Page 81 of By His Rule

“No,” I bark, a little more aggressively than I was expecting. “I’ll take you home.”

Placing her purse and new laptop bag over her shoulder, she turns to stare at me.

She wants to argue—I can practically hear the words falling from her lips. But she can’t.

She knows as well as I do that she doesn’t want to get the bus.

Not when I’ve got a perfectly good car sitting in the underground parking lot.

“Thank you,” she finally whispers through gritted teeth.

Silently, we step into the elevator, and no sooner have we started moving than Lorelei lifts her cell to read a message.

“Your brother?” I ask.

“Yeah,” she says as another of those genuine smiles appears on her lips.

“Are they local?” I ask, needing to find out more about her. I didn’t recognize the high schools, but that doesn’t mean they’re not close.

When I told her that I’d done my research, I wasn’t lying. But I kept it focused on her life here, and admittedly, I got most of the intel from her best friend one night when I had dinner with her and King.

“No,” she replies curtly.

“Do you have any other siblings?”

“What is this?” she snaps. “Twenty questions?”

"Just trying to get to know you better,” I confess.

“You know everything you need to know.”

Her cell buzzes again, but this time when she lifts it up, a smile doesn’t form. Instead, she frowns.

“Everything okay?” I ask before thinking.

She turns to look at me as the elevator descends the last few floors.

“Fucking brilliant,” she hisses before stepping from the enclosed space the second the doors open.

“O-okay,” I mutter. “My car is this way.” I point out as she takes off randomly through the empty parking lot.

With a huff of irritation, she spins on her heels and begins following me.

“Why am I not surprised?” she says as all the lights on my Maserati illuminate when I unlock it.

“Not a fan?” I ask with a smirk.

“Of over-the-top shows of wealth and pretense? No, not really.”

I want to point out that she probably still has time to catch her bus, but I keep my lips sealed.

Stopping at the passenger side of the car, I pull the door open and wait.

“It’s okay, I won’t tell anyone you got in and actually enjoyed your ride.”

She raises a brow. “I can guarantee you that I won’t.”

“We’ll see,” I say, closing her in the second her ass hits the seat.

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