“Where did Tabitha go?” I asked Lucas.
He scratched his jaw. “She went into the living room, or maybe she left. Are you in trouble?”
Before I could answer, Ryker was back with shoes on and a T-shirt covering his toned chest instead of the light-blue unbuttoned shirt that he’d been wearing. “If anyone shows up looking for Haven,” he said to Lucas, “tell him she was never here. If they ask about me, make up a story.” Ryker tugged me along, out a door, and through the garage.
I had no idea where he was taking me, but his hand in mine and his need to protect and help me made me relax for the moment.
31
Ryker
Fucking Tabitha. Fucking senator.My mind wasn’t exactly clear, as the alcohol was doing a number on my equilibrium. But hell if I hadn’t sobered up when I’d laid eyes on those big emeralds beaming from Haven. She had an uncanny ability to make me forget how dismal things were for me. The minute I started remembering that Mom, Dad, Randal, and Leigh were no longer there, I thought of Haven.
Even now with her hand tethered to mine, I was able to breathe. I had honestly been in mourning over not seeing her in three days, which was crazy.
“Where are we going?” She sounded more curious than worried.
I gripped her hand like she was my lifeline. In part, she was. She gave me a sense of purpose, like I had a future, like I might make it through the heartache that hurt like a motherfucker every minute of the day.
I was grateful for friends. I was grateful for football. I was beyond grateful that I’d met Haven despite her old man or despite how scared I was to dissect the feelings I had for her.
“You’ll see. Hurry. I don’t want Tabitha to find us.” With my luck, the blonde would be hiding in the bushes, taking pictures of us and then sending them over to Senator Hale.
Haven grunted when I said Tabitha’s name, followed by, “Seriously, I can’t go on campus.”
“I wouldn’t throw you to the wolves.” I veered down a side street with the lights from campus glowing in the distance. On my way to get my shoes, I’d asked Erik if I could use his place for an hour, or maybe the entire night.
Five minutes later, we were walking into an immaculate home where everything was in its place—two couches, a large-screen TV, a coffee table, a weight bench and workout gear in the dining room, and a kitchen that glinted with shiny stainless-steel appliances.
I flipped on a switch, and the light on an end table illuminated. “Erik, Vin, and Ajax live here.”
Haven scanned the floor plan, which was a wide-open space. “Are you sure three men live here? The place is spotless.”
“You don’t know Ajax. His dad is military. Everything has to be clean.”
I crossed the carpeted floor of the family room and headed into the kitchen, then I snatched two bottles of water from the fridge. My throat was parched from all the scotch I’d been drinking since I’d gotten home from the game.
Haven glanced at pictures on the fireplace and on the walls. The guys might have been big brutes, but each of them had a talent when it came to their living space. Ajax was the cleaner. Erik was the designer. He believed a home, even one with three dudes, needed to be homey with pictures and stuff. Vin was the cook, and the guy could whip up some mean sushi rolls.
I set one bottle down on the marble island, which took center stage in the kitchen, and uncapped the other before drinking the entire contents.
Haven finally joined me. It was then I had a chance to really check her out, not that I hadn’t noticed the thin fabric of the low-cut T-shirt she was wearing or the shorts that rode up her thighs, stopping midway. I liked that she showed skin, but I was digging how she didn’t wear those short shorts that revealed her butt checks only because I would kill any man who dared to see underneath her clothes.
“Thirsty?” she asked.
I was thirsty for more than water now that we were alone and the haziness in my brain was dissipating.
She took a swig from her bottle. “So the guys are at your party? I didn’t see them.”
“They’re there. What’s going on?” I didn’t have to ask. I knew she was there because of something her father had done. Or maybe she’d told him to fuck off, and she’d come to tell me that she would move in with me.
All of a sudden, those butterflies that had died when she declined my offer awakened.
Swallowing water, she rested against the sink across from me. “Could you not feel Tabitha on you?”
I chuckled. “That’s what you want to talk about?”
I had other things on my mind than Tabitha, who was turning out to be a stalker in my book. I skirted the island and cocooned Haven between my body and the sink, gripping the edge of the counter on either side of her. I was careful not to touch her yet. If I did, we wouldn’t talk.
