Sasha’s hands are flat on my chest, pushing hard, sending me back a step. A moment later, the sting of a slap cracks across my face.
“Get out,” she growls. “I will not take part in this plot you have to capture Nick. I won’t be used like some thing.” Her blue eyes are burning bright with anger. But there’s something else underneath. Something I can’t quite place. “I said—”
“I heard you, Miss Aston,” I interrupt her again.
“And don’t think I will fall for those fake manners you have, either. Get the fuck out of my house or I will remove you myself.” She glares at me, daring me to challenge her threat.
I can’t stop the snicker that comes out. I mean, it’s a bad move, considering her state of mind at the moment. But holy fuck, that was hot, cute, and even though I know it will piss her off, I want to accept that challenge.
My face is stinging with another slap, followed by a leg sweep that sends me falling over sideways. And any other tough guy might be embarrassed by her success, but my snicker has turned into a full-fledged guffaw. Instead of getting up, I stay on the ground as I throw my head back to enjoy the moment.
“Why are you laughing?” she growls, standing over me with a stern look on her face. Her legs are spread wide, allowing me to get a good long look. She notices my gaze and steps back. “What the fuck?”
“Oh, God.” I laugh again. “I’m sorry,” I say, still chuckling. “Really, I apologize. You’re just so damn cute as the tough girl. And the dress, it’s very revealing—”
“I know, asshole. You picked it out for this reason.”
I laugh again and she puts her balled-up fists on her hips as she keeps her position of power. “I didn’t imagine myself on the floor with you giving me a peek, no. But I’m not complaining. Can I get up now? Or will you kick me when I’m down?”
She turns on her heel and walks further back into the house. It’s an invitation I can’t refuse. I’ve been wanting to get a look inside here for months.
But as soon as I’m on my feet she’s turned on her heel and headed back my way. I put a hand up to protect me from the possible slap, but she glides past and opens the front door. “Get out. I’m not going.”
I grab her wrist and kick the door closed with a slam. Her pulse is throbbing beneath my fingertips and she draws back, ready to put the walls up again.
I tug her towards me, making her crash into my chest, and then I spin us around and push her against the coat closet door, pinning both wrists to the wall on either side of her hips.
“Every time I take a breath, Sasha Aston, you surprise me.”
“Let go,” she demands, wriggling against my hold.
“I expected a lot of things from you, but fear really wasn’t one of them.”
“I’m not afraid of you.”
“I know,” I tell her back, leaning my face into her long hair and drawing in her scent. No perfume. Just the clean, fresh smell of a recent shower. “You’re not afraid of me,” I say into the shell of her ear. My breath makes her shiver and I’m on the verge of being turned on. “You’re afraid of life. And I just didn’t expect it.”
“I’m not afraid of anything. I can kill you right now if I wanted to. I could end your life. And if you push me, I won’t hesitate.”
“Mmmm,” I say, leaning back so I can look her in the eye again. “We seem to find ourselves in this position a lot today.” She stares up at me. I really didn’t expect fear. But there it is. She’s terrified. “I’ve had you backed up against the wall three times now. Is that how you like it? Forced?”
“Let go.”
“I won’t force you, so if that’s how you want this relationship to start, you’re out of luck.”
“What the hell—”
“I’m just truly surprised that you’re so scared of intimacy. I figured you were one of those academic nerds. Grad school and shit, right? But you’ve been floundering all semester. Even I could see it. And I know you had some big test today and you came out of your office carrying a box, all sad and depressed. So I’m guessing it didn’t go well. But Sasha, you don’t belong here.”
“I do belong here. I came here to make my dream a reality and I can still do that.”
“Can, sure. But you won’t because you belong with me. You know it in your soul. You want what I’m offering.” She opens her mouth to speak, but I let go of a wrist and place two fingertips over her lips. “Don’t talk now. Just listen.” Her eyes dart back and forth, anxious. Her other wrist, still in my grasp, allows me to continue monitoring her pulse. It races beneath my soft touch. “You don’t belong with these people. You don’t fit in with them. You and I really are a lot alike. We like adventure, justice, and a challenge. So I’m challenging you, Miss Aston. Get to know me tonight and think about what I can offer you.”
“I know you well enough to understand we are not the same. Those things are not what I want. And I only accepted this to learn more about Nick Tate. And it’s not because I have some girlhood fantasy of marrying him, either. It’s because we were close and then he disappeared. Anyone who lost a good friend would want to know what happened to them.”
I press myself closer to her body, my chest coming into contact with her breasts. She gulps in air and holds it when I slide my free hand behind her neck the way I did earlier. She almost came undone with that move and it has near the same effect this time around as well. “You might think you’re safe enough on your own, and I might agree. But allow yourself the luxury of my protection for just one night. Let the guard down, Sasha. Let me bring you under my own armor and just try out what it means to simply exist without the stress and worry of who you were. Allow yourself to be who you are. And then at the end of the night I’ll ask you one question before I change your life forever or walk away.”
The breath she drew up finally comes back out in a rush. “What question?”
“Who do you want to be?”
She stares up at me like a child, filled with amazement. Like the thought she could make this decision and not have it made for her is a novelty that is almost too good to be true.
“I already know the answer to that question.” Her sentence starts strong but finishes weak. She knows she’s at a crossroads.
“Good,” I say back. “Then you’ll know just what to say when it comes up.”
“Don’t kiss me again.”
“Done.”
“And the next time you grab my wrists I will break a whole lot more than your fingers.”
“Got it,” I say, smiling. “Anything else?”
“I’m not afraid of you.”
“I know.” My surrender both surprises her and makes her suspicious at the same time. She’s very good at reading me. “You have nothing to fear from me. But Sasha, there are still so very many, many things in this world to be afraid of. So”—I back up and give her all the space she needs as I open the front door and invite her through—”you’re under my protection until you tell me you don’t need it anymore.”
“I don’t need it anymore, Agent Jax. And I need to set the alarm from inside, so I’m sorry to interrupt your chivalrous moment, but you need to leave so I can do that.”
I smile as I exit, and then wait for her on the porch as the sounds of a keypad alarm being armed leak through the door.
A long black car pulls up to the curb just as she reappears, back in control. Her head is high, the doubt is gone, and her back is straight.
“Our ride is here,” I say, offering her my arm.
She accepts that gesture like a lady, lightly wrapping her fingertips around the crook of my elbow. “Your car is in the driveway, Agent Jax.”
“No, Sasha,” I say back as we descend the stairs of her porch. “That car belongs to the government. I, however, do not. And this night, as I promised, is not about them. It’s about us.”
I expect some questions, but she refrains and goes with the flow. Secrets are a part of her, just like they’re a part of me. I played a card and she held one.
Game on.