mouth but before I could say anything he said, “Promise me and mean it.”
I closed my mouth.
If I could have crossed my arms on my chest, I would have. Instead, I explained.
“Stevie’s mad at me because Tod was in the line of fire. Ally’s chasing down bad guys, totaling her Mustang. My life’s completely out of control and taking others with it. I can’t sit around and wait, I have to do something. I’m tired of being scared.”
I was trying to twist away. He threw a thigh over mine and pinned me, let go of my wrist, got up on an elbow and traced the line of my jaw with his finger, looking in my eyes.
He was deciding something.
“Then you work with me.”
My body stilled. Was he serious? Work with the Mysterious Badass Liam Nightingale?
“What?” I asked.
“We’ll look for Rosie together.”
My mouth dropped open.
“Seriously?” I breathed.
He nodded.
I started to smile but then he said, “There are conditions.”
The smile went away and I narrowed my eyes at him.
“What conditions?”
His eyes softened and crinkled at the corners.
“You’re very cute,” he said.
Excuse me? Cute?
“Conditions?” I snapped, deciding to deal with the “cute” comment later.
“You do what I say when I tell you to do it and you keep your mouth shut. If we get into something and I get a bad vibe and feel you shouldn’t be there, you don’t argue, you just go.”
I thought about it and decided I could do that.
“Uncuff me,” I said again.
“You agree?”
“I agree.”
He uncuffed me, I started to roll away but he hooked me and rolled me back.
“Where you goin’?” he asked.
“Just ‘cause I agreed to work together with you doesn’t mean I’m not angry with you for cuffing me. You want honesty, I’ll give you honesty, you’ve pissed me off.”
He nuzzled my neck, apparently unaffected by my announcement.
“I can help you work through that.”
“You’re way too cocky,” I told him.
“I know, but you still love me.”
I froze.
“Excuse me?”
His arms came around me, holding me tight as if he knew I was about ready to bolt and he was preparing early. He lifted his head and looked at me. His eyes were dark and warm.
“You love me.”
I stared at him and lied through my teeth (glad to know I could still do it), “I do not love you.”
He pulled me even deeper into him.
“Liar,” he whispered. “You’ve loved me since I held your hand at your mother’s memorial service when you were five years old.”
It was then, my head exploded.
Chapter Sixteen
Must… Stop… Brain
“What?” I shouted.
He was watching me closely.
I bucked, pushed and tried to get away but he held on tight.
“Let me go,” I demanded.
He didn’t say anything, just effortlessly held me to him.
I stilled and looked at him.
There was no denying it. His intelligence about when my infatuation started was too detailed to lie about.
“How did you know about that? Was it Ally?” I asked.
“I read your diary.”
Oh… my… God.
“What? When?”
“I don’t know, when you were fifteen, sixteen. You were schemin’ and throwin’ yourself at me pretty steady, recruitin’ your friends to help, some of it was ingenious. I was lookin’ for ways to…” he hesitated then found the words, “diffuse your eagerness.”
Holy shit.
How embarrassing was that?
It was a long time ago and I didn’t remember what I wrote in my diary. What I did remember was that it was nearly all about Lee and all of it was very personal.
I pressed my hands against his chest and tilted my chin down so I couldn’t see him.
I was never going to live this down. It felt like my whole body was on fire with mortification. I had to get the f**k out of there before I exploded. I was the Embarrassment Bomb.
“Indy.”
“You shouldn’t have read my diary. That was low,” I told his chest. “But it was a long time ago. Things change, I’ve changed. I don’t feel that way anymore.”
“That’s why you made chocolate cream pie last night.”
I lifted my head and glared at him. “You’d had a hard couple of days, I was trying to be nice.”
“Last night was nice, very nice.”
“Go to hell.”
I was too embarrassed for compliments or to be fair or rational. I just wanted to get away.
“Considering I’ve finally had you, had you in three different rooms, and feel pretty f**kin’ pleased about that, I’ll let that comment slide,” he said, sounding like he was beginning to get annoyed.
“Nice of you.”
I bucked again to get away and he rolled on top of me.
“Settle down,” he ordered.
“Get off me.”
“Right,” he clipped, (yep, definitely annoyed), “shut up and listen to me.”
My eyes rounded with anger, about to pop out of my head. Before I could say a word, he started talking.
“First of all, back then, you were underage. No way I could touch you, legally. Not the way I wanted to anyway. There aren’t a lot of people whose opinions I care about but your father’s is one of them. He’d have lost his mind if we’d hooked up then because my reputation wasn’t exactly unearned.”
This was true.
I still glared at him.
“It wasn’t easy to keep sayin’ no, you’re f**king gorgeous and always were. I wanted you then but you were a wild child. Everyone knew you were a handful. I wasn’t gonna go near you until you calmed down. It might be entertaining to watch when you’re removed, but if you’d been mine, you’d have driven me up the wall. I knew myself well enough to know that.”