And I sure as hel didn’t have the money to help them out.
And I wasn’t about to make Mace take care of yet another of my problems.
Which would only be another in a long line of problems, of the past and undoubtedly wel into the future.
Yep, Kai Mason was too good for me.
Mace got closer to me. “Babe,” he said softly. “Get in the car.”
His voice washed over me like soothing elixir.
I knew I had my opening. His father gave it to me. Mace didn’t like it when I was in danger. He didn’t like it at al . He didn’t like it enough to get over being mad at me for being stupid.
I al owed myself to feel it for only a beat then I asked.
“Are you taking me to Eric?”
Mace’s eyes narrowed. “No, I’m not f**kin’ takin’ you to Turner.” I shook my head, he let go of my hand, his fingers wrapped around my upper arm and he leaned in. “We’l talk at your place, now get in the car.”
“Take me to Eric,” I said softly.
I felt his fingers tense spasmodical y on my arm but that was the only reaction he al owed me.
I could take no more.
“God damn it, Mace, take me to Eric!” I shouted.
He stared at me.
I held my breath, kept my outward calm as my insides were shivering and stared back.
The pain slashed in his eyes again.
This time, it also slashed through my heart.
He let go of my arm, turned and walked back to the doors of the bar.
“She wants to go to Turner,” he told Lee as he tossed Lee the keys in his hand. Lee caught them but in turn Hector lobbed some keys at Mace, Mace nabbed them and went straight to another Explorer. I watched as he swung in, started up the SUV and drove away.
“Get in the car, mamita. ” Hector’s heat al of a sudden was close, beating into my side and he was talking to me softly.
“You’l take me to Eric?” I whispered and with Mace gone I didn’t f**king care that Hector could see, plain as day, the tears in my eyes.
“I’l take you wherever you want to go,” he replied.
Without further hesitation, I got in the car.
* * * * *
I felt the bed depress. Then I felt the weight of my hair being lifted away from my neck.
“You al right, sweetheart?” Eric’s voice came at me in the dark.
No.
No, I was definitely not right.
I didn’t know what time it was but it had to be late, I’d been lying in that bed for hours. It was coming on summer and the days were longer but the light had faded and night was pitch black.
“Yeah,” I lied.
“You need to eat something,” Eric told me.
The very thought made me want to hurl.
“I’m not hungry.”
“Stel a, that tel s me you aren’t al right,” Eric said then he waited for my response that didn’t come then he went on.
“What the f**k happened with Mason’s father?”
“He’s a jerk,” I told Eric.
Eric laughed but it was short and I got the feeling he didn’t think anything was funny.
“Preston Mason is a definitely a jerk.”
I tried to focus on him in the dark but he was just a shadow so I focused on where I thought his head was.
“Do you know him?”
Eric was silent a second then his voice came at me and it was heavy with surprise. “Everyone knows Preston Mason, Stel a. The man’s famous.”
I got up on an elbow.
Just so you know, I knew I was doing wrong. I wasn’t only playing Mace, I was now playing Eric.
Earlier, I had thought for a brief moment to ask Hector to take me to his place but Hector had to work with Mace. If Hector took me in, Mace would freak out, their working relationship would deteriorate and I’d be to blame for that too.
No, the only way to make a surgical y clean, never to be healed break with Mace without dragging anyone into it that mattered was to be where I was right at that moment.
In Eric Turner’s bed.
Mace wouldn’t ever forgive that.
Ever.
“Famous for what?” I asked.
Eric moved, leaning forward, he turned on a lamp that lit the room with soft light.
It was a decent room, an impersonal room, the room of a man who probably didn’t live there but was staying there for an assignment.
Eric had wanted to put me into protective custody but I wouldn’t let him. I had a life to lead. I would go back to my ultra-safe apartment but only when I knew Mace couldn’t get in anymore.
That was a phone cal I was not looking forward to.
My mind went from the phone cal to Eric who was watching me.
His hand came to my jaw and he murmured correctly,
“He’s on your mind.”
I closed my eyes and bit my lips.
Then I opened my eyes and whispered, “I’m sorry.” Eric got up and grabbed my hand. “Come to the living room.”
Not letting go of my hand, he led me to the equal y impersonal living room. He sat on the couch then he pul ed me down on his lap.
I should have resisted but I didn’t. I also didn’t resist when he pushed me so my back was to the couch, my head was on the padded arm rest and he was on his elbow at my side. My ass was stil in his lap, my legs over his thighs, his other arm lying loose across my bel y.
Somehow this intimate position felt more comfortable and reassuring than sexual and predatory. I figured it had a lot to do with the worried, gentle look on Eric’s face.
“I’m tryin’ to figure out how you spent so much time with Mason, fel deep for the guy and don’t know who his f**kin’
father is,” Eric said to me.
I was trying to figure that out too.
Though, if I was honest, I knew the answer.
Because I was a big, screaming loser.
When I didn’t say anything, Eric went on, “Preston Mason is loaded. Stinking rich. He’s got shitloads of money.”
“I kinda guessed that with the limo and the suit.” Eric smiled, it was a good smile and some girl some day would be super lucky when he smiled at her like that.
Unfortunately, that girl was not going to be me.
“As rich as you think anyone can be, sweetheart, he’s richer.”
That was a little surprising considering I could think of being filthy rich.
“Yeah?” I asked.
“Yeah. And he didn’t get where he is because he’s a nice man, either.”
I pul ed in breath and before I could reconsider or even think of what a bitch it made me that I was laying on Eric’s couch with Eric and playing at his feelings for me in this whole fiasco, I said, “He told me Mace was responsible for his sister’s murder.”