Page 36 of Hunting Gianna
He nods and scurries away.
When she comes back, her hair is a little damp and she’s smoothed the dress down so the hem is just a couple inches longer than it was before. It only exposes her tits more. Fine by me, I can appreciate all her curves. Her eyes dart around the room, then land on mine. She expects me to say something, to reprimand her for taking too long or for trying to fix herself, but I let her stand in the uncertainty. With a grin, I scoop fresh fruit, the eggs, a loaf of bread, coffee and a few other items into a bag.
She cracks first. “Are we done here?”
I finish my coffee in a single gulp. “For now.”
We head out of the kitchen and back into the dining room. The crowd parts for us again. The same line cook tries to meet my eyes, and this time, I let him. I don’t smile. I just watch as he shivers and looks away.
On the porch, Gianna inhales, breathes the cold mountain air like she’s just surfaced from drowning.
I light a cigarette, let the smoke drift out between us. “You did so good,” I say.
She snorts. “You’re a fucking asshole.”
I step closer, crowd her against the railing, thumb her jaw until she’s forced to look up at me. “Yeah, but you like it.”
I kiss her, rough and fast, biting her lip just hard enough to make her whimper.
She doesn’t pull away.
Such a pretty little bird.
We haven’t been on the porch two minutes before Noah shows up.
He moves like a mountain that learned how to walk—impossible to ignore, silent as stone until he’s right on top of you. Today he’s dressed like every other day: battered jeans, boots older than most people in the resort, flannel shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. His forearms look like they could snap a moose’s neck, which is funny, because the only thing he ever snaps is my fucking patience.
His eyes flick to me, then to Gianna, then back to me. He doesn’t bother with pleasantries. Never does.
“What are you doing here, Knox?” The words aren’t a question, just a challenge.
I tilt my head, let the corners of my mouth pull up. “Getting groceries. Stocking up for the week.”
He grunts, eyes raking over Gianna with the bare minimum of interest, like she’s a new piece of furniture in a room he’s already catalogued. He addresses her only to say, “You’re bleeding on the stairs.” Then, to me: “Put it on the account?”
“Yeah,” I say. “Put it on the account.”
He rolls his eyes and walks away, not even bothering with goodbye. The kind of man who only exists in stories about war or murder, but here he is, alive and sweating and hating every second of it.
Gianna watches him leave, then huddles close to me again. “He’s intense,” she mutters.
“He’s nothing,” I say. “You want intense, you should meet his cousin, Kairo.”
She laughs, a soft little sound, then shivers. I like it. I tuck her under my arm, more to keep her in place than to comfort her. Noah was right though, she was bleeding on the porch. I didn’t care. I’d let her bleed on me if it meant I was buried between her legs.
I take another drag and savor the flavor. I don’t smoke often, but something about today calls for some nicotine.
A few minutes later, the door behind us opens again, and this time it’s Cassidy.
She’s the kind of woman who doesn’t walk so much as glide, her feet barely making a sound on the old boards. Hair tied up in a messy bun, yoga pants, baggy sweatshirt, no makeup. She looks like every woman who has ever tried to fix a broken man. Good thing for Noah. She might have actually succeeded.
Her eyes land on Gianna first. They widen, then soften, and she steps toward us, ignoring me entirely. She stands in front of Gianna, like approaching a wounded animal.
“Oh, honey,” she says. “Are you okay? Hey, is that my dress?”
Gianna blinks, like she’s never heard those words before.
“No,” she says, voice small. “I’m not.”
