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“I didn’t mean—” My head spun, jumping around and trying to figure out what had him so worked up, not that it seemed to be all that hard to poke at his bully.
“It doesn’t matter what you meant.” His jaw clenched, and still, he held onto me, refusing to let go.
My brow furled in disappointment and ire flamed in my chest. I’d taken another chance on him and, here he was, throwing all his assholery around like it was free.
Well, it was going to cost him.
“Dumb me to think you might not be a total jerk. I should have known you would prove me wrong,” I hissed as I tugged my elbow from his grip.
He roughed the hand that had been containing me through his hair. Frustration tightened his jaw, a violent war visibly going down in his heart and mind. He exhaled, the hostility not knowing whether to drain or expand as he angled in, so close but not touching me. “I need you to be thoughtful.”
“You think I’m not being thoughtful by staying here for lunch to spend time with Evelyn?” My words were hard and low, hoping to keep them from the child when my anger wanted to fly all over the place. “Or did you get one look at my house and decide I’d only agreed because I can’t afford to feed myself?”
He scuffed both those big hands over his face before he dropped them to glare at me. “That’s not what I meant.”
“What you meant doesn’t matter, Mr. Greyson.” See how he liked it when someone started firing dirty arrows at him.
He flinched.
I had to stop myself from gloating or maybe from stomping on his foot.
Except I didn’t have the time.
Glass suddenly shattered behind us, the sound piercing and echoing on the travertine floors.
I whipped around at the same time Evelyn screeched, her little hands coming up to cover her ears as if the noise had terrified her. Without hesitation, I rushed that way and scooped her into my arms since she was standing in a pool of glass and mayonnaise.
Tears started to track down her face, and I bounced her like she was a baby, running my hand down the back of her head and making all these shooshing sounds.
“It’s okay. It’s okay. It wasn’t your fault. It was just an accident,” I promised.
“Are you injured?” Caleb was right there, at our side, his tone deadly. The same as it’d been when I’d backed into his car, though this time, I heard it differently.
Recognized the current.
Terror.
Worry.
Dread.
It knitted it up into harsh syllables and grating vowels.
His fear as stark as the child’s.
Evelyn furiously shook her head that was buried in my shoulder. “I broke it.”
“That’s okay,” I told her again, looking at her dad from over her head, trying to figure out what the hell was going on since Caleb looked like he was going to blow a gasket.
Seriously, it was just a mayonnaise jar, not the end of the world, but there was something about the man that gave off the mood that at any second it might be.
That everything was in a constant state of crumbling.
Precarious and unsteady.
“Here…let’s just check and make sure, okay?” I didn’t know if I was telling him or her, but I had to physically pry Evelyn’s arms from around my neck as I set her onto the island. I took one of her arms, scanned it with my eyes, before I ran my hand down the length of it, making sure there were no cuts or scrapes.
“All clear here,” I murmured softly, worried if I spoke too loud, it was only going to worsen the situation.
I did the same to the other, then I picked up each of her booted feet and checked them out, but since she was wearing them and jeans, she was completely fine.
Hoping to lighten the tension, I jostled her little pink boots emblazoned with rhinestones, making her flutter kick, my voice twisting into playfulness. “Not a cut to be found…all thanks to these awesome boots you have. Where did you even get these? I need a pair of them for myself.”
“You do?” she asked through her tears, her little fists rubbing at her eyes.
“Absolutely. Don’t you think I’d look great in them?”
Evelyn barely peeked up at me through the locks of brown hair that had fallen in her face, pieces matted to her wet cheeks. Caution clouded her sweet demeanor, though she sniffled and seemed to let go of some of her fear.
“Because you like horses, too?” she asked.
I brushed her hair back so I could look into her earthy brown eyes. “That’s right, I love horses, just like you.”
Warily, I glanced to the side at Caleb who was still right there, towering over us. A dark storm. The muscles in his arms flexed as he clenched and unclenched his fists, the designs writhing above.
