Page 23 of Roped

My heart skips a beat and I swallow. “Right, of course. Again, you’re the expert here.”

He watches me a beat. “I am.”

“So then—”

He keeps his eyes locked with mine as he shares, sort of randomly, “Watched you order coffee a few times.” I go still, but he keeps talking. “At the shop close to your apartment. You always get the same thing and you never know that twenty percent of your fancy city coffee is one and a half dollars.”

“I—”

“So you always smile and ask the asshole behind the counter to do the math for you before you tip.” My mouth falls open, and yet he keeps going. “And then you smile at him again and tell him how bad you are at math and that he’s the expert,” he says with a bite, especially the latter half. “And ’cause the asshole’s a big fuckin’ asshole, he tells you not to worry about it ’cause he can just bet you’re better at other things. So yeah, I know I’m the expert between the two of us.”

My swinging legs have come to a stop and my heart’s beating so loudly that I know he can hear it. It’s beating so so loudly that he probably won’t be able to hear what I say, but I still ask, “Are you… are you talking about”—I swallow—“Ethan?”

His jaw clenches and I watch his biceps go tight and flex. “Didn’t get a chance to ask his name.”

I swallow again. “Didn’t get a chance to ask his name when?”

Another clench of his jaw but nothing else.

I fist my hands in my lap. “I haven’t… He hasn’t… he hasn’t come for his shift in weeks now. I thought he quit. I…” I take a deep breath. “Did you do something to him?”

No answer.

But dear God, I don’t need any. “What did you do?”

Nothing.

I dig my nails into my palms as I curse myself. How did it not occur to me that my stalker could’ve been involved in this? Hasn’t he done this to other guys? And before, I could’ve taken it as a compliment, an unhinged gift from him, but not now. Now, I need to know if Ethan’s okay. “Tell me he’s fine. Tell me he’s—”

His eyes flash. Then, in a low, growling voice, “You keep gettin’ worked up about him like this and he won’t be.” I open my mouth to say something, but he goes on, “Broke his jaw but left him alive, all his limbs intact. He won’t be talkin’ for a while, but that’s just as well ’cause every time he did, he ran his mouth about you.”

“So what?”

In response, his chest moves with an angry breath.

“So what if he was talking smack about me?” I continue asking. “What did you care? I’m the Turner Princess, aren’t I? The girl you were hunting. You were planning to kidnap me. So what does it matter what a random guy said about me? You could’ve joined in. Actually, why didn’t you?”

His jaw tics before he replies, “’Cause a man doesn’t put down a girl he’s got a hard-on for, or any girl for that matter, behind her back. A smart one, anyhow.”

I watch him for a few seconds, my heart still racing in my chest. “So, what, you’re a hunter with manners? You’ll kidnap girls, but you won’t disrespect them?”

His eyes are penetrating as he replies, “Just you.”

I keep watching him for a few seconds after that. Probably to let everything sink in. By that I mean the fact he broke someone’s face for talking smack about me. First, I can’t believe Ethan did that. I thought we were friends. Sort of. And second, good. I’m glad he broke that asshole’s face for me. And that’s exactly why I need to shut my thoughts down. I’m still acting like everything is normal. Like he’s my Phantom who watches me and keeps me safe. Instead of being a hunter who kidnapped me and is my family’s biggest enemy. Didn’t he say he saved me from all those men so he could keep me for himself? This is what the Ethan thing was too. I’m his favorite pet, his favorite prey, that he doesn’t want anyone else to toy with except himself.

So I blurt out the first thing that comes into my head in a very stern way: “Tell me your favorite color.”

But the asshole that he is, he doesn’t even let his plump mouth twitch.

“You like to read, don’t you,” I keep going. “Tell me your favorite book.”

Of course, he doesn’t.

I hop down from the dresser, my feet landing with a loud thud. “Do you have a tattoo?”

I don’t expect him to answer, but somehow his not answering tells me he does.

“Where?” I ask, walking toward him.