Page 32 of Wild Fire

I can’t explain it, but it’s like he has this way of reaching inside of me and pulling out someone else. Someone I barely know.

Maybe I’m having a latent reaction to the trauma of what happened, or something. Lacey did say sometimes people experience things after the initial event, and sometimes it can pop up even years later.

Or maybe I’m just finally cracking from all the pressure and stress, and I’m sliding into madness.

I grind my jaw, my body heating like a volcano both from the inside and from the onslaught of heat coming off of the vents aimed directly at me.

I narrow my gaze at home, huffing out an aggravated sound, and I swear, it only makes him look more smug.

And hot.

Who does he think he is, anyway? My knight in fireproof armor who looks hot as hell in grey sweatpants?

I mean, that doesn’t exactly sound like a bad deal, but…

Focus, Nate!

AJ has the audacity to lick his lips slowly and the sight alone makes a fresh bout of heat flood my face. I don’t know if it’s the fact my breakup is still fresh, or that I haven’t had sex in months, or if it’s just that I’m a glutton for punishment, but as his gaze drifts over me and I cross my arms. the words come out without thinking about them. I never talk back to anyone. Ever. But the need to tell AJ off is so prevalent it’s hard to ignore and I feel like if I don’t give him a piece of my mind right now, I am going to explode in more ways than one.

“You always just tell people to do shit and they listen?” I bite as I enter Lacey’s address into the GPS. I feel his gaze on me, hot like fire as I do so. My cheeks flush, and I can’t help it.

I’m not doing it because he asked me to. I need to go home. He knows that. I know that, but still, something about this moment feels different. Like earlier, when I’d found out I was apparently starting my job today.

It’s like he’s trying to instigate me or something, even though I know that doesn’t make any sense at all. I feel like I’m losing my damn mind.

He lets out a low sigh as he answers me, that raspy, deep voice tinged with so much sex appeal, I think half the fires this guy puts out must be started by the heat radiating off of him like a furnace.

“Most of the time,” he says, putting the truck in gear, breaking my gaze and focusing on the road. A heavy silence blooms between us as the music drones on, and the air between us shifts. Suddenly I feel like an asshole as I notice the way he stares at the road, the way his jaw sets.

AJ is confusing. One minute he’s candid, genuine, and the next he’s like a fucking grizzly bear which isn’t all that unattractive, either.

We don’t speak the rest of the way to Lacey’s, nor does he look at me.

I think I pissed him off.

Great. Good job, Nate.

I lean back in the seat and let out a deep sigh of defeat.

See, this is why I don’t say shit to people. Why it’s so much better to keep my mouth shut.

The truck slows just outside Lacey’s apartment complex, and I am both thankful and disappointed because as badly as I want to leave… I don’t want to leave with this feeling in my chest, or this air of animosity between us. Not after all he’s done for me, and I don’t just mean the job.

“I’m sorry,” I say carefully, and AJ pulls the car up to the curb and puts it in park. Right outside Lacey’s building.

But he doesn’t move, and neither do I.

He just stares at the darkness ahead, through the window.

“I didn’t mean to snap at you, I just—”

“No,” he says quietly. “I’m sorry.”

I raise my eyebrows.

“What the hell do you have to be sorry for?”

AJ leans back against the seat, flashing his dark eyes at me, and for a moment, they look softer. Sad, almost.