She was back a half an hour later with her coat and purse. The look on her face said she was not pleased as she stormed towards the door without saying goodbye.

Did she have to make me feel guilty for doing this for her? And why the fuck does her displeasure make me feel like jumping through hoops to please her?

I met her at the door when it looked like she was really going to leave without uttering a word to me. Damn girl! I stood close enough to mess with her, but didn’t allow myself to touch.

“Come on, I’ll have someone take you home.”

“That’s okay, I can find my way on my own.” She refused to even look at me, but kept her head straight ahead looking through the glass door.

I reached out and stopped her this time when she tried to open the door. “I said I’ll have you driven home, didn’t you hear me?”

“You don’t even know where I live.” She shrugged my hand off her shoulder.

“I will soon since Tony is going to drop you and bring me back those details.” I beckoned Tony over before she could give me any more of her shit and gave him my orders.

I was still trying to figure out where she lived since I hadn’t had any luck on that score as yet. This way I wouldn’t have to guess any longer and I can sleep at night without worrying about where she was and if she was safe.

Now with this niggling doubt in the back of my mind because of what happened earlier, I really needed to know. It was the only way I could protect her after all.

“Tony, go inside with her, make sure she lives where she says she does. I don’t want to have to go looking for her at the end of the night.” She struck me as the type to pull a fast one.

“You son of a bitch, who do you think you are?” She turned and stormed out the door leaving me standing there looking after her in shock. Girl has balls.

Tony didn’t need me to tell him to go after her, he knew me well enough to know what I wanted and I

had no doubt he’d get it for me. I could’ve gone with her to make sure, but I’d given away too much already.

I needed to get my shit straight before I started dipping into the employee pool. If I was off and this shit was nothing more than a flash in the pan, it could lead to a very uncomfortable situation in the future.

I went back to my office to think without the noise and disruptions of people going in and out. I had a sneaky suspicion that there was more than met the eye about what had been done to her.

But no matter how I shake it, I can’t see the purpose behind it. Had he simply been feeling her out to see if she was interested?

That didn’t answer the fact that he’d asked to be seated in her section. If someone had indeed sent him here, I had a pretty good idea who that might be. But it didn’t help to jump to conclusions until I had all the facts.

Nothing showed in the footage when I went back through the night again, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was on the right track.

If what I suspect is true then I’d have to hang around here longer than usual to make sure she was okay. If I’m right this had happened to her because of me.

But how had I given myself away? I’d stayed away, hadn’t shown any interest in her at all while I was gone. Not that anyone here would know about anyway.

But as I recalled, that first day I hadn’t been as careful as I should’ve been. I’d acted out of character and obviously someone had noticed. Someone who obviously wasn’t afraid of retaliation.

I know it wasn’t the other club owner because he knew better. But a female might be under the misguided impression that I wouldn’t harm her because of her gender.

That may have been true in the past. Everyone knew that I had a soft spot when it came to women. In fact I was their strongest champion.

But I was sure that if the one responsible for this was indeed a female I won’t let her off easy. Every time I think of his hands on her I want to kill.

Not only was it a violation of her and should never have happened, let alone in my place. But no one else is to put hands on her. How dare that fuck?

Tony came back more than a little bit flustered over an hour and a half later. He dropped down in the chair across from me and glared at me like I stole something from his ass.

“What the hell’s wrong with you?” I knew before he opened his mouth that it had something to do with my pain in the ass. I wasn’t wrong.

“She’s just as bad as you or worst.”

“Why, what happened?”

“She evaded me like an expert that’s what, damn. And she’s fast too. I never saw anyone take the subway stairs that fast since we used to jump the turnstile.”

“You lost her?” He gave me a dirty look.

“I didn’t say that but you owe me.” He rubbed his leg and grumbled under his breath.

“She gave you a workout did she?”

“I had to take the subway. I barely bought a Metro card in time and got downstairs just in time to hop on the train.”

“The good thing is she didn’t see me get into the next car over so she didn’t notice me following her home. Here’s her address.” He threw a piece of paper on the desk. “I need a damn drink.”

He left and I picked up the piece of paper and read it. I wasn’t familiar with this part of the city, but I knew enough about it to know that it wasn’t the safest place for anyone, especially not someone like her. One more damn thing for me to worry about.

That night after I was done for the day with the bullshit, I had him drop me off outside her building. I looked around at the broken street lights and almost broke out in a sweat.

She walks these streets after midnight. What the fuck had I been thinking? And how the fuck am I gonna get her out of here?

She lived in a shitty apartment building in a shittier part of town. My nose turned up in distaste as I made my way up the stairs to the second floor apartment after walking through the unlocked main door.

There was an elevator down there, but no way was I getting into one of those things in a place like this. I’d had enough of that shit as a hungry kid in the Bronx growing up.

There was graffiti on the walls and gang tags. The more I saw the more pissed I became. Could she be any more of a fucking stereotype?

Innocent young girl, new to the city, living in a dangerous side of town, walking the dark streets alone at night. It was the prototype for a typical B-movie.

This late at night there was still a lot of noise in the building. Kids screaming, TVs blaring and couples arguing. Not to mention the smell of burnt food from somebody’s dinner disaster.

The usual for a place like this where no one gave a fuck and most of the tenants had already given up on life. If you tried hard enough you just might catch the scent of desperation in the air.

As I approached her door I realized it had been a while since I’d been in a place like this. Not since I left home for college. I’d come a long way from those days.

I knocked twice on her door and waited. I thought I heard movement inside, but she didn’t answer, not even when I continued knocking. I sensed her on the other side of the door and knew that she was looking at me through the peep hole.

“Annabelle, open the door.” She took her sweet time, but I soon heard the locks disengage. She pulled the door open and glared up at me with her arms folded, blocking the way with her little body.

I pushed her back and walked in and down the short hallway with her hot on my heels. The place was tidy if sparse and there was a scent of something sweet in the air.

It was obvious that she’d tried to make the place into a little haven away from what was right outside her door. There were posters on the walls, and potted plants in the windows and on the one ratty desk in the corner.

I stood in the middle of what was the living room slash bedroom area of the studio apartment and turned to face her. She’d already changed out of her work clothes and her hair was still wet from her shower.

She looked out of place here, and if I wasn’t mistaken, more than a little embarrassed by her surroundings. She also looked tiny as hell in the robe that swallowed her up.

“What the hell are you doing here? How did you find me?” She went on the defensive. Something she does every time I get too close I noticed.

I kept my cool, knowing it would infuriate her farther and the perverse part of me wanted to set her off again. I could feel my body getting ready and sex wasn’t even on the table; not right this second anyway.

“Is that any way to treat your guest?”

“A guest is someone that’s been invited.” Rude little thing isn’t she? She folded her arms and tapped her foot.

“If you don’t mind I’d like to get dressed.”

“Who’s stopping you?” She walked over to the only chest of drawers and pulled out a pair of shorts and a tank top before storming into the bathroom.

She came out wearing the same robe, but this time it was open over the shorts and tank. Each time she moved I got a tantalizing view of her thigh and

I found myself staring at that bare flash of flesh.

My eyes fled up to hers. Was she teasing me on purpose? From the way she looked at me, like she was more interested in strangling me than stripping down and letting me have her, told me she didn’t have a clue.

She probably didn’t know that with her arms folded under her breasts, the robe had fallen open and I could see her cleavage. There was a mole right on top of her right tit.

My mouth watered and my eyes fixated on that spot until it was all I saw. What other little goodies did she have hidden under there?

“Open your robe.” My hands itched to touch her.

She shook her head no and took a step back as her eyes opened wide. She clutched at the neck of the robe and tried to keep it closed; too late.

I moved forward, she stepped back, like a game of cat and mouse. The pulse in her throat was working overtime and her cheeks held a slight blush.

Her eyes got that dreamy molten look and her tongue came out to lick her lips as if they were dry.

I looked down at her chest and saw the pinpoints of her nipples pressing into the soft material of the flimsy robe.

It hit me like a brick over the head. She was attracted to me no matter how much she tries to hide it. The knowledge was freeing, liberating. It untied some of those knots in my guts and made me feel like less of a fool.

Then she had to go and open her mouth and push the wrong damn button. “How do you know I’m here alone? I could’ve been…” The fuck is she saying?

I wrapped my hand around her throat and pushed her back against the nearest wall before she could finish that asinine statement. “Don’t…just, fucking don’t.”

Just the thought of what she was implying made my guts start up again and did something strange to my heart. I reminded myself that she’d already had one scare already for the night so go easy.