Page 20 of Savage Hero

She rolls her eyes at me and makes a show of shoving back her chair and wandering over to the fridge. I watch her as she walks, my eyes trailing down her body.What I can see of it, anyway. She’s swaddled in so many layers of shitty clothes, it’s impossible to see her figure.

I take my phone out of my pocket to check the time. “Bring me one.”

“I’m not your fucking slave,” she snaps. When I hear two bottles clinking against each other, I suppress a smile.

Nyx slams down my bottle so hard, I’m amazed it’s still intact.She watches me as if wondering how I’m going to deal with this flagrant display of disrespect.

For the fucking life of me, I can’t decide if she’s suicidal or an adrenaline junkie.

We both know how this goes. She pisses me off, I get mad. I get mad, I want to beat her within an inch of her life. But I can’t kill her. She’s a fucking woman—despite how hard she’s tried to convince me otherwise.

My mind hastily recoils from the memory of grabbing that fake penis of hers.

What does she think is going to happen here? That I’d happily eat as much shit as she’s willing to dish out?

Ignoring the beer, I stand.

She stiffens as if she’s keeping herself in place through sheer force of will. But she glares up at me without a trace of fear in her beautiful eyes, and more than anything, that’s what intrigues me.

Women are one of two things in my life. Obedient sluts, or strangers. Family being the exception, of course.

But this girl?

“Get naked,” I tell her as I take a slow step forward.

She snorts out a laugh. “Get fucked.”

“This is the easy way.” My leaden face twitches into a smile. “Or would you prefer the hard way?”

“We talking about that tiny dick of yours again? Because I’d honestly prefer it if you just kept it in your pants. Can you,El Salvaje? Can you keep it in your pants?” She wriggles her pinkie finger at me.

It’s not her mockery that gets me. It’s the way she caresses my nickname with her tongue.

“Wherethe fuckdo you think you are?” I rumble, cocking my head to the side as I take another step toward her.

Her eyelashes flutter, but there’s nothing coy in her expression. Her face is set, her lips parted. She’s wary and uneasy, taking a step back even as she shrugs and glibly, “In every interior designer’s nightmare?”

Has she finally figured out that you can only poke a lion so many times before it lunges for you? We have lions in our zoo down the road. I can show her. She’d learn a valuable lesson, although it would be the last thing she ever learns.

“If I hadn’t shown up at La Buena Papa today, what would you have done?”

“My job.” Nyx pushes the words through her teeth and then grits them like she’s about to start snarling. “So fuck you very much for ruining my day.”

“And here I thought it was the Browning machine gun that ruined your day.”

There’s a flicker in her eyes. Could she really not have known about the drive-by? “Nope. Pretty sure it’s you.”

Her back thumps into the glass sliding door that opens onto the small balcony overlooking the foyer. No one can look into the room from below. Even if they took the stairs, you’d have to be right up against the glass, like Nyx, to see them.

I grab a fistful of her jacket and twist, keeping her in place. She immediately drops her beer to the floor and tries to punch me. I dodge, but she parries with a left-hand uppercut that knocks the wind out of me.

“Fuck!” I wheeze, staggering back so she can’t get in another shot while I’m recovering.

Is she fucking ambidextrous or something? How the fuck can she have such a good left hook?

She’s grinning at me like she can read my mind, but instead of trying to escape, she’s just standing there. Waiting.

For what? Round two?

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