Page 42 of Zeke

“Zeke, what—” she sputters as I pull her along behind me. I’m not sure where I’m going, but I need somewhere away from the windows.

I settle on the hall that leads to the bathroom, pulling her just out of sight of anyone walking by.

“Zeke,” she says again. “I don’t understand, what—”

I back her into the wall, my body pressed against hers, and she looks up at me, her mouth slightly open.

“Tell me to stop,” I say, running my hand down the side of her body to rest on her hip, which I grip tightly in my fingers.

She continues to stare at me, her breathing growing heavy, but she says nothing. She doesn’t tell me to stop. Her eyes don’t leave mine, and then, slowly, I bend down and kiss her, pulling her against me as I press her more tightly into the wall. Her lips are as soft as they were the first time, and I want nothing more than to feel them all over me, her soft, sweet-smelling skin under my lips, to have my hands on every inch of her body.

There’s a slight vibration on my lips as I hear and feel her moan into my mouth, and I lose all control. I grip her to me like she’s the only thing in the world that matters, which in this moment, she is.

My tongue slips past her lips and encounters hers, swirling around it as her hands go to my cut, pulling me even closer. God, I want her so fucking bad. Right now, I could take her and she’d be fine with it. I seriously consider it, but, somehow, I come to my senses and realize the mistake I’m about to make. I can’t fuck Kira here and now. First of all, I’m not going to make her my stress release. The last thing I need is to prove Eli right, to treat her the way I’ve treated hundreds of women over the years. To prove I don’t deserve her.

I pull away, and her lips follow me for a moment. Then she settles against the wall, her eyes slowly fluttering open to look into mine. This is the right choice. I know it is. It doesn’t make it any easier.

I lean in again, and she tilts her head up for another kiss, but I say, “Soon, Kira, you and I are going to finish this.”

She nods as though she’s in a daze, and I force myself to turn away, storming out of the door and back to my bike. I have to get home. I need to apologize to Eden, much as I don’t want to, and I’ll deal with whatever fallout coming from this Wizard bullshit.

As I pull away, I glance in the window of the bakery. Kira simply stares straight ahead, her hand over her mouth.

Looking exactly how I feel.

CHAPTERTWENTY-ONE

Eden

Ipace the kitchen, occasionally catching on the spot of blood on the floor from where Zeke hit Wizard. He’d only split his lip, but the bright red drops are a contrast to the clean white of the kitchen floor and I can’t stop staring at it.

I’ve seen Zeke tear out of here before like this, but he’s more volatile than usual. I’m sure it has to do with the fact that he and Eli are fighting. I get it. They both like the same girl, and while that hasn’t been an issue before, it’s important enough that keep the fight going.

I know why Zeke dipped out when he did. He’s like me—shoot first and ask questions later. He needs something to bring him down when he gets this wound up, and I hope he isn’t seeking a fight somewhere and getting himself killed since he has too many things weighing on him right now.

I pause in my pacing and look out the window. Pony’s coming out of the barn to talk to Savage. I’d tasked Pony with hiding Wizard’s truck in the barn until we figure out what to do about him. And to keep him from causing any issues, Savage put the finishing touches on the knots he was tying to hold Wizard to a tree in the yard.

Eli comes in and looks around with a confused and alarmed expression. “What the hell happened here?”

I sigh and lean against the counter, pointing outside to show Savage at his task.

“We found the guy stalking us,” I tell him. “Or rather, he found us. Had a gun to Zeke’s head.”

It’s a mark of how deep their feud runs that he barely reacts to this news.

“Don’t worry,” I say sarcastically. “He’s fine. I’ll make sure he knows how concerned you were.”

“Good,” Eli says in an unconvincing tone. I shoot him a look, but he pretends not to see it. “So what’s the deal? Do we need to be worried?”

I shrug. “Guess that remains to be seen.”

“I know you, Prez,” he says in deference to my position. “You already have a plan, even if you’re not sharing it. Why not just spill it?”

“Because I’m not talking to you and not to Zeke. I’m tired of your petty feud. I’m not repeating myself every time I have something to tell both of you. You can deal with each other long enough for me to go over my plan and what I need from you both.”

He stares at me with a blank face. He’s clearly deciding if he wants to fight or not. Eli isn’t like me and Zeke. He’s calculated, clever. He looks at all sides of a situation before reacting.

Which is why I can’t, for the life of me, figure out why he’s being such an idiot about this girl from the bakery. Especially since, until today, we had an unknown threat coming at us, among all the others I think about day in and day out. I’d think, as my VP, he might be considerate about that.

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