Page 16 of Look What You Made Me Do

Ella shut her eyes on a shuddery breath, trying to block him out, but she was close enough to feel the warm puff of his breath, to smell beer and lime. Close enough to just lean in and take. If she wanted. But she didn’t… right?

Oh God. This was bad.

Hastily, she stood, her trembling legs barely holding her upright. “Come on, Cerberus.” She cleared her throat. “Let’s go home.”

Without a backward glance, Ella headed out of the alley assuming, like most strays she knew, the dog would happily follow. The last thing she expected was Jake falling into step beside her. “What are you doing?” she asked, stopping abruptly.

Jake also stopped. “I’m walking you home.”

Oh hell, no. “It’s only a few blocks. I’ll be fine.”

“I’m not going to let you walk home alone in the dark.”

“It’s not dark yet,” Ella quibbled. Not really. “And anyway, I’m not alone, am I? I have the hound from hell, ninja dog with me.”

They both looked at Cerberus, who wagged his tail and trembled at the same time. Rolling his eyes at the pathetic combination, Jake said, “I insist,” and started walking again.

Ella refused to move. She didn’t want him to accompany her. She didn’t want to spend time with him. Frankly after two years of mediocre sex, a week of hot dreams and whatever the hell that was just now, she was so horny she didn’t trust that she wouldn’t try to jump him before they even left the alley.

“I’m a big girl, Jake. I don’t need a chaperone.” If anyone needed a chaperone it was him.

He stopped, walked back to her, grabbed her arm and pulled. “Just come on.”

Ella resisted the tug, her skin buzzing where he’d touched her. “What about the bar?”

“I’ll text Pete and let him know I’ll be gone for a bit.”

Ella dug her heels in. “He’s kind of young to have that sort of responsibility, isn’t he?”

“Don’t worry about Pete. He can handle himself.”

Reluctantly, Ella let herself be dragged along, shaking her arm free as soon as they exited the alley. She took some deep, steadying breaths of the warm August air and mentally congratulated herself on not slamming Jake against the bricks and having her way with him.

They ambled along the sidewalk, Cerberus trotting perkily between them, the techno beat from the bar gradually fading. “So what do you want to talk about?” he asked.

Ella, who was pretending she wasn’t walking beside God’s gift to the female anatomy, was grateful for the silence. “Talk is overrated.”

He laughed. “You sound like my kind of woman.”

“Yeah. I figured you for wham, bam type.”

More laughter. “Well, you’d know, sweetheart.”

Muscles deep inside her performed a wild tango at his ungentlemanly reminder. They walked in silence for a moment or two, Cerberus trotting between them, Ella concentrating on the rumble of commuter traffic.

“So what’s the story with you and Rosie?”

Ella didn’t answer for a while. Where did she start? How did she put almost two decades of friendship into words?

“It seems like you’ve known each other for a long time.”

“Nineteen years.”

“She was in Trently?” He frowned. “I’m sure I’d have remembered her.”

“She came halfway through twelfth grade.” He’d moved to Kansas City to further his football career by then.

“Has she always been… alternative?”

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