It was a bad idea to go back to his den, but I was down to my last option. Besides, Niall may have thrown me out before and told me I was useless, but now he’d shown up, freed Mateo and come rodeoing in to rescue me. That had to count for something, even if I was just fooling myself into hoping he’d missed me like I’d missed him.
I wasn’t going to forgive him like a friendly dolphin looking for its blowhole to be tickled though. I wanted a big fat sorry alongside a big fat French kiss, and maybe a little finger up the butt if I was getting all my wishes fulfilled.
I was fooling myself for the second and third part of my wants though, because Niall was engaged to a well-titted Russian. So I’d settle for the sorry, and if I didn’t get it, I’d be leaving pronto, riding Angry Jack off into the sunset with Brutus chasing a squirrel at our side.
W e pulled up at my house at last, the shitty old truck I’d stolen wheezing and creaking as it rolled to a halt and I cut the engine. I was going to need to get the thing taken care of sharpish as it was likely registered in the name of that fella whose head I’d found smashed in back at that shack, and I didn’t much need the headache of having a big lump of evidence sitting right outside my house.
That said, I wasn’t in a whole lot of a rush yet. This place was untraceable, hidden from eyes all around and damn near off the map altogether. That was what had made it such a perfect hiding place for a man on the run from the most bloodthirsty cartel in all the world. And it was why I’d decided to stay after claiming it from him and locking him in my basement.
I snatched Brooklyn offa Mateo’s lap, not liking the way he’d been pawing at my little Spider on the drive back here. I was liking the way she’d been appreciating his fancy new haircut even less. It wasn’t even that fancy. I’d seen a baboon with fancier hair at the zoo once and that was far more impressive than Mateo and his stubble.
“I’m still mad at you,” she hissed at me, yanking her arm outa my grasp as I directed her towards the door.
“Well, be mad inside. It’s fucking freezing out here and you’re dressed like a crazy person,” I said.
“I am a crazy person,” she said. “And I’d never choose to wear this.”
She yanked the oversized plaid shirt off to prove her point, hurling it into my face and I didn’t even catch it as my gaze fell to her bare tits and my throat bobbed with that hunger I’d been fighting against so hard ever since she’d run out on me.
Fuck, she was a stunning creature.
My tongue ran along the seam of my lips without me giving it permission to and I found myself indulging in fantasies of tasting her skin and sinking my teeth into the pert flesh of her hardened nipples before I could fight to keep the thoughts out.
I lingered there for a moment, ignoring Mateo’s curses as he climbed from the truck too and just stared at her. My little psycho, all outraged and river-swept and here. Right fucking here where I could keep her safe. Not to mention the half-naked part which I was having a whole lot of trouble ignoring.
“Holy mother of a fucking goose,” I cursed, doubling over and clutching at my cock as it enjoyed the show a bit too much, swelling at the sight of her and damn near making me pass out from the combined pain of the healing tattoo and the new piercing once again.
“I’m not your mother goose,” Brooklyn growled from somewhere above me, but she was gone before I managed to catch my breath and look up at her again.
“Hijo de puta,” Mateo muttered, spitting at my feet and stalking after her, clearly giving in to the fact that I would just shock him and haul his arse inside if he didn’t do as I wanted. They left me with the beast man still tied up in the front seat and Brutus who looked seven shades of confused as he cocked his head at me from the truck bed.
“Out, boy,” I snapped at the dog through the window behind me, wondering what the fuck he was playin’ at, making me wait for him and pointing to the front door of the house which Brooklyn and Mateo had left wide.
The dog bared vicious looking fangs at me then leapt out, charging into the house like he was on the hunt for a kill and I smiled.
“Good boy. At least someone around here listens to me.”
I turned my attention to the giant in the front seat next, his cold, soulless eyes staring right back at me with a deep kind of intelligence that made me scowl. I didn’t need no clever men making themselves at home in my house. I didn’t need no men at all. Just my little Spider. But now she’d brought another stray home, and with the tenuous peace I’d formed with her following my arsehole display of mass proportions, I was afraid to rock the boat by turfing him out right away.
She said he’d saved her? Fine. That bought him one night of leniency with me. One night of mercy, fresh sheets and food in my home. But that was it.
I tugged the door open and jerked my chin at him in command. “Out.”
He surveyed me a little longer, his grey eyes dropping to my feet, taking in the gun holsters still strapped over my body and the desert eagles contained within them before shifting all the way up to meet my eye.
He held my gaze.
Not a flinch, not a blink, not a single emotion flittering through his pupils. Nothing. Man was as stone cold as me. Maybe even stonier.
Before I could lose my rag and clock him in the jaw, the big fella stepped outa the truck, unfolding himself from it like he was an origami figure or some shit and standing there before me all smug in the few inches of height he had over me. I couldn’t say I’d been forced to raise my gaze to meet another man’s at any point which I could remember, and I’d have been lying if I tried to pretend it didn’t irk me some.
“That way.” I pointed towards the open door and he strode away without a word, his gaze only breaking with mine once he’d passed me and I tutted loudly.
“If it’s a brawl you’re looking for, I could do with a workout,” I warned him as I followed him inside. “You won’t emerge looking so pretty after it though.”
Nothing. Stone, cold nothing. Not even a denial about the pretty comment. And he wasn’t pretty. He was rough and tainted in sin and full of dark promises, none of which would ever cause anything good to come of them.
I scowled at his back as I followed him inside. This wouldn’t do. Not at all. I needed to reassert my authority here and get the prisoners back to where they belonged.
I followed him into the kitchen as he tracked down the sound of Brooklyn’s voice while she jabbered on about all the things she’d been up to since she’d been gone, giving quite a lot of detail to the way she had choked her past tormentor with a twelve-inch rubber cock while not looking at Mateo at all.
There was tension hanging in the air between them. Tension I’d no doubt put there after finding her with his fucking cock in her mouth and accusing her of being a naïve little arsehole who had fallen for his tricks and let him use her.
He was probably salty about the way she’d run off and left him behind too. But hey ho, their drama wasn’t my issue.
I moved to the drawer on the far side of the room, grabbing the taser from it and ramping up the power to ‘might just kill a T-Rex’ as I eyed the big fucker my little psycho had brought home with her.