Page 130 of Fixation
“Be quiet.” At my sharp tone, Harper closes her pretty mouth. My brow furrows, blood pumping into my biceps. Her confession is as interesting as it’s disturbing. “Judging you? Harper, I am so fucking proud of you for everything that you do. I never said and never will say that you chose wrong. Who did? Give me their names.”
She said she didn’t run from anyone in LA. But she is hurt. She does carry a mean comment around with her, and I won’t have it.
“No one.” She shifts her weight from one foot to the other.
My head tilts. A silent command.
Eventually, she obeys, crouching until we’re at eye level.
I have her attention. I’m never letting go. “Names, Harper.”
She leans in closer, green eyes glimmering in the low lights of the house. “You can’t kill everyone I went to school with, Anderson.”
At that last comment, pride swells my chest. She believes I’m capable of killing people for her. She realizes that, as long as I breathe, I will bury the monsters in her life.
“That’s where you’re wrong.”
Before I can think better of it, I press a hand on her window. Right next to her face. I need her.
“Anderson.” The corners of her eyes crinkle. Harper’s no longer glowering or showing signs she fears me. She’s smiling. Edging closer. Her nose almost touches the glass. “It’s old news. Some crap they wrote about me in the yearbook.”
“I swear on my life, Harper.” I’m not used to this. Being useless. Idle. Standing out here, doing nothing, puts my whole body on edge. “I’ll stay here, parked outside your home, until you start giving me names.”
“You’re insane, you realize that?” Her nose twitches with disbelief.
My heart lurches at that, fingers digging into the glass. “I’m persistent and resourceful, yes.”
“Yes, you are. Look, I’m sorry for snapping. I—” She closes her eyes, shaking her head. When she opens them, they’re wide, mildly horrified. “I can’t fucking believe I’m apologizing to…to you.”
My cock jerks. Every part of me is elated that I’ve turned her into this.
Into being mine.
“What I’m trying to say is, they aren’t important anymore.”
“They.” The word is bitter on my tongue. “It’s alwaysthey.”
Something in my voice must get to her, because she’s as close to me as she can be. Sitting on her windowsill, her nose lightly pressed to the glass.
“Theyhurt you,” she deadpans, looking at me. Seeing through me.
Infuriating.
“This isn’t about me. Speak.”
Her suppressed smile messes with my psyche. Melting parts of me that I’ve spent years trying to ice over.
“Okay.” We’re a lot alike, Harper and I. She’s quick to rearrange her features. To hold the cards close to her chest. “I never cared about fitting in, or my GPA, or extracurricular activities. I sketched during classes and lunch breaks. I experimented with soldering at home.”
She pauses, waiting for me to ask whatsolderingis. I’m silent.
Not because I don’t care what the term means. It’s because, as soon as I had cameras in her house, I immediately started researching who she was and what she did for a living.
That’s how I learned that soldering is the process of joining metals together. With the damn blowtorch I want as far from her as possible.
“You know what soldering is. Of fucking course,” she mumbles to herself, her voice a gorgeous mix of amusement and hesitation. “Anyway. They made fun of the blisters on my fingers. Of the dark circles around my eyes. I’m—I thought I was over it. Then you asked me about it, and I snapped.”
What she doesn’t say is that she cares about my opinion. She’s having a hard time coming to terms with that. With the fact that she’s more than a warm body to me. More than tits and curves and a pussy I want to pound from sunup to sundown.
