Page 52 of Pulse

“Not what I meant, and you know it. Now focus. You owe me some explanations, so start talking.”

If only an explanation were all he owed her. She was in this whole mess because of him.

“I have a contact I’ve used for years. I helped him out of a bad situation when we were just kids, and he’s been loyal to me ever since. This guy has some special skills he’s been able to use to find out information I couldn’t obtain otherwise.”

“Wow.” Talia snorted. “As an attorney, I’ve gotta tell you, there are more than a few holes in that story.”

“I know.” He set his coffee down and scooted his chair closer to her. “Talia, I’ve landed you smack in the middle of a clusterfuck you don’t deserve to be involved in. The more details you have, the bigger the risk to you.”

She pressed her lips together. Her brow wrinkled as she processed his words. “Is that the reason you went radio silent this week?”

Of course, it was. The thought of putting her in more danger enraged him. “It is.” That and he wanted to rip her clothes off every time he looked at her. His club had enough reasons to hate him. Fucking their attorney would only make things worse.

“Hmm.” She tilted her head as her spine straightened. “You know I don’t need you to decide what risks I should take?”

“I do.”

If the situation weren’t so volatile, he’d have laughed. Leave it to her to get spicy when he tried to keep her safe.

“This isn’t my first go around, Pulse. I’ve been at my job for years and am privy to plenty of sensitive information. If I didn’t know how to be discreet, I’d have been out of a job two days in.”

“This has nothing to do with whether or not I trust you to keep your mouth shut. I trust you implicitly. It’s about your safety.”

“You do realize I’m a grown woman who is perfectly capable of taking care of myself?” Any trace of flirtation vanished, leaving the fierce attorney he’d trust to defend him any day.

“I do.”

“And you realize I don’t need some man making any decisions for me, no matter how they might affect me?”

“Yep.”

“And yet, you’re deciding what I do and do not need to know.”

“That’s correct.”

Oh, man, her eyes were spitting fire now. His cock twitched. The bastard had never learned good timing.

She huffed. “Why?”

“Because fuck your reasons.”

“Excuse me?” Her voice rose, and she hopped up, fury flying all over the room. “What gives you the right—”

He stood, too, snagged her around the waist, and yanked her to him, kissing her with all the pent-up fear, anger, and desire he’d been growing over the past week. It only lasted a few seconds but was a hard, fierce kiss, not another frenzied exploration. This was a claiming.

“That gives me the fucking right,” he said as he ripped his mouth away.

“Pulse…”

“No, Talia. This is not about independence or what I think you can or can’t handle. This is about your goddamn safety, andI’ll be fucked before I let someone hurt you again because of me. If that means I act like a Neanderthal, so fucking be it.”

He shoved away from her and stalked across the apartment. This place was too damn small, and he reached the opposite wall in under twenty steps. He should have gone out the door.

“Pulse, I…”

He whipped around so fast that she stumbled back a step even though fifteen feet of space separated them. Her eyes were wide and radiating a mixture of anger and sympathy. She held her hands wide as though approaching a wild animal.

“I’m not scared.”

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