Page 23 of Hostile Cravings (Wicked Cravings #3)
“Something like that.” I couldn’t keep up the gruff mask with Mason. He’d read right through it. And he knew me too well not to notice.
“What’s wrong, Ty?”
I eyed the elevator and decided to take the stairs, wanting the privacy. Finch followed, but I motioned for him to give me some space. He moved past me, checking out the rest of the stairwell.
“Why do you ask?” I ran my hand through my hair as I leaned against the wall.
“Because you’re not bitching about Angie Donelli. I thought she was a pain in your ass.”
“She is,” I said, my eyes staring at the step in front of me. “She’s a bratty, spoiled bitch who drives me insane. Everything she does grates on my nerves and pretending like this is killing me, Mace. I don’t think I can take much more of it.”
“But?” he asked, reading me easily because the usual aggression in my tone was missing .
“But…she’s making me crazy.” I sighed.
“Ty, that picture you sent for Joey…that wasn’t staged, was it?”
I heard Casey in the background, her voice growing a pitch higher with excitement. Damn, I should have known she’d be with him.
“No.” I slid onto the stair. “No, it wasn’t.
Shit, Mace, I can’t keep my hands off her.
It built up, you know, this craving inside of me I couldn’t stop until I had her.
And now, it’s like I can’t stop and…I don’t know that I want to stop because she does something to me, makes me so…
” I paused, unable to get the words out.
“You’re in love with Angie Donelli?” his voice was incredulous, but it was Casey’s surprised scream that made me smile. The word was one I hadn’t wanted to admit, but when he said it, I couldn’t deny it.
“Yeah, I think I am. Completely and utterly in love with the bitch who has made my life miserable for the last seven years.”
“We can have a double wedding!” Casey yelled.
“No!” What was she thinking even saying that? But something about it had sounded right, and I shook the sensation off. “No. What the fuck, Mason? Calm her down.”
“Oh, you don’t want me to do that, buddy. You won’t like the way I calm her down.”
I rolled my eyes, wanting to reach through the phone and strangle him.
“So, did you tell her yet?” Casey said, having clearly grabbed the phone from Mason.
“Case, settle down. And no, I haven’t. We…this is all new for both of us, and I don’t even know if she feels the same way.” But I did. I’d seen the look in her eyes that she’d shielded quickly.
“You need to tell her, Ty. This is huge. For both of you!”
“Yeah, it is, Case, which is why I’m not gonna say anything yet. I’m not ready and I’m not even sure what it is I’m feeling. ”
“Give me the damn phone, princess, or I’ll tie you up with that scarf?—”
“Mason,” I scolded, not wanting to hear anymore.
That stupid purple scarf that he carried in his pocket now drove me nuts.
It was from the set Casey and I had split and I didn’t like the thought of them using my mother’s scarf in their sex games.
I had a few of my own tucked in my closet, not sure what to do with them.
When I’d caught Angie sleeping in my bed, she’d had the blue one clutched in her hands.
It had pissed me off that she’d gone through my things, but seeing her like that had soothed the irritation.
“Fine. Go enjoy more of your wife.”
“I will,” I replied, thinking of all the ways I wanted to enjoy Angie today, a surprising few not sexual. “Hey, what is Casey doing there? I thought you were meeting with Tirenti still?”
“I brought her with me. She’s cleaning out her apartment. I’m going back to see Tirenti with Donelli later. They’re negotiating and I’m mediating. Now that Angie’s out of the picture, Tirenti wants more in trade from Donelli. I’m still suspicious that he’s thinking of turning.”
“Be careful and make sure you go well armed.”
“Got it. You keep that prize busy while I turn Joey’s attention to something else.”
He disconnected, and I sat in the stairwell for a few more minutes, thinking about Angie and how I felt about her.
As much as she aggravated me, I’d fallen for her.
I had fallen for her that first time I’d seen her years ago, but now I was lost to her.
And as much as I hated to admit that a woman had claimed my heart and destroyed the guardrails I had in place around it, I couldn’t deny that Angie had done just that.
She had elbowed her way into my heart, one foul-mouthed remark after another.
And the hate that had sat between us had been nothing but a shield to my attraction to her.
It had taken only a few days alone with her to realize it.
Years of hiding from it, of denying how like a vine that overtakes a fence, she had rooted herself into my consciousness, into my very being and I’d refused to recognize it.
Deciding I needed to get some fresh air before I returned to her, I went for a walk, using the back entrance to the resort to avoid the bustle of the front lobby.
I needed to prepare myself mentally, knowing when I saw Angie next, I was going to dismantle those guardrails completely and tell her how I really felt.