Page 5

FOUR

Damon

I know that I’ve fucked up the moment panic tears through Joey’s face.

“Fucking dumbass,” I mutter, quickly stepping out of the shadows.

Mere hours before, I told her that Hiller was escorted out of the arena.

And Hiller knows where she lives.

And I’m standing in the darkness of her fucking porch, waiting for her to come home.

Dumb as shit.

I stop at the top of the few steps, standing in the bright spot of light, making sure she sees it’s me.

And I know the moment that processes because her face goes carefully blank and then she reaches up to the visor again.

The garage door rumbles open, and she pulls in.

Then it rumbles shut behind her.

I turn around and wait by the front door as lights turn on inside, as the faint sounds of her moving around on the other side of the wood reach my ears.

Then I wait some more.

I wait so fucking long I consider that she may not actually open the door to me.

Not that I blame her.

Still, I don’t leave, just lean back against the pillar, keep my eyes on the door, know that the camera doorbell has likely picked up my movement. If she looks at the feed, she’ll see I’m in for the long haul.

And five minutes later, the cold biting at the exposed skin on my hands and face and throat, I know she realizes that too.

Because the light just beyond the door turns on, shining through the long window on one side of it.

I hear a click and then the handle turns, the door swinging back enough for her to stand in the opening. Her brows flick up in silent question, but she doesn’t otherwise move. She sure as shit doesn’t step back, push the door wide, and invite me in like all the other times I’ve come over before.

“No beer?” I ask dryly.

The frost in her expression grows, ices over.

Yeah, not my finest moment, but sometimes the smart ass just doesn’t want to stay buried.

“What are you doing here, Damon?” she asks.

“You going to let me in?”

“It’s late.” The door closes an inch. “We can talk tomorrow.” Or never. Though she doesn’t speak the last two words aloud. I just read them in her furious expression. But when she goes to shut the door, I react without really thinking, catching the panel before it latches, slowly pushing it inward.

She fights me for a second, but I’m stronger and, though she’s stubborn as shit, she’s not as stubborn as I am in this moment.

I don’t want to move fast and risk the door hitting her.

But I’m going to win this battle. So, I keep pushing, gaining inch by slow inch until the door is open wide enough for me to push inside.

“Why are you?—”

I close the door behind me, throw the lock, and lean back against it.

She clamps her mouth closed, a muscle flickering in her cheek, but she doesn’t argue further, just spins on her heel and takes off for the kitchen.

I follow uninvited, figuring that I’m in for a penny at this point so I may as well be in for a pound, and reach the kitchen just as she slams the door to the fridge closed and turns with a beer in hand. With one beer in her hand.

Right, I guess that answers my earlier question.

No beer for me.

She moves to the counter, yanks open a drawer, and pulls out a bottle opener.

Pop!

The cap hits the trash and then she wraps her fingers around the neck of the bottle, lifts the beer to her lips, and drinks deeply.

I ignore the pulse in my dick at the sight of those plump lips wrapped around the top of the bottle, ignore that I want it wrapped around other things, and move to her, not stopping until the toes of my shoes are against the toes of hers.

Her eyes are wide, but the ice doesn’t melt.

“I’m sorry,” I murmur.

A crack in that exterior, surprise flickering through the emerald depths. But she doesn’t reply, just sips from the bottle.

“I was out of line,” I go on. “I shouldn’t have pressed you, not before the game.”

“Just another time,” she mutters, eyes sparking with frustration as she tips back the bottle again.

I lean forward, snag the bottle from her.

“Hey!” she snaps.

I ignore her and down the last of it, the cool bite of the brew hitting the perfect spot. I look at the label, note the local brewery, and file that bite of knowledge away. Then I set the bottle aside, taking advantage of that movement to cage her in between my body and the counter.

Soft, lean curves brush against my front, setting it alight, reminding me of why I always keep my distance.

She’s too fucking tempting.

She’s not fucking for me.

I can’t risk it. Can’t risk her .

But right now, close like this, every cell in my body screaming at me…that’s a lot harder to remember.

That fucker hurt her, raped her, and she’s borne that silent hurt for too long.

“Yeah, Red, it would have been another time,” I say, crouching a little to hold her gaze. “I would have discovered the truth eventually. I’ve known something was eating at you for a while, and I thought it was the job. If I knew that Hiller?—”

Rage crawls up the back of my throat, wrapping tight fingers around my neck, making it almost impossible for me to force my next words out.

But they do come out.

In a rasping rage.

“If I knew that asshole touched you too, I would have fucking killed him.” She jumps, green eyes flaring. “He would have disappeared between one day and the next and no one would ever have found his body—except, maybe, for the big ass black bears that I’d feed his body parts to.”

Wide eyes go even wider.

But then her expression locks down. “You wouldn’t, Damon,” she whispers. “You fucking couldn’t .”

That’s where she’s wrong.

The anger in me, the constant thrum just beneath the surface, always held carefully in check, but always threatening to escape my grasp—it would love to escape, love to be set free on Hiller.

No.

I can’t risk it.

“I could have.” My fingers brush over her cheek. “I would have.”

She shakes her head, as though she doesn’t see how dangerous I am.

“Joey—”

“Damon,” she says on a sigh, “I don’t know why you’re pushing this. Me telling you before tonight would have changed nothing. I wouldn’t have gone public, Hiller was already fucked, and the most important thing in your life is the team. The shit that I went through would have jeopardized that further.”

I still.

Does she honestly think in her fucked-up world that the shit that man did to her is less important than my dedication to my fucking job?

My answer to that mental question comes with her next words.

Because she does believe that.

“I have no evidence. I have nothing but my word against his, and after that night…” Her voices breaks. “He left me alone. It was like he did that shit and then it was over and done. So, there was no point. I went to therapy and it took a long time, but I found my enjoyment in sex again. But—” Her eyes close, a single tear sliding down her cheek. “I didn’t know about Ivy and the others…I should have, and if there’s any argument about me speaking up, it’s that. If I had done that, they would have been safe. But I didn’t and everything went down and…then it didn’t matter at any longer. The most important was refocusing on the team, getting it cleaned up, and moving everyone forward.”

“It wasn’t more important than you, Red.”

Her body jerks, as though those words surprise her.

Jesus Fucking Christ.

“The team was our focus. That’s how it had to be.” The words come fast and furious, as though she’s desperate to convince me…and herself. “It’s what the guys and staff needed. It’s what Ivy and the others needed. It’s what you?—”

“Don’t,” I rasp.

Another sharp shake of her head. “It’s what you needed, and I needed to give you that.”

Fuck.

I don’t think about all the things that are wrong in this scenario, about all the fucked-up shit inside me. Not right then.

I just…react.

I wrap my arms around her and draw her flush against me.

“I didn’t need you to do that.” My words are like gravel, even as I can begin to understand her fucked-up logic, can appreciate that she was trying to protect me. I understand . But I’m mad as hell and I want to shake her until she sees how wrong that was.

But…I need to hold her more.

So, I just draw her nearer, wrap my arms more tightly around her, and I listen as she gives me more of her fucked-up logic.

“You’ve already been through so much with your sister and I didn’t want you to have to revisit it and”—a shrug of her slender shoulders—“you didn’t even like me anyway, so it wouldn’t bother you.”

See?

Fucked up.

So much that the lid I keep slapped tight on all things Joey pops off and the truth I’ve wrestled with for so long slips out.

“I like you far too much, baby.”

She goes statue still.

And then she bursts into tears.