Page 45 of The Renegade Billionaire

Savvy squeezes my cheeks so hard my lips pucker, and she adds some gloss that I hate. I’ll have eaten it all off before we’re even to the Firefly, but if I know her, she’ll be chasing me down all night to reapply.

A quick coat of mascara and they’re ushering me out of my room, down the stairs, and out the front door. Pops is sitting on his porch swing, staring at Braxton.

“Don’t keep her out too late.” My grandfather chuckles.

“Pops, I’m a grown woman. I don’t need a keeper.”

He shrugs and looks up to the sky. He sits out here a lot when he’s missing my Grams.

“Are you okay, Pops?”

“Never been better, kiddo. Boy?” I have no idea why he doesn’t use Braxton’s name, but Braxton always answers.

“Yes, sir?”

“Don’t let that Harry Turd anywhere near our girl. You got it?”

“Our girl?” Savvy whispers while Clover and Elle pretend to swoon. Did Clover have more than one glass when I wasn’t looking?

“Pops, knock it off.” Turning to Braxton, I should be unnerved to find he’s already watching me—it’s become a stalkerish habit of his—but I can’t deny that I like the attention. “You really don’t have to do this. The high school runs a car service on a buddy system for locals on the weekends. It’s a way for the teenagers to make a little cash, and it keeps most people from drinking and driving.”

“Madison,” he drawls as though he were born and raised in the South.

“What?” I snap. I don’t like how he makes me feel sometimes.

Liar, liar, Madi. You don’t want to like how he makes you feel.

Ugh, that girl who sits inside my head urging me into bad decisions is seriously the worst.

While I’ve been playing mental gymnastics with myself, Braxton’s inched closer and the girls have entered the truck. Clover and Savvy sit in the back, and Elle is in the passenger seat.

“Get in the truck, Madison.”

Why don’t I despise that commanding tone of his?

“Why?” My voice cracks as I crane my neck to meet his intense gaze.

He smiles down at me with his dimples on full display and his hair falling messily over his forehead.

“Because if I don’t take you to the Firefly, Pops is going to have me sanding floors.” He holds up his right hand, then turns it to show me the back. His knuckles are all cut up with scabs forming.

“What in the…?” I spin on Pops, but Braxton catches my elbow and turns me back to him as if we’re already on the dance floor. My palms sprawl flat against his chest, and I gasp.

“Don’t yell at Pops. I enjoy spending time with him, and he’s teaching me stuff I’d never learn anywhere else. But my knuckles are sore as fuck, so I’d much rather watch you and your friends and make sure you get home safely than do anything else on his list tonight.”

“W-why are you doing all this?” My voice is a shadow of itself. It’s fear. Fear that I might catch feelings for this man. Fear that Pops already has. Fear that my heart pitter-patters in a way it hasn’t since I was a teenager whenever he touches me.

His left hand presses into my back, keeping me tightly against him, and he uses the finger of his right hand to trace the headband braid. “This looks nice,” he says quietly.

Then his gaze falls to mine, and my mind screams at me to pull away. We have an audience, for crying out loud, yet I don’t move. I’m stuck in his sphere, and I’m pretty sure if I stopped lying to myself, I might even love it.

Braxton chuckles before stepping back, as though he just realized the peanut gallery is taking us in.

I take a deep, cleansing breath.

“I’m doing it because I’ve never felt needed before,” Braxton says. “And apparently, helping is my superpower. I promise heisn’t getting me to do anything I’m not willing to do. Especially tonight.”

Helping might be his superpower, but so is his ability to get me to lose myself.