Page 17 of Bedding Rose
Sliding into the passenger seat, I gasp at the temperature difference—with the heater blasting, my brother’s car feels like a sauna compared to the air outside.
Sweet relief.
A leather jacket plops onto my lap.
“Whoa, thank you.” I turn to look at Quique as I pull my door shut. Only, I discover my brother isn’t in the car.
The rat-bastard blackmailer is.
ANGELO
When Quique got that text from Rose and was too drunk to drive to get her, I jumped at the chance. This ends tonight.
I’m going to drag the truth out of her no matter what it takes.
I pull up and see Rose huddled in the dark, her bare arms wrapped around herself as she shivers. She’s wearing black leggings that outline every curve and an off-the-shoulder purple t-shirt. Who wears that shit outside in the middle of winter? What’s she playing at?
Taking in her outfit makes me furious, but taking in her surroundings amps me up to absolutely livid. She’s standing in front of some playground equipment and right behind the slide is a set of tall bushes that cast a shadow so black the devil himself couldn’t see through it. Fucking junkies or psychopaths could leap out of there at any moment.
My chest tightens. Doesn’t she know how goddamned dangerous this is? Where is her common sense?
Why the hell is she outside in the middle of the night? What the hell is going on here?
Does this have anything to do with that night?
The image of her huddled on the floor of the hall bathroom, silently sobbing, slams into me with all the force of a steel beam dropped by a crane. The memory alone has the power to crush my skull—and it has been, on repeat, every night since I saw her there.
The fact that she's been avoiding me ever since and nothing I've fucking done has gotten through to her ... that makes me want to crush someone else's skull.
My hands tighten on the steering wheel as I roll to a stop, the Jeep’s headlights outlining her hourglass figure perfectly.
Fury thrums through me as she hurries to the Jeep. I force my eyes up to her face, to those glossy red lips and the dark curls spilling over her shoulders, trying to tell myself I did not just see her hard nipples or breasts bouncing underneath her shirt when she ran over.
Nope. She doesn’t even have breasts.
As she climbs in, bringing in a juniper-scented gust of cold with her, I accidentally take in how long her legs are and every hair on my arms stands up, my body very aware that she’s not young at all anymore.
Fuck.Quique’s sister. Quique’s sister,I tell myself as I grab my jacket off the center console and throw it in her lap, relieved that she’s going to cover up, because I cannot be having these thoughts.
Anger and sex don't mix well for me. They become this potent cocktail that topples my good sense.
I quickly pull up a mental image of Rose as a scrawny fourteen-year-old. It doesn't quite erase the vision of the woman before me so I have to pull out the big mental guns: football, and the easy pass my QB missed last game that pissed me off.
Rose grabs the jacket and turns to see me in Quique’s seat. She freezes. And the gratitude in those huge, gorgeous green eyes of hers withers, turning them into cold, hard peridots.
“FUCKER!” She grabs the door handle, about to push the car door open.
Oh no. She is not running off into those bushes. We are fucking talking and that’s the end of it.
I do the only logical thing possible to keep her inside the vehicle. I jam on the gas and do a donut in the parking lot.
“What the hell!” she screeches as she reaches up and clings to the oh-shit handle as we circle.
“Buckle up, lil reina.”
“Fuck off! I’m not going anywhere with you! And don’t call me that!” she spits, all fierce fire. She’s always hated being called a queen, though when she was younger, she used to just flip me off for doing it. While I’ve been away, it seems she’s developed a little more fire.
“You’re not getting out of this car,” I reply, in as calm and even a tone as I can manage. “There could be crazy people out there.”
