Page 30 of Entangled By You
“Come on, Princess. I need you to tell me what happened.”
Her shoulders rise and fall, and those piercing blues peek up at me from below tear-stained lashes.
“I got fired.”
“What? Why?”
“Evan’s pompous, vindictive, bitch of a mother,” she spits, despair parting way for fury.
“While none of that surprises me, since her spawn’s a walking piece of trash I wouldn’t use to wipe my shit stained shoe on, what does she have to do with you getting fired?”
It’s like the lights just flicked on at the theater after a movie, and Lexi realizes I’m still holding her. She pushes away, walking for the fridge, likely to dig for one of her favored ginger beers.
The pullback is expected, but it still stings that she’s not ready to let me be there for her entirely. I’d doanythingto make her problems go away, slay every demon that dares stumble into her path, but this is one I can’t touch. That would complicate things more than they already are. Evan was one thing, but Mrs. Montgomery’s unexpected disappearance into a vat of my special concoction of chemicals might have the FBI sniffing around.
“All she had to do was snap her perfectly manicured fingers, tell an edge of the truth, and Bethany May was kicking me out the door without an ounce of care to listen to my side of things.”
She’s clutching the small green bottle like it’s the neck of the woman who vexed her. Still sloshing full of drink, it goes hurtling through the kitchen. The bottle hits the wall with a sharp crack, glass shattering outward like a firework explosion. Shards spray in every direction, catching the light for a split second before blanketing the ground like a glittering minefield. The air fills with a sharp spiciness and pungent bite from the fermented drink.
“Don’t move,” I say, firm but maybe too late.
She’s already too deep in her head to hear me. One step, and she’s in the mess.
“Dammit, woman.”
My boots crunch against shattered glass, each step grinding the pieces deeper into the floorboards. It’ll take days to clean this up properly. I’ll be vacuuming for weeks, chasing down stray shards that could slice through skin in an instant.
Before she can argue, I scoop her into my arms. She lets out a surprised squeal, her body stiffening against mine.
“Put me down! I need to clean that up.”
“No,” I grunt, shifting her weight as I turn toward the hallway. “What you need to do is get in the tu?—”
“But you said dinner was almost done.”
“Dinner can fucking wait.”
I kick open the bathroom door a little harder than necessary. It slams against the wall with a hollowcrackthat echoes through the house. “Get in the tub. Then bed. I’ll bring dinner to you.”
“But—” she starts, feet landing lightly on the plush bathmat.
I reach for her before she can try to form another excuse. My fingers settle gently beneath her chin, guiding her gaze to mine.
“Bath. Bed. Dinner. Now strip, before I do it for you.”
The words come out more gravelly than I intended, roughened by the heat flaring low in my gut. She’s looking at me with those sex-me eyes. Ones that used to undo me in an instant, and still do.
Her hands tremble faintly as she peels off her cardigan, revealing a soft, low-cut top that clings to her newly developed full curves.
My pulse stutters. I step back like she’s scorched me.
I promised her I wouldn’t go there, not until she’s all in. Both feet. No life jacket. Just trust. And she’s not there yet. Not really. If she were, she wouldn’t have pulled away from me in the kitchen like she did.
I don’t know how long it’ll take. Weeks. Months. Years.
Hell, it could be another decade, and I’d still be standing right here, waiting because the boy who let her push him away all those years ago is gone. The man in his place doesn’t give up so easily.
I’ll wait for her to come to the same conclusion I did months ago.
