One Last Breath by Lisa Jackson (7)

Chapter 7

Heather stared out the window of the bedroom she was sharing with Charlotte, watching the sway of black leaves against a sky which was only a few shades lighter. Rendezvous. From the onset of her relationship with Liam she’d told herself she was making a mistake—hadn’t she learned anything from running out on Cal?—but she hadn’t really listened. Looking around the restaurant, she chose a place in the rear, a recently vacated booth with high backs that was near a hooded fireplace and a comfortable fire. She and Liam waited as a busboy swept away the glasses from the previous occupants, then wiped the table clean. There were people on either side of them, the conversation was a continual hum, the waitstaff slipping in and out among the tables. The place was anything but a secluded, intimate rendezvous.

Good, she’d thought at the time.

She sat across from him as they’d glanced over the menus and then ordered coffee drinks, hers a mix of coconut and cream with a shot of Baileys for good measure, and his black. As they sipped, her insides warmed with the drink. She told herself not to be fascinated by his blade-thin lips or just the hint of a dimple on one side of his face. When he ordered her a second drink, she wanted to argue, but had glanced out at the slanting rain and decided sitting near the fire and talking to a handsome man wasn’t all that bad. He was bright and witty and never once pulled out his cell phone again. Nor did she. As the gas flames licked the logs and she sipped the rich drink, she learned that he was in construction and worked for his father’s Portland company. He was visiting Washington with his brother, Derek, and while Liam was attending a conference in the heart of Seattle, Derek was scouting out real estate for potential expansion into the area. Derek was heading back to Portland that evening, Liam staying on a few more days.

She found out he was single, a lifelong Portland resident, liked the great outdoors of the Pacific Northwest, and worked for the family business that had been in Oregon for over a quarter of a century. He hiked and biked, fished, and even windsurfed along the windy beaches of the northern Oregon coast. He mentioned getting a pilot’s license and seemed comfortable in his own skin. She had to admit, she liked his self-confidence, and she began to thaw in spite of herself.

But when the conversation turned toward her, she became uncomfortable. She always kept talk of her own family to a minimum, the fewer answers the better, she reasoned. And as this was only a quickie coffee date, really some kind of penance for knocking her down on the street, there was no reason to divulge too much.

“You’ve lived here all your life, then,” he said as the waitress refilled his cup.

“Around here. Not in the city, really.” She wasn’t about to explain that her small family had never settled anywhere for more than six or eight months at a time. She’d been enrolled in six different elementary schools. She’d never made any friends that had lasted more than a year, two at the max. And then there were the problems with her older stepbrothers.

At eighteen, she’d struck out on her own, working during the day, taking classes at night. She’d put up with a series of flaky roommates, two of whom had skipped out on the rent, just like her own mother and stepfather had done on more than one occasion, hauling the kids out of bed in the middle of the night, hustling them into a rattletrap car and driving to an unknown destination. That always meant a brand-new school for Rory, along with a different curriculum, a stranger for a teacher, and a classroom of kids who stared at her for what seemed like weeks until she’d settled into a desk and eventually made friends with a small group of girls whom she never brought home.

She’d been told her stepfather’s hunt for a job was what had uprooted the small family from one battered apartment to the next, but eventually she realized that Harold was always keeping one step ahead of the law.

But on their “date,” she didn’t confide any of this to Liam Bastian, who, she’d gathered, had been born to money. He hadn’t said as much, not outright, but she could tell by the cut of his clothes, the way he spoke and held his head, his body language. Liam Bastian knew his place in the world.

Finally, she set the glass mug on the table and said, “Thank you. But I have to run.” She stood up, her knee aching a little.

“Too bad.” He said it as if he meant it and pulled out his credit card to pay. The waiter scooped it up as he added, “I thought you might show me the city.”

“Seattle?” she said, her eyebrows rising. “Even though you live in Portland, a couple of hours away, you want a tour of Seattle?”

“More than a couple,” he clarified. “With traffic—”

“Come on. Haven’t you ever taken the train up here for a Mariners or Seahawks game?”

“Well, maybe . . .”

“So I’m guessing you know the city.”

He grinned. “Okay, ya got me. I just wanted to spend a little more time with you.”

She shook her head, tempted but firm. “I don’t do ‘tours.’”

“What does that mean?” He smiled as the waiter put the bill down and he signed it in a fast scrawl.

“Just what it sounds like.” She smiled back as she shrugged into her coat. The man was way too attractive.

“Make an exception.”

She shook her head as she walked around other tables to the door, Liam following behind. Why not take him up on his offer? she argued with herself. He was smart and interesting and certainly good-looking. Why not spend a day with him? But she added a lie instead. “And I’ve got plans.”

“Cancel them.”

“Pretty bold, the way you keep ordering me around,” she said.

“Not ordering. Suggesting,” he said easily. “These plans . . . are they life-or-death?”

“Not really.”

“So . . . they’re maybe changeable?”

“I don’t know you.” She flipped up the hood of her coat and glanced up at him through a fringe of faux fur.

“How do you think you ever will if you don’t spend more time with me?” His eyes glinted. “Come on, Rory, take a chance. You seem like a risk-taker.” They were walking toward the waterfront now and the sidewalk was more crowded with pedestrians, while traffic was clogging the streets. Cars, SUVs, trucks, and buses jammed together.

She smiled back at him, cautiously. “You don’t know anything about me.”

“Yet,” he said as the wind battered her face, raindrops peppering the ground. “You said you were single, so I’m guessing no serious boyfriend’s in the picture.”

That much was true. She’d broken it off with Cal two months earlier, the last straw coming when she’d learned he was supplementing his wages as a waiter by stealing food from the kitchen of the upscale restaurant and reselling it. She’d begun to think she only attracted the wrong kind of man.

She let Liam walk her to the bus stop, where a bus that would take her to the University District was just pulling up. “Gotta run,” she said and picked up her pace. “That’s mine.”

“I could drive you.”

She almost hesitated. Almost, but instead, turning her head to call over her shoulder, she said, “Thanks for the coffee!” She waved and, following a lumbering man in a tweed overcoat straight out of the 1940s, she climbed aboard. As she was wedging herself into a seat, she glanced out the window and saw Liam standing at the stop, his phone already in his hand, as if he was picking up from the very call he’d dropped over two hours earlier when he’d bumped into her.

That should have been the end of it. And she’d expected to never see him again.

But she’d been wrong.

The next day at work she found out she was still hanging on to her job, though Ned warned her, leaning over her desk in the accounting department, his nose pressed so close to hers she could view his pores, “Another outburst like yesterday’s, Abernathy, and you’ll find yourself looking for work.”

“And if you don’t quit leaning over my desk and staring at me, I’ll file a formal complaint with HR.”

“I know people in Human Resources.”

“So do I, and I’ve got some of your little jokes recorded on my cell phone,” she’d blustered, lying through her teeth but satisfied to see him pale beneath his fake tan.

“You’re lying.”

She pulled out her phone then, and scanned the small screen.

“You’re a stone-cold bitch, Abernathy, and trust me, you’re gonna pay for this.”

“Compliments won’t work,” she said tightly, and as he sent her another murderous glare, added, “Have a nice day.”

Ned nearly ran into one of the office gofers, a young woman with a killer figure who was carrying a white bag with markings from a local bakery and a cup of Java Jive coffee. “Whew,” she said as she brought her bounty to her desk.

“Don’t let him ever get to you,” Rory warned. “He’s a bully. Always stand up to him.”

“Maybe he has a small penis,” she suggested.

“Maybe.” Rory smiled.

She thought about just leaving work. Getting the hell out. Not giving any notice, just never showing up again.

Gritting her teeth, she stuck out the rest of the day, avoided Castrell, and walked out of the building at five p.m., where she’d spotted Liam Bastian, big as life. In jeans, an open-collared shirt and his ubiquitous jacket, he was waiting under a portico from the building that housed the central offices of Java Jive.

Having spent the afternoon ignoring the hard-edged stare of Castrell, she was in no mood for anything other than a long, hot bath, glass of wine, and a good book. She’d planned on grabbing takeout Thai food on the way home, but it looked like her plans for eating chicken panang curry out of the carton were about to be scrapped.

Liam was phone-free, at least for the moment, one shoulder propped against a concrete pillar holding up the portico. She walked straight up to him. “What?”

“I had some time to kill, so I thought I’d wait around till you got off work.”

“You a stalker, Mr. Bastian?”

“It’s Liam. And I’ve never been a stalker before, but I don’t know. Maybe it’s a new affliction.”

“I should’ve never told you where I work.”

He nodded. “That might’ve been a mistake.” He was staring at her with those slightly bemused eyes, the irises of which were a light brown color, almost gold.

She couldn’t help but smile. She wanted to go with him, but she couldn’t trust her instincts. They’d let her down too many times before. And really, Liam Bastian, damn him, seemed to be too good to be true. Which she also didn’t trust. She’d learned that lesson the hard way. Over and over.

“I could take you to dinner,” he suggested.

“Or I could go home and put my feet up.”

His crooked smile touched his eyes. “I could go with you. Takeout, or in this case, take-in pizza? We could pick up a bottle of wine.”

The thought was enticing. But dangerous. She knew little about him other than what he’d told her, though she had Googled him and confirmed the facts: thirty-four, unmarried, graduate of Oregon State University, currently working for the company his father had founded, Bastian-Flavel Construction in Portland, Oregon.

“I don’t think that would be a good idea,” she said, even though she’d come up with much the same plan earlier, with one big exception, of course. In her envisioned evening there had been no Liam.

She started walking down the hill to the bus stop, to the spot where she’d run into him the previous day, and once more she felt as if she was being followed, though of course she wasn’t, not that she could see.

“Then let’s grab something together,” he said. “You pick the place. You’re the native.”

She probably should have said a firm no, but she hadn’t, and they’d spent the night on the town with dinner at a funky Italian dive off the waterfront and drinks at an Irish bar a few doors down. She’d let him walk her to the bus, and as she’d turned to catch the big, rumbling vehicle, he’d grabbed her elbow. “Let me drive you,” he’d insisted as rain fell from the night sky and the lights and noise of the city had surrounded them. She’d been about to argue, but he’d leaned forward quickly and kissed her upturned face. His lips were warm in the cool evening and she felt them mold over hers as raindrops fell onto her cheeks and starred her lashes.

Though she fought her emotions, she leaned toward him, like a plant bending toward the sun. She longed for someone, something, that had completely escaped her all her life. She gave herself up to the thrill and warmth that invaded her body as his arms were surrounding her. Human touch. She was desperate for it, and she became oblivious to the hustle of the city surrounding them. Only when she heard, “Get a room!” did she pull back, surprised at her reaction, and made her way on weakened legs to the bus.

“Rory, I can drive you,” she heard Liam call after her as she climbed aboard, but she shook her head. She stumbled to one of the last seats available. As the bus chugged away from the stop, she craned her neck, looking out the window, feeling a little buzz from the drinks and a surge of lingering excitement from his kiss. She watched him walk away. Oh. Lord. One kiss and she’d nearly melted against him. What was wrong with her?

Still basking from the glow of that one kiss, she touched the glass and looked out the window to a side street, where she was certain she caught a glimpse of a dark figure staring at her.

Her throat tightened and she blinked, but the bus rolled past, the image disappeared, and she exhaled and told herself she was imagining things, the ghosts of her past chasing through her mind, forcing her to feel things that weren’t there. She was away from her family now, the horror that she’d lived through for those years was over. No need to worry.

Nerves jangled, she took a sweeping gaze of the other passengers and decided she was safe. She settled back into the seat. Thoughts of Liam came rushing back, crushing her worries. The hours with him had been magical and exciting, but their night together was at an end, though she replayed it over and over again as she made her way to her apartment, one of the cheapest ones in the U District, which she’d sublet, probably illegally, from a student who had dropped out of college before the term was over. She slept on the pull-out couch, the bedroom belonging to a roommate she’d barely seen, a girl who spent all of her time at her boyfriend’s place. Rory and Ashley were passing ships, only seeing each other in their shared bathroom and kitchen and then only sparingly. Ashley was set to be married in the summer, and then Rory would have to move.

Again.

Crawling into her couch-turned-bed, she wondered what it would be like to put down deep roots, to find a home that she could call her own for more than a few months at a stretch, to feel as if she belonged. As she stared at the blue luminescent face of her digital clock, she replayed the scenes of the past few days in her mind, how she’d wanted to run away from her lousy job and Ned Castrell, how she’d hoped to spend a quiet, boring evening at home, and how Liam Bastian had changed all that.

He was staying at a hotel downtown and had told her the name and room number as some kind of not-so-subtle invitation, but she’d declined either visiting him there or inviting him here. Now she wondered if it had been a mistake, especially after her reaction to him.

She did believe he was interested in her. But what would happen when he found out about her family, how they were all just one step away from the law? Worse yet, what happened when they found out she was dating a wealthy man, someone who would be immediately perceived as a mark? She shuddered inwardly at the thought. No, better to let things be. She sensed Liam might just be the kind of man she could fall for—big-time, and that would be a mistake of colossal proportions. She needed to get her own life on track before she complicated it with anyone else.

Oh. God. What was she thinking? Was she seriously contemplating a relationship with him?

That would never happen.

And yet, that’s exactly what happened.

The following Friday, he met her after work and spent the weekend with her, blowing off the last of his conferences and walking through Pike Place Market, which was teeming with customers browsing the fresh fish, homemade wares, and art, then down to the waterfront where seagulls wheeled through the gray skies and ferries churned through the water. They headed to Pioneer Square for the underground tour, where there were remains of the city as it once had been. And then, to cap off the “total tourist experience,” he insisted on dinner at the Space Needle, where, despite the rain, they viewed the shimmering lights of the city.

As they were leaving, he took her arm and said, “I’m not taking no for an answer. I’m driving you home.”

The wind was stiff, buffeting their bodies, the rain a fine mist. She thought about returning to her empty apartment, as her roommate was again a ghost, so she considered. What would it hurt? She didn’t have to invite him in, or if she did, she could insist he leave when she wanted him to, if she wanted him to. But in the end she didn’t give in. She was too unsure. Instead, she caught a bus that would drop her off only blocks from her apartment.

As she stared at the night scape of the city, through the raindrops on the windows of the bus, she wondered why she resisted.

Because Liam is dangerous. She sensed he was a man to whom she might lose her heart, a heart she guarded ferociously.

Usually impulsive, ready to cut and run, Rory had learned to protect herself, as well as land on her feet, to rely on no one but herself. Maybe that was what this was all about. Since Liam Bastian was different from the other men she’d dated, she sensed he could hurt her. It would be best if she got on the bus tonight, then avoided him, thus ending the “relationship” before it really began.

“You’re an idiot,” she muttered to herself as the bus screeched up to the stop near her apartment building. She stepped onto the curb, into the lonely night, feeling the dampness of the night pressing against her face.

As the bus rumbled away, she dashed across the street to the front door of the older building with its brick-and-glass façade. As she did, she heard footsteps behind her. The street was nearly deserted, the vapor from the street lamps causing an eerie glow.

Her heart froze.

A glance over her shoulder confirmed that a dark figure was hurrying forward, emerging from the alley she passed. Oh. God.

Fear propelled her. Blood cold, she ran for the door, all the while reaching into her purse, her fingers fumbling as she located her keys.

She splashed through a puddle on the sidewalk, heard the rush of traffic speeding past. Would someone stop if she was assaulted? Maybe she should call for help now. From the corner of her eye, she saw him, a tall man in dark clothes approaching rapidly.

She opened her mouth to scream just as the door opened and he stepped into the pool of light cast by the bulbs set deep into the ceiling of the portico.

“Rory!” he called. She recognized Liam and her knees gave way. He swept her up, wrapped his arms around her and pulled her against him, then pressed cool lips against hers.

“Oh, God,” she gulped out.

“You all right? I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“Well, you did!” She sounded so breathless. Fear, or something else? Something more treacherous, sliding through her, a wanting she knew would only cause her pain . . . yet . . .

Standing in the puddle of light, feeling the strength of him, she made the irretrievable mistake of kissing him back. Automatically she opened her mouth and felt his tongue touch hers. A shot of pure sensation sizzled through her, and she knew, despite all her protests, she was lost to him.

Without a word, she led him to the elevator and the upper story apartment. They didn’t bother with the lights, or a lock on the door, just tumbled together on the futon that was her bed and struggled out of their clothes, always touching, ever kissing. Rory felt the warmth of his tongue glide down her body, leaving a trail on her bare skin. Blood thundered in her ears and she felt an instant warmth growing deep within her when the tip of his tongue found her nipple and toyed with it.

I’m in trouble, she silently told herself in her one last moment of sanity, then her body arched, he took her breast into his mouth and her body arched to meet him. Her fingers traced the sinewy muscles beneath his skin as she felt him slide into her, his eyes locking with hers as they began to move together. Then her throat was tight, her entire body pulsing with need. She met his thrusts with a sweet rhythm of her own. The moment built and built. She couldn’t breathe. It was better than anything. The totality of feeling. All beyond her experience. Everything intensified, faster and faster, hotter and hotter, the crescendo building until she was screaming silently, her fingers digging into his flesh. She wanted to drag him into her core, feel him inside her as deep and connected as she could. Her thoughts splintered and she suddenly came in a breathless spasm, crying out in surprise. He groaned as he met her at the apex. When he fell against her, she held on to his perspiring, heaving body, full of joy and a kind of disbelief. So, this was what it was all about. Beautiful.

She never wanted the night to end.

But she couldn’t tell him, not then, not for a while. She was too afraid. It took weeks of lovemaking before she could be completely honest about her feelings, and then once the words were out—I love you—she mentally braced herself for the rejection. It was too soon. Too soon! Apart of her feared he would vanish like smoke.

He took a long moment to answer her, long enough for her to crawl inside herself and die a thousand deaths. It was about a month into their relationship and they were back at Rendezvous—his suggestion—and somehow she’d just popped out with her feelings, blurted those three little words over another coffee with Baileys. She saw everything in sharp relief, though the noise retreated to the background, deafened by her panicked heartbeat.

And then, in all seriousness, he asked, “What are you doing the rest of your life?”

And she answered without thinking, “Spending it with you?”

His slow smile was all the answer she needed.

Now, turning away from the window, Rory climbed in bed with her daughter, who was mumbling in her sleep, plagued by restless dreams. She touched Charlotte’s forehead—a little warm, maybe?

She watched her daughter for a while, and Charlotte finally fell into deep, rhythmic breathing.

Rory pressed her face into her little girl’s red tresses and blotted out any further thought about Liam Bastian.

* * *

The hotel room was dark except for what filtered in through the crack in the curtain from Portland’s city lights, a strip of illumination that hurried over the end of the bed, striping their bare legs as it ran across the room and up the wall.

The woman lying naked on the bed felt like having a cigarette, though she didn’t smoke, never had. She just felt like she should be doing something, and smoking was what they did in old movies after coitus.

Coitus . . . that term sounded quaint and old-fashioned, not anything that had just transpired between her and . . . her bedmate. She threw him a look. Also naked, on his stomach, too damn relaxed. What they’d just done was less than romantic. It was base, emotionless fucking. Period. And it was starting to sort of piss her off.

It had been a long while since they’d gotten together. You’d think that would have whetted his male juices—absence making the prick grow harder—but instead she’d just been subjected to a kind of rote thrusting that had left her thinking about all the problems she needed to take care of instead of a hopefully impending climax. (She hadn’t felt anything close to that in months.) No, her mind had wandered to the same problems of five years ago. Problems that hadn’t been resolved in the least at that fiasco of a wedding, although she’d thought for a short while that she’d gotten lucky and a few of the people she couldn’t stand would die. But no! And that lunatic’s rain of bullets had damn near hit her.

What had happened? She still didn’t know. Nobody did, apparently.

And now . . .

Jesus Christ, here she was, lying naked in this three-star hotel room with a man she didn’t even really like. Their affair had raged like a firestorm at the time of the wedding, but now . . . well, let’s face it, he smelled. Sure, the odor could be called musky, male, maybe even sensual, but to her these days it was just plain old BO.

She was icked out by practically everything he did, though an honest part of herself, something buried deep in her female brain that rarely saw the light of day, had to admit she’d become rather particular as the years rolled by. Drop food on the floor and abide by the three-second rule? No way. That shit needs to go straight in the garbage. Let an animal lick you with its tongue? God, no. They were fine at a distance, but keep them away from her.

So, okay, here she was . . . tied to this sweaty male because of decisions made that she now wished she’d thought through a little more carefully at the time. What to do now?

She stared up at the darkened ceiling. She could lift her head and look past him to the clock on his side of the bed, or she could get up and find her phone to learn the time, but she did neither. She toyed with the idea of pretending to smoke as she looked down at her naked body, admiring her own smooth stomach and toned legs. She was a fine-looking woman. Who had said that to her? Or was it something from the days of coitus and old movies? She’s a fine-looking woman.

For some reason that thought pissed her off, too. Like she was made for some man’s pleasure.

She exhaled noisily, then decided to try the pretend-smoking thing. She brought her fingers up to her lips, sucked in a lungful of air, then blew out a fake stream that she could almost see. She kind of liked the feeling, so she did it a few more times before she tired of the artifice. What was the point, anyway?

He made some kind of noise with his lips that made her think about his breath. Garlicky smell. She wrinkled her nose. She had to get out of this rut she was in. And it also pissed her off that he’d fallen asleep almost instantly after he’d rolled off her.

“What time is it?” she asked in a loud voice.

He didn’t move and she glanced over at him. One eye was open, dark and liquid, looking her way.

“Would you look at the time? Okay? Please?” she asked, jabbing an elbow into his ribs for good measure.

With a grunt of exaggerated effort, he lifted himself up and looked over. “Midnight,” he pronounced.

“Oh, my God.” She scrambled off the bed and searched for her clothes.

He turned over and watched her step into her scrap of panties and snap on her bra.

“Stop looking at me,” she ordered, shimmying her dress over her head.

“C’mere.”

“Fuck you.”

“No, c’mere.”

When she ignored him, sliding her purse from the nightstand, making sure her cell phone was tucked inside, he jumped off the bed and grabbed her around the waist, tumbling them both back onto the bed. She shrieked and immediately began slapping at him. He roughly clasped her hands together, manacled them over her head, held her there hard.

“Stop it,” he ordered.

“You stop it,” she spat back, squirming. “I’ve got to leave!”

His other hand was marauding over her body and she twisted and fought and gnashed her teeth. But then he thrust one knee between her legs and dry-humped against her and goddamn it, she suddenly wanted him SO BAD.

“You better do it right this time, asshole,” she whispered in his ear before clamping her small, white teeth onto it with vigor.

“Ouch! Bitch. I’ll do it right.”

His free hand yanked at her dress, hiking it up over her hips. She heard a rip.

“Damn you! I paid—”

She cut herself off on a gasp as he yanked off her panties with hard fingers and then was on her, driving into her so fast, thrusting with such force that she had to lift her palms to the headboard to keep from crashing her skull into it.

“I—hate—you,” she gasped in time to his thrusts. “I—hate—YOU.”

He came with a groan and a collapse that left her furious, still moving beneath him to ensure she came, too. She was so mad she could scream. He’d taken his pleasure and left her hanging!

But no . . . the furious rubbing was working anyway and his half-hearted attempts to aid her with a few desultory hip thrusts helped bring her to a climax. Not as good as it should have been, but at least she got there.

“Ooooh, oooh,” she moaned on a deep exhalation of air.

“Good for you, huh,” he said, self-satisfied.

That did it.

She slapped him across the face, hard.

Immediately he clasped her hands over her head again, and she could feel him harden.

“You can’t do it again,” she goaded. “You don’t have it in you.”

“Careful, bitch,” he whispered.

She was getting really turned on. “Yeah, yeah . . . you’re not man enough. Can’t even pleasure a woman.”

It was a game they’d played in the past. The distant past. She was thrilled the game was resurrected. She was moving beneath him, inviting him, even while she insulted him.

But then, instead of taking her like he should have, she sensed his cock start to shrivel. He rolled away from her.

“What?” she demanded. This was it. She couldn’t stand for this any longer. She had to finish this affair tonight. Right now.

“We gotta talk about something.”

Now he was sitting up. She could only see his back. Her excitement was quickly turning to anger. “Talk all you want,” she snarled. “It’s o—”

“He’s getting out of prison. This week.”

The rest of the word remained unsaid. She almost asked who, but the words turned to dust in her mouth and she felt a stab of fear. “No.”

“I’ll take care of it.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I’ll take care of him,” he amended.

She started laughing, quietly, hysterically. He turned around swiftly and glared her down.

“What are you going to do?” she managed on a hiccup.

“I’ll take care of it,” he said again, biting off each word. “Now get the hell out of here.”

That was a second shock. “You don’t tell me what to do!”

“I said I’LL TAKE CARE OF IT! Just give me some room to breathe!”

She threw herself off the bed, straightened her dress, slipped into her shoes, swept up her purse, and stomped out of the room. She would have slammed the door behind her, but it was too late to bring that kind of attention to herself.

Take care of it, my ass. She was the one who always handled things.

She marched down the hallway, aware she was missing one piece of her outfit.

Well, screw him. He could just figure out what to do with her panties. She hoped to God they drove him crazy with lust, but more than likely he wouldn’t even pick them up.

And THAT pissed her off, too.