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What an asshole. “Throw it on the bar and I’ll get you your change,” she said as she moved toward the cash register.
Unfortunately, she had to pass him to get to it. As she did, he fucking grabbed her again!
This time by the back of her neck and as she brought her hands up to break free, he snagged her wrist again.
If she fought him, he would only tighten his grip, so she tried to remain calm, even though her heart was beating right out of her chest and her breathing had become choppy and shallow.
Why did he have this effect on her? He shouldn’t.
“Stella.”
And why the fuck did her name on his lips and the way he was holding her make her lose her breath? “Let me go.”
It was impossible to hide her reaction to him. Which put her at a disadvantage.
Even so, she would not give in.
If she did, everything around her would collapse. Again.
She would lose control of her life. Lose control of what was hers.
She’d lose everything.
She did not need a man like Trip in her life.
She didn’t need a fucking man at all.
And the fucking balls on him...
She lifted her chin and met his eyes directly. “Let. Me. Go.”
“What were you dreamin’ about, Stella?”
She jerked her arm, but he held tight.
“Same thing I’ve been dreamin’ about every night?” His anger had softened a bit, but it was still there, barely simmering beneath the surface.
“Depends. Are you dreaming about when you pushed an eleven-year-old girl so hard she cracked her head open on a concrete block wall? Is that what you’re dreaming?”
The fingers on the back of her neck tightened and the ones around her wrist twitched.
“Let me go, Trip.”
“I was fuckin’ fifteen, Stella.”
“And that makes it okay?”
“No, it doesn’t make it fuckin’ okay. But what fifteen-year-old kid wants a little girl chasin’ him around tryin’ to kiss him and demandin’ he marry her?”
None. She knew that now and she knew that later once she was old enough to know better.
“Try kissin’ me now. Bet you won’t get that same response.”
What? “You know what? It would be the same result. It’d be like slamming my head against a fucking concrete wall. Back then I thought you were the greatest, now I see you as you really are.”
“And how’s that?”
She could see it in his face. Him putting up a wall, becoming guarded. And a muscle in his tight jaw jumped.
“Someone with nothing and nobody. Someone scrambling to make something out of nothing because you don’t have shit to show for the last thirty-five years.”
As she tried pulling away from him again, he spun them until her ass was against the back counter and his hips had her pinned.
His brown eyes glittered fiercely. “Sounds fuckin’ familiar, Stella. What do you have to show for your thirty-one years on this goddamn Earth? This run-down goddamn bar that was handed to you? A mountain of debt? What? What do you have to show? No man. No kids. No fuckin’ nothin’. So, before you start throwin’ stones, you better move outta your own goddamn glass house.”
She sucked in a sharp breath. “Fuck you, Trip.”
The motherfucker smiled.
And that didn’t cool down her anger at all. “You just walk in here out of fucking nowhere, and then think you’re going to be some fucking hero and help the damsel in distress? For what? What the hell do you expect to get out of this?”
“Told you what.”
What she didn’t want to give him. “A portion of the bar.”
“Half of the bar.”
Half... Suddenly, she couldn’t breathe. “And I’ll say it again... Fuck. You. Trip.”
“Give me half and you’ll have more fuckin’ money in your pocket than you do now.”
“Right.”
“Swear it. You’ll have free or cheap labor—”
“Prospects—”
“Money to invest in fixin’ up this shithole—”
“I don’t want to turn this into a fucking biker bar, Trip.”
“It doesn’t have to be a fuckin’ biker bar, Stella! Fuck! You’re so goddamn stubborn.”
She wasn’t the only one. “Because you want me to give up half of everything that belongs to me. Just like that, you walk in twenty fucking years later and you want half.” Like she was in the middle of a bad divorce.
“Let me help you.”
Fuck that. “No.”
Trip closed his eyes and his nostrils flared. His fingers had flexed on her wrists, which were pinned between their bodies.
She shoved at him, but he didn’t budge. “Back off.”
His eyes opened and their gazes locked. “If I back up, you’re gonna knee me in the nuts.”
“And you’d deserve it because I still owe you one.”
He dropped his head until his mouth was just above hers.
Like at the barn. Like in her dream.
Though, with two different results.
His warm breath beat rapidly against her lips. His jaw was working and his eyes so intense, they seared her. “If you fuckin’ think I hurt you on purpose, you’d be fuckin’ wrong.”
