Page 101 of Wild Eyes
Ignoring me. Though she’d have to be deaf not to have heard me come roaring in here.
I yank the door open and drop from my truck, boots heavy on the gravel.
She still doesn’t give me her attention.
I’m keeping my cool, but my voice shakes when I call across the space to her. “You’ve been ignoring me for twenty-four hours. Then you drop ten grand on me. And now you’re going to continueto ignore me?”
“I don’t want my date right now.” She swings again.
“Skylar, I have been searching high and low for you for the past thirty minutes, and so help me, if you don’t turn around and address me?—”
She leaps from the swing and spins on me, eyes blazing as her voice bounces off the tall pines surrounding us. “What? If I don’t pay attention to you, you’re gonna what?”
I swallow, happy to take her anger over her indifference.
“I’ve had it up to here”—her hand slices through the air above her head as she shouts—“with people demanding my attention. And I’m not ignoringyou. I went for a fucking walk.”
Good god, she walkedback?
“I’m trying to keep it together so I don’t make a total fool of myself. Again,” she adds quietly.
The heat from the front grill of my truck pushes against my back, making me want to move in closer, but I don’t. I’m too concerned about scaring her off. Startling her. Doris’s words about her looking ready to run echo through my head.
“Not once have you made a fool of yourself.”
Her scoff floats across the warm summer air between us. “Oh, let’s see. I freeze up on camera. I try to pet wild bears?—”
“That’s an exaggeration, and you know it.”
She takes assertive steps in my direction, staring me down as she continues to list all her perceived failings. “I take a soccer ball to the face. I kiss a guy who tells me he only wants to be friends. I kiss that guy again and thenItell him we’re better off as friends. And then I…I…I throw a jealous fit and buy him at some small-town man auction. And now I’m sitting here trying to train my brain into thinking I did that because it was for a good cause.”
A foot of grass separates us now. She’s close enough now that I can smell her. Her skin. Her lotion. Coconuts and pineapple. Perfectly applied makeup and those red fucking lips.
I bite my tongue, inclining my head to take her in as she rakes her hands through her hair and averts her eyes. Like she hates what she just admitted.
She doesn’t even realize how she’s blossomed since that first night. “First of all,” I bite out, clenching my fists to keep from grabbing her, “you should be fucking proud of yourself. You are strong and you are capable, and you’ve done nothing but prove that to yourself and everyone around you for the past several weeks.”
She starts, eyes widening as her hands fall limp at her sides.
“Second of all, I’m buying you a phone because not knowing where you were made me fuckingsick.”
A flush streaks up her cheeks, and I see the apology in her eyes.
“And third of all, the only foolish thing you’ve done is continue to refer to us asfriends.” I spit the word. “That word makes me want to break something.”
“Well, great. Thank you for that?—”
Her eyes roll, and I snap.
I step up to her and grip her chin, the defiance in her eyes a match for my own. “Don’t you fucking get it, Skylar? How much clearer can I be? I moved you into my house. I’ve included you in my family. I cleared any other complication without a second thought. I spend almost every waking moment with you. I fist my cock every night thinking about you. You see any otherfriendsof mine hanging around?”
I turn, peering around dramatically. “’Cause I sure as shit don’t.”
“That’s not funny.” I feel her rough swallow against my palm, and when she draws away, I slide my hand to the back of her neck. Forcing her to stay, to see me. To hearme.
“Good, because I wasn’t fucking joking.”
My right hand snakes around her, and I lift, turning and dropping her on the hood of my truck. I step between her knees, dress draping between them, and slide my hands beneath thefabric. “I’m done pretending that being your friend is enough.” I grip her thighs. “Now spread your legs.”
