Page 62 of The Love Bandits

I don’t trust myself.

The sun goes down, and I still haven’t moved. Finally, there’s a knock on my door.

“Don’t come in.”

It’s Jake, dressed in a black T-shirt and jeans from the bag I packed for him. His fox on fire is fully exposed, flames curlingoff its face and tail. Professor X, the traitor, leaps down from the bed and does figure eights around his legs.

“I said don’t come in,” I hiss, glowering, even though something inside of me lifts at the sight of him. I realize that I’m relieved to see him. Part of me had expected him to give Damien the slip.

“I’ve always been told I’m bad at listening to directions,” he says with a smile. “You’re the type of jailer who’d let your prisoner starve, aren’t you? I thought it was customary to offer a captive stale bread and water.”

I sit up, watching him. My stupid heart speeds up. “I was reasonably sure they’d let you eat. Nicole told me you were helping Damien with something.”

He gives me a half smile. “I doubt you’d approve. We broke into a guy’s house to find proof that he’s been hiding resources from his ex-wife. I know how you feel about breaking and entering.”

I shrug. “I’ve realized I was being hypocritical yesterday. Maybe it’s myself I hate more than you.”

He raises his eyebrows, scrutinizing me, and I have the feeling he sees it all—the self-doubt and hatred. The hot, pulsing need I’ve tried to rein into submission.

I swallow. “Did you find anything?”

A wicked smile stretches across his face. “We did. Damien’ll have to backtrack the information to its source, but it’s a start.” His eyes blaze into me. “What have you stolen other than my fake necklace?”

“Lots of things.”

“I’m gonna need more to go on than that.”

I glance out the window at the front yard, taking in the little squat car parked there. “My not-a-sports car.”

This is something I haven’t told anyone else. Not Claire, not Nicole, not anyone. It’s absurd to tell him, but again, I feel acertain freedom with Jake. He won’t be staying, and he’s in no position to judge me. Maybe I needed to confess the truth to someone, and he’s the best choice.

Jake grimaces. “You stolethatcar? There’s a world of cars out there, and that’s the one you looked at and said, ‘Screw law and order. This has to be mine?’”

I throw my pillow at him, feeling laughter bubble up. “It’s not like I took it from a used car lot, you ass. It was my parents’ car.”

Emotion flashes across his face, not lingering long enough for me to name it, and then he whistles. “What did they pull to get a girl like you to do a thing like that?”

I stand up for the first time in hours, putting a hand on my hip. “What do you mean a girl like me?”

He shrugs, walking over to my desk and picking up the small glass bird Claire gave me for my birthday last year—maybe her too-subtle way of telling me I was in a cage and should get out while I could. I take it from his hand, feeling the immediate sizzle of touching him, and throw it back down, nearly breaking it wings.

His mouth twitches as he gives me a sidelong look. “I wasn’t saying it to offend you. You don’t strike me as the kind of person who’d steal something from someone unless they deserve it.”

“You think some people deserve to be robbed?” I ask, feeling a roiling of self-righteous fury, although it’s more directed at myself than him. After all, I do too. I’m the child who wanted to be Robin Hood, the self-righteous woman who stole his necklace without really understanding what she was doing.

He’s less than a foot away, close enough that I feel the heat roiling off of him. I wonder whether he felt a rush of adrenaline when he broke into that man’s house tonight, of vindication when he found the information they needed. Both of those things are fuel to me, and it’s so hard to come by them honestly.

“I really do.” Then he lifts his hands to face me, palms out. “Which is not me saying that I haven’t taken things from people who didn’t deserve it, but that’s me, and we’re talking about you.” He watches me. “So what did they do?”

I shrug. “They wanted me to get married.”

“To the cheater? See, I told you, assholes.”

I smile and shake my head. There’s no reason to say anything else, but I find myself continuing, “He was rich andimportant. That’s what they cared about. When he broke off the engagement, they accused me of not trying hard enough. Of ruining everything for all of us. That was supposed to be my job, you know. Marrying a wealthy, connected man. They’d been pushing me toward it for years.” A laugh gushes from me. “You know…he got engaged almost immediately to the other woman, and when I went over to my parents’ apartment to ask if I could borrow the car to come here, my mom threw Todd’s engagement announcement at me. I’m guessing she thought it would be this powerful gesture, but it kind of just fluttered through the air and fell halfway between us. It was funny.”

He doesn’t say anything, his expression as readable as a brick wall. “So you took the car without asking.”

I shrug. “Seemed only right.”

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