“I need to talk to her. To know the truth,” I said honestly.
His face dropped, but he nodded once. “I understand you want to know her side, but that doesn’t make it the truth. Be careful, son.”
Chapter Three
Baker
He hadn’t come home.
If I said I hadn’t waited up, I’d have been lying. Because I had until I couldn’t keep my eyes open any longer. And after I’d gone to bed, nightmares plagued me and every noise had me on alert. But I’d known he wasn’t here. Felt his absence.
As I turned my key in the lock after a long day at work, I half expected his things to be gone.
I pushed open the door. Quickly peering around the open space, everything seemed the same. His books littered the coffee table. The mug he’d left on the kitchen counter three days ago was still there. A T-shirt draped the back of a barstool. The apartment was still, lacking the energy that hummed through it when Holt was home.
Home.
What a joke. I’d jumped at the opportunity to get out of the shelter. To leave behind the first place that had been a real home to me in a long time. Because I wanted it all. The place to come back to that had nothing to do with the surroundings but who was in it.
Foolishness.
That desire for things that didn’t exist was what had gotten me into trouble in the first place.
Illusions.
I still had a hard time distinguishing what was real and what wasn’t. This was something I’d worked on with my therapist, but I’d taught myself to put up a good front. Deep down, I hadn’t learned who was to be trusted and who wasn’t. Like an innocent little girl, I let my heart do the picking.
That was why Trish was my best friend. Why I loved her baby like she was my own. Why I was living with a man I had no business being around.
He could hurt me. I doubted the way I had been in the past, but he had the power nonetheless. And he shouldn’t.
I didn’t even know him.
But the fact he hadn’t come home after the morning we had stung me something deep and fierce. And I wasn’t brave enough to wonder if that was because he could have hooked up with someone last night. I’d even stayed late at work and contemplated asking Trish if I could sleep over with her just to give Holt a taste of his own medicine.
In the end, the pull toward home had been strong. I couldn’t stay away. Needed to know if he would come back. I had my answer.
No.
And that stung.
I dropped my bag on the counter and went straight for the wine. Some of my co-workers had asked me to go out tonight, but I’d declined. Now that I’d come home to an empty place on a Friday night, I reconsidered.
Phone and wine in hand, I leaned against the counter and took a long, satisfying swallow. Immediately, some of my muscles loosened. I thumbed through my contacts about to press Call for one of my colleagues when the front door opened.
Holt’s coveralls were filthy. He had a smudge of grease on his cheek. His hair was a wreck, strands of it haphazard in opposing directions.
Relief rushed through me even as I stood a little straighter.
“You should lock the door.” He kicked it shut and shucked off his leather jacket, tossing it on the back of the sofa.
My pulse thrummed a rapid beat with every step he took toward the kitchen. His eyes were locked on mine, but I couldn’t read anything but the heat in them. Fury or desire, I didn’t know. He looked exhausted, that much I could tell.
He swiped the glass from my hand and drained half, making a disgusted face when he handed it back to me. “How do you drink that stuff?” He grimaced and went to the fridge, grabbing a beer and twisting the top off.
“Like this.” I made a show of putting the glass to my lips, slowly tipping it back until the dark liquid flowed into my mouth. “Delicious,” I said once I’d swallowed.
His throat bobbed as he watched me. His eyes slid down my body when I lowered the glass to the counter.
“Nice dress.” His gaze lingered at the V where just a hint of cleavage peeked out.
I’d worn the red A-line dress for him. To get his attention. Pathetic.
“That what people who work at a magazine wear?” He pointed his beer toward me, heat burning a trail where his eyes wandered down my body all the way to my heels.
“Only the easy ones.”
“I already explained that,” he said with a hint of impatience.
“I know what easy means.” He had explained and I loved his nickname, but I was still pissy after he hadn’t come home last night. “Apparently you’re well acquainted with the definition.”
He wiped the back of his mouth with his hand. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
I lifted one shoulder to my ear. “Nothing.”
He set his bottle down and closed the distance between us, though he was careful not to touch his clothes to my dress.
“You’d better clarify, Easy. This grease monkey isn’t following.”
I barely heard what he said, blindsided when the scent of motor oil wafted into my nostrils. I gripped the rounded edge of the counter and pressed my lower back into it to get away. It was useless. I was dizzy with the combination of sweat, garage, and Holt.
“I said nothing.” I lifted my chin, as I pretended not to be affected. There was no way I was asking if he’d been with someone the night before. “And stay out of my room.”
“That’s where the only working bathroom is. You knew that when we moved in.”
“Sounds like you’ve got a problem then.” I shrugged, and he scowled.
“No problem.” His voice held dark promise and unspoken desire.
Every inch of me ached for him to touch me, his breath ghosting across my face not anywhere near enough. I clenched my thighs together. That did nothing to stop the throb of heat in my core.
“You stink.” I wrinkled my nose and prayed he believed the lie.
“Then why’d you just inch closer, Easy?”
“I didn’t,” I said indignantly. “Can you back up, please? I have plans.”
He flattened his palms on the stone surface on either side of me. “We have plans.”
I held my breath to keep from taking any more of that intoxicating scent in, but I had to let it go so I could speak. “We do not.”
Holt winked at me, a signature move of the Dixon men. I should have been immune, but I melted. “Sure we do. It’s in our roommate agreement. Friday nights, we hang out.”
I shoved at his shoulders. “What are you talking about?” My voice was shaky, far too affected for my liking. “We don’t have a roommate agreement.”
“Sure, we do,” he said easily. “Did we or did we not agree to be roommates?”
I stared at him a moment. This was a trick question. It was too easy not to be. “Um . . . yes?”
He tapped the tip of my nose and grinned. “Exactly. And since we agreed to be roommates, we agreed to Friday nights. I’m picking this week. Pizza. Beer. And The Walking Dead.”
“Did you get hit on the head at work today?”
“Not that I remember,” he said cheekily.
I quirked my mouth to one side. “Inhale toxic fumes?”