“He’s here again,”Lively’s sing-songy voice cuts through my thoughts.
She’s standing at the threshold of the locker room, and I look up from my seat on the bench. My shift is about to start and I just got off the phone with my sister—yes, she’ll be in bed by the time I want her to and she’s taken all her meds and no, she still won’t look at the brochures. But at Lively’s declaration, my heart starts pounding. Because I know who she’s talking about. Still, I pretend I don’t know as I get up and stow my cell phone in my locker. “Who’s he?”
Lively gives me a look. “Like you don’t know.”
I snap the door shut and walk toward her. “I don’t.”
“Yousodo,” she says, wiggling her eyebrows. “One of these days you’re going to have to tell me what you did.”
I walk past her and leave the room. “You know what I did.”
As in, she partially knows what I did. I told her I spilled my drinks on him, and he got really mad. But I apologized and all was well. No mention of the back room and what happened there. Or that he crashed my date last night and then I ran away from him.
I come upon the mouth of the hallway that overlooks the dim lit floor, with Lively following me. “Well, whatever you did, it looks like he wants more.”
Yeah, I figured. That he’d come for me. I knew it the moment I ran from him last night. For the record, I wasn’t going to. I did everything he wanted me to—made an excuse about my sister needing me at home; plus I told Joe that his soccer idol got a phone call and had to leave as well. But when the time actually came to walk through the doors and get into his truck, I panicked. I took the back exit and called a cab to get home.
And now, here he is.
He sits in one of the booths, sprawled and relaxed, his thighs spread, one of his arms thrown on the back of the seat. He’s in direct view of the hallway, making me think he saw me leave through it and was waiting for me to come back. That’s the only explanation as to why his eyes lock on me the second I come out of it. And those eyes, God. They’re dark and shiny. They’re saying something to me.
Just one word: mine.
My knees shake as soon as I hear it. It only gets worse when I notice a waitress stop by his table, probably asking after his order. But without taking his eyes off me, he shakes his head, dismissing her. Like he doesn’t want anyone else but me. Like no one else would do butme.
I take a deep breath and walk toward him then.
It’s not like I have a choice anyway. He won’t leave until I give him whatever he came here to get. And as if my eyes are talking to him back, telling him he wins, satisfaction flickers through his frame and he sprawls on the seat even more. His chest swells with a long breath, and his brawny thighs splay wide.
When I reach him, he takes me in from the top of my head to the bottom of my heels, before murmuring, “Nice uniform.”
“I’m going for the sexy schoolgirl look,” I tell him, my heart racing in my chest.
His eyes flash. “Good thing I’ve been known to teach a few lessons.”
I swallow, my throat dry. “I probably shouldn’t have run.”
He shakes his head once. “No, you shouldn’t have.”
“Are you here to chase me then?”
“I’m here to catch you.”
I bite my lip. “Maybe it’ll be easier if I just do as you say and pay my dues.”
He glances up at my mouth for a second before saying in a tone that makes me clamp my thighs, “Nothing I do to you, Little Strawberry, is going to be easy. But I’m glad you finally see the light.”
My breaths are all choppy now, but I manage to utter, “Just so you know, you’re a toxic snake.”
He hums. “Yeah, but when I bite it hurts so fucking good you can’t help but want more.”
A spasm goes through my body, and I have to curl my toes at that. Then, I reach inside my skirt’s pocket and retrieve the credit card he left for me last night. I put it on the table before straightening up. “This belongs to you.”
He looks at it for a second before glancing up. “You use it like I told you?”
I swallow. “Yes.”
I didn’t like using it. Or more like, it felt strange. It felt like… I belonged to him. In a way that I’ve never belonged to anyone. But then again, I haven’t, have I? So what do I know what belonging feels like?
