Page 22 of Snake

She heaved out a long, deep breath and stood up straight to look up at him. “I’m okay. Thank you. Though I gotta say I’m surprised.”

Not understanding, Cox frowned. “About what?”

“That truck would have solved all your club’s problems with me.”

She thought he’d have let her get pancaked on the road because she’d bought a property they hadn’t wanted sold?

“Fuck you,” he snapped, furious at once. He was still holding her, so he snatched his hands back as if her arms had turned to spinning saw blades. “Fuck you.”

Fuck this stupid job, too. Cox turned on his heel and headed back toward the park. He’d tell Badger somebody else could keep an eye on her. Not Kellen, though.

“Cox!” she called almost immediately.

He ignored her. Fucking bitch. He’d let her wriggle into his head somewhere, he’d been conversing with her, asking personal questions, giving personal answers, and all the while she was over there thinking he’d hurt her.

“Cox!”

Again he ignored her. He could hear her running to catch up, and gaining on him. He’d sooner jump into traffic himself than run away from her, but he lengthened his strides. She was short; those little legs could only make so much gain, even running.

Then she called, “Daniel!” and the name went through the base of his skull. He’d turned around before he realized it. She was right there, panting. Her ponytail had slipped, leaving a soft sag of hair around her face.

“Don’t fucking call me that,” he snarled. When he moved to turn away again, she grabbed his arm.

“Hey, wait.”

“What?”

“I’m sorry. What I said was shitty. I was going for banter. I missed.”

He glared, unwilling to get pulled back into personal talk with her.

“You saved my life, Cox. You literally saved me just now. I’m grateful, and I’m sorry I ruined my thanks with a swipe at you.”

There were still no words he cared to say, but he failed to hold back a sigh, a sound she obviously considered encouraging.

Still holding his arm, she said, “I don’t know what to think about feeling this way, after everything. But I would like to continue our trip to the bar. I’d like to buy you a drink—which is the least I can do.”

“You wouldn’t have been on the road if you’d been on your own.”

“Maybe. But I was planning to wander around town tonight, before I had a companion, so maybe I would have been exactly the same place even without you.”

“That’s stretching logic ‘til it gets pale and stringy.”

Another of those curious, surprised head tilts. “You have quite the way with words. You should use them more.”

Chapter Six

Cox frowned down at her, the V between his eyes becoming a canyon. Autumn held his gaze, unwilling to give him any ground. His eyes were the blue of a favorite pair of jeans, faded with age and use but with random strands of fresh-dyed dark.

Somewhere during their wanderings tonight, his handsomeness had really sunk in, and she needed to get control of herself. A whole ocean—wide as the Pacific—churned between ‘wooing’ him to try to get the Horde to stop treating her like the enemy and actually liking him.

When had she started to like him?

No, she didn’t. That was nuts. Less than three hours ago, all she’d known of him was the basic details she’d researched; he wasn’t important enough to have gone deeper than a surface search. She didn’t know much more about him now. The man could not be accused of oversharing.

Maybe that was it: he was so gruff, so taciturn, every nugget of insight felt like a gift just for her. Also, though he really did not use it often, he really did have a talent for words. Poetry slipped randomly from his lips. The world feeling ‘too big to wear,’ logic stretched until it was ‘pale and stringy’—metaphors like that were nuanced and evocative.

Autumn had a tragic weakness for artists, especially poets and songwriters. She would never have expected one of these bikers to be a danger in that way, but here he stood. Each time Cox delivered a pithy turn of phrase, it was like he’d brushed her hand with his.

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