Page 50 of Brutal
I don’t ask to come in.
I don’t need to.
I step inside.
She lets me.
Not like she has a choice, but she doesn’t yet know that.
Her place is smaller than I expected. It’s warm and homey. A guy could get comfortable here way too quickly. I’d best remember that.
I turn to face her. “You were at the marina again.”
She cocks her head. “Again?”
“Yes. Again.”
She crosses her arms. “First of all, how the hell do you know where I was? And how did you know I was there before? Are you having me followed?”
I don’t answer.
“It was you, wasn’t it? In the SUV? Watching me.”
I don’t answer again. I also don’t deny it.
Her eyes flash. “You don’t get to do that.”
I take a step toward her. “I do when you walk into something that doesn’t care if you walk back out.”
“And why should you care what I do?”
Why should I? A good question, and one I don’t have an answer for. Other than she’s already become too important to me.
I drop my gaze for a split second to her mouth. To those full lips I want so badly to kiss.
When I look back up, she’s watching me like she saw it.
I lift my hand slowly and take her wrist, settling my thumb against her pulse point.
It jumps.
She gasps, but she doesn’t pull away.
“This is your second warning,” I say quietly.
I tighten my grip on her wrist. Not enough to hurt, but to make it clear that I’m not fucking around.
She tries to yank her hand away, but my grip is too firm.
Her breath catches.
“Careful,” I say, my voice lower now. “You’re getting closer to things you won’t be able to walk away from.”
She parts her lips. God, what I’d give to shove my tongue between them.
“Maybe I don’t want to,” she says.
She doesn’t understand the dangers that lurk in the darkness. The dangers that lurk around the marina.
