“How the hell did you know I was here?” I demanded when Hunter dragged me closer to him. I tensed, trying to pull away, but his grip turned into iron.
“I always know where you are.”
“That sounds like a felony,” I hissed. I gripped his shirt and tried to shove him off me, but he was stronger. He was stronger on the date he’d hurt me too.
I was more clever back then and very good with my knees. I had decent aim for a man who was blind from birth, so the blow had connected with his balls.
I laughed all the way home, where I promptly threw up on my kitchen floor and spent two hoursscrubbing it clean with a bottle of bleach. My hands were raw for days.
“Micah, Micah,” he murmured, dipping close to my ear.
“Seriously.” I shuddered and tried to pull my face away from his. “Stalking is a crime.”
“Mhm. But it’s not really stalking unless you can prove it. Besides, you were the one who asked me out.”
“Once. Then you turned into a literal psychopath.”
“Is that why you couldn’t get hard?” he asked, then laughed. “Because you don’t like it a little wild?”
I almost laughed.Wildwas not the word I’d use to describe what he’d been doing. But I knew that right now, he was trying to get a rise out of me, and I wasn’t going to play his games.
“I’m leaving.”
“It’s very crowded in here,” he said, pressing his lips against my ear. “I can walk you out if you want.”
“I want you to leave me the fuck alone!” I shouted.
“And I want?—”
“Sorry,” came someone else, and then there was a new hand on my side, yanking me away from Hunter. “You holding my boyfriend. Why?”
Oh fuck. I knew that voice too. I knew it a little too well for my own liking. Ivan Maximov.
Vanya.
Alexio’s best friend and self-appointed newestbrother-in-law to Jonah, now that he and Alexio were engaged. Not that he was actually related to Alexio, but Vanya didn’t seem to care about that sort of thing.
I liked him.
And I hated that I liked him.
And I never, ever wanted him to see me like this. I was probably pale, I was definitely shaking, and I felt like I was going to sick up those weak-ass gin and tonics the bartender had made me.
His big, warm hand closed tighter around my hip and tugged me back into a massive wall of muscle. I knew the feeling of him almost as well as I knew the shape of my own body. Vanya was big on the hugging kind of celly whenever we played competitive games against Alexio and Jonah and won. Which was often.
But it had been a long while since I’d been in his arms. Hunter’s bullshit had ramped up again once summer was over, and I’d started avoiding everyone all over again so I didn’t have to answer questions.
“Who the fuck is this?” Hunter demanded.
“I already tell you. I am his boyfriend,” Vanya growled. “Went to bathroom and come back to find what? Ugly little snake slithering over him? Fuck off before I rip your limbs off and make you look like actual snake.”
“Micah?” Hunter whined.
I couldn’t fucking believe my ears. Was Hunter actually trying to appeal to me?
“You know what’ll happen if you make meunhappy,” Hunter said when I didn’t reply, his voice taking on a hard edge.
I almost laughed. If the situation weren’t actually dire this time, I might have. There was nothing Hunter could do that would make me leave with him. Not when Vanya was holding me so tightly. Not when the tone of his voice said he’d kill Hunter and suffer whatever consequences came with that.
