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A few minutes later, I step onto an elevator with Randall by my side. “Bodega is wonderful?” he challenges. “She offered to take a trip with you and that’s what you say?”
“I’ve hit my limit right now, Randall,” I say. “I need rest. I need an emotional timeout.” The elevator dings and opens, but I don’t exit. I turn to Randall. “I know my father wasn’t your father, but surely you can understand that this affects me. Tonight was about him. Tonight is not every night.”
With that, now I exit the car, walking to my right, toward my suite. I’ve barely made it to my door and Randall is there. My hand fumbles with the key and damn it, it’s now on the ground. I grab it and by the time I stand up, he’s closer. He’s so damn close. I rotate and he’s there, hand on the doorjamb above my head. “Randall,” I bite out. “Timeout means timeout.”
“I think you need someone to talk to. Let me be there for you.”
“Be there for me? You have been riding me like I’m a problem pet who won’t behave.” The elevator dings, a sound that echoes in my mind with the promise of company and an excuse to push him away.
“If I’ve been overbearing—”
“You have,” I say. “Step back.”
Instead, his hand settles at my waist. Instinct is instant and I shove him back. “Stop, Randall.”
He steps into me, that hand still at my hip, and anger surges through me. “Emma—”
“Stop,” I order. “Stop right now.”
“Problem?”
At the familiar voice, Randall’s hands fall away from me and he turns to face Jax. “Jax North. Never where you’re supposed to be, now are you?”
“Seems like I’m exactly where she needs me to be. Step away and let her go into her room.”
The air around Randall snaps and pops. “Who the fuck do you think you are?”
“A man of little patience,” Jax replies all cool composure, “as you well know.” A statement that infers a history I don’t expect. “Just as we both know,” Jax adds, “that she’s a Knight and you are not.”
If there was anything that could hit a nerve with Randall, it’s this, and I’m certain, for reasons I don’t understand, Jax knows this and knows it well. It’s also everything I want to say to Randall but have not, not in the way Jax just did, and for reasons I’m not certain I can live with going forward.
“Spoken like the son who only inherited when everyone who mattered in his family died,” Randall replies dryly.
Jax’s eyes meet mine from over Randall’s shoulder and there is something cutting in his stare, something cold that wasn’t there before, as if he feels I am one with Randall. I shake my head, silently rejecting such words but he’s stone, unreadable stone. “Do you really want to travel this path you’re traveling right now, Randall?” he asks, his gaze shifting back to the other man.
“I could pull your business,” Randall threatens.
“And I’m certain she could overrule you.”
She being me, but he’s wrong. I don’t have that power, now more so than ever. Randall makes an amused sound. “You know nothing about her or our operation,Jax North.”
“I know that you’re acting like an asshole,” Jax replies. “Think about it, man. Tonight is not the night.”
Tonight is not the night. He means because of my father. Doesn’t he? Why do I feel like there is something more there, something between these two that I don’t understand? Jax steps closer to Randall and speaks softly, whatever he’s said escaping my ears, but it reaches Randall’s. A telling tale I read from the stiffening of his spine, the tension rolling along his shoulders that even beneath his suit jacket cannot be missed.
A second passes, then two, and I can’t see anything but Randall’s back. I can’t hear them speak either but suddenly they turn to leave and disappear around the corner. I breathe out, my posture softening. What just happened? A part of me wants to charge after them. A part of me feels like this battle that just erupted is about me and therefore I have a responsibility to end it, but is it? I felt a familiar energy between them. I read something unspoken in their exchange. I suck in a breath when I understand what happened tonight. I sat down with Jax and made myself a target, or rather, a weapon he could use against Randall.
I can almost feel the slice of the emotional blade, the pain of yet another person using me and this one, this one almost succeeded. This is exactly why everything I do for me has to be anonymous, has to be outside this world of cut and be cut. I was drawn to Jax. I wanted Jax. I wanted him to the point that had he pushed just a little bit harder, at just the right moment, I might have ended up naked with that man. Stupidity is hard to swallow and I rotate and face the door, shoving the key in front of the sensor. Once I’m inside, I lean on the door and swallow against the tightness in my throat. Why am I even staying thenight? I live in the city. I don’t have any desire to turn breakfast into business contacts. I’m suffocating in the Knight empire.
Decision made, I grab my phone, book an Uber, and with it only fifteen minutes out, hurry deeper into my suite, where I quickly change into jeans, sneakers and a baseball cap that will allow me to get out of here without the likelihood of garnering notice. Packing takes me another ten minutes and since Randall hasn’t shown up, my escape holds hope. Hurrying to the door, I peek into the hallway to find it empty. My overnight bag is light and I take the stairs, heading down twenty flights, but that’s fine. I need to clear the booze out of my system that’s still hazing my mind. Once I’m on the ground level, I pull the cap down lower and enter the lobby.
Finding it sparsely populated, I exit to the street and spy my Uber right away. Dashing that direction, I open the rear door, toss my bag inside and greet the driver. I’m about to climb inside when a prickle on my neck is impossible to ignore. I turn and scan the area around me, my eyes landing hard on the tall, good looking man standing just outside the hotel entrance: Jax. Jax is standing there, and I swear the weight of his stare heats my skin, calls me to him, the look in his eyes leaving me no question. He’s looking for me. He’s found me.
But I can’t stay.
Because there is one certainty I know, one that I feel to my soul. Once I get involved with that man, there is no turning back. And there is no question, there’s no coming back from where he takes me. There’s no recovery from what Jax North would do to me. I get into my Uber and shut the door. “Drive, please,” I say, but I don’t breathe easier when we begin to pull away. I barely breathe at all.
Chapter four
