And there, striding down the crumbling brick sidewalk, bundled up in a thick puffer coat and green knit hat, was the most terrifying thing I’d ever seen, given how my heart damn near jumped up my throat at the sight of her.
I slowed even further, rolled my window down, and hooked one elbow over the door. “Chloe Adams, as I live and breathe,” I drawled.
Her eyes darted sideways to take me in. “Pity,” she murmured.
I smirked. “Sorry my existence disappoints you.”
She kept walking, so with a quick glance at my mirrors to ascertain no one was behind me, I did a u-turn in the middle of Main Street and pulled up next to her. “Where are you headed?”
She pulled her coat collar higher, like it could save her from me. “Doctor,” she grumbled.
I frowned. There wasn’t a doctor in this part of town. The hospital was forty-five minutes from here, and the closest medical office was a fifteen-minute drive. “You’re walking?” I asked sharply.
She stopped and turned to face me, annoyance stamped all over her pretty face. I hit the brake. “Well, driving makes me nauseous, and I can’t drive and puke at the same time, so yes, I’m walking.”
“I’ll take you,” I said.
She started walking again. “No, thank you.”
“Come on,” I argued. “You can lie down in the back seat, or hang your head out the window, or go ahead and puke if you need to. I’ve got a trash bag for you.” Fuck me, now I was begging her to let me do her a favor? This woman had me by the balls and didn’t even know it.
She stopped again. “You’re going in the wrong direction.”
Goddamn, this woman.
“I’m going wherever you are,” I growled. “Get in the fucking truck, princess. It’s freezing out here. You’re not walking.”
The belligerent purse of her full lips told me she was not done arguing. “Don’t test me, Chloe,” I warned. “I’m used to dealing with nine-hundred-pound ornery animals. I can deal with you the same way.” I stretched across the cabin and pushed open the passenger door for her.
With a petulant sigh, she got in, slamming the door closed with more force than necessary. “It’s five miles, Steven. I can walk five miles.”
“It’s ten miles, there and back, and it would be dark by the time you were walking home. I don’t want you walking next to a road in the dark.” I waited while she struggled out of her coat and buckled her seatbelt and then hit the gas.
She squirmed lower in her seat, smashing her knees against the dashboard, then grabbed the lever next to the seat and pulled it. The backrest jolted flat with a bounce.
“Are you gonna be sick?” I asked, alarmed. With one hand on the steering wheel, I flicked open the center console and pulled out one of the plastic bags I kept balled up inside. “Here.”
She took it but dropped it in her lap. “Not yet. We’re about to pass the library and Hannah gets off work soon. I don’t want her to see me.”
With you. She didn’t have to say it. I knew that was how the sentence ended. It stung. Another reminder that we weren’t friends and never would be. We sure as hell would never be more. And that didn’t just sting. It burned. Because sometimes…
Sometimes she looked at me with those green eyes glinting like she saw right into my soul, and I saw the ghost of a future we would never have. A future we maybeshouldhave had, if I hadn’t fucked everything up before we even got a chance to know each other.
I didn’t know what the hell I was doing with Chloe Adams. I just knew I couldn’t stop myself.
I unlocked my phone and handed it to her. “Put in the address.” I had a pretty good idea of the direction we were headed, since all the medical buildings were clustered by the highway, but I didn’t know the exact location.
“Ohhh, you’re giving me access to your phone?” she asked, opening the maps app. She tsked. “Not very smart, Steven. Who knows what I’ll find?”
“You already know the worst thing I’ve done. No point in keeping secrets now,” I said. When she didn’t respond, I glanced over and found her scrolling through my photos. “Wow, you’re nosy,” I muttered.
“It’s all pictures of Junior,” she complained. “Where are all the vanity selfies?”
“Vanity selfies?” I repeated, merging onto the highway.
“You know. Fresh out of the shower, a towel wrapped around your waist, flexing your abs but pretending you’re not. Maybe a little steam for atmosphere. You seem like the type.”
“Oh, I do, do I?” I smirked at her over my shoulder. “Why are you so obsessed with my abs, Chloe?”
