Page 14 of Grind
“Ava,” his voice is rough, but his touch gentle as he tips up my chin. “You have nothing to be sorry about. That’s my alarm just going off. I have a meeting in an hour.”
Those oceanic eyes are dark, and I keep my eyes on the stubble lining his rugged jaw.
Unexpectedly, I lean forward and kiss him lightly, tracing a hand along the muscles down his side toward the band on his boxers. My lips curve into a smile as he curses again under his breath. He hugs me tightly to his body for one second, before letting me go. The beeping gets louder.
“Fuck,” he growls at the alarm, releasing me. “Give me a few minutes to shower. I’ll take you home.”
Connor walks into the bathroom, and throws one last smoldering look in my direction. As he slips out of sight and the water turns on, it’s like I’ve been hit in the face with an icy splash.
Panic overtakes me as soon as the water starts. I have to get out of here, before he gets further embroiled in this mess. Or before the illusion of what this could be – of me somehow fitting into this man’s life - makes it harder to cope with reality.
Before I can think again, I rush into his room and pull on my black pants from last night. I can’t bring myself to put on my dirty shirt and underwear, so I roll them into a ball and stuff it in my bag. Grabbing a notepad embossed with a huge gold letter D on the nightstand, I scrawl him a note.
“Connor: Thank you for your help. And the shirt. I’ll wash it and get it back to you. I promise.”
For a long minute, I look at the business card and debate whether I should take it or not. Then, I stuff it into my pocket.
Tossing on my coat and grabbing my bag, I turn all the bolts to leave. The door swings open and I pause for a moment, afraid of leaving it unlocked given what Connor had said last night. Was he serious about the bad guys? Footsteps ring down the hallway, moving rapidly in my direction.
“Connor! Your lazy ass up yet?”
The tall, handsome man wears an expensive-looking charcoal business suit and he’s moving quickly, his eyes on his phone. There are familiar contours to his face, and I realize he looks like Connor. He’s one of the brothers from the picture.
As he reaches the door and looks up from his phone, his face flashes surprise. Bright blue eyes look me up and down and then scan the apartment behind me, before he steadies his expression and meets my gaze with a frank appraising stare.
Maybe Connor had been telling the truth about not bringing women to his apartment.
“Excuse me,” he says, in a not unfriendly tone. “I was looking for my brother.”
He quirks an eyebrow at me, waiting for a response.
“He’s in the shower.” That doesn’t sound less incriminating than anything else I’d offer. “Excuse me.”
Taking the opening, I move fast down hallway to the elevators, grateful that he doesn’t follow. As the doors glide closed behind me, I press against the door and squeeze my eyes shut.
What have I gotten myself into now?
6
Connor
Goddamnit.
My fingers rake through my hair, scrubbing shampoo through it as steaming hot water pours down over me.
Exhaling hard, I turn my face up into the stream. I’m going to be late to meet Seamus, which is the least of my problems at the moment. I don’t have time to get tangled up with a woman, especially not one with a complicated history.
My history is too much on its own.
That overwhelming desire to protect her comes roaring back as I remember her green eyes widening with fear when she startled me awake this morning. I hate that the world, that Brooks fucking Stacy, made her so afraid.
It’d be pretty satisfying to kick his teeth in. But right now, I need to finish this shower. And I need to concentrate on something other than Ava’s nipples hardening for me and the sweet sound of her moans if I ever want to get pants on again.
Imagining rearranging Brooks’s pretty face is an effective hard-on killer. Sully got a nice head start on that last night.
While I’m not always anxious to jump into a brawl, I’m not afraid to get my hands dirty. You can’t be squeamish in this line of work. And I will get involved personally when there’s a woman’s safety at stake. My dad would pull the shillelagh he’d brought from Ireland off the barroom wall and knock our skulls in if he thought for a minute that any of us ever hit a woman. Brooks’s sack of shit father obviously hadn’t taught him any manners.
Maybe I need to stop thinking about both Ava and Brooks so much.
