“Yeah, okay.” I hate it sounds like I’m pleading with him not to.
“I’ll see you around.”
But I swear he sounds like he’s pleading as well, and I know with the quickness of which the line dies that he’s hating himself for how he just sounded.
The laughter rings through my head once more and I try to push aside the jealousy that is, for whatever reason, forming.
It takes another 2 weeks before the insurance check comes in, but as soon as it does, I make my way up to the bar.
I’m sure that he wouldn’t have cared if I mailed it, but there’s a small part of me that’s hoping I’m able to see him again. Maybe this time we won’t be able to force our mouths closed, force all the things which are floating around just beyond the surface away.
But when I find myself in the lobby, and they tell me that Zane isn’t there, I almost breathe a sigh of relief. A clean break is best.
My heart stings a bit as I’m walking back through the parking lot and see his bike sitting there, telling me it wasn’t that he wasn’t here, it’s just that he doesn’t want to see me.
“Hmm.” He smirks as he looks at me. “I was expecting it to at least be another year before I saw you again.”
“Ha ha,” I mumble to him sarcastically as I step into the room. “It probably would have been if you wouldn’t have left this.” I smirk as I hold up the ring that I’ve seen on his middle finger the last couple of times that I’ve been with him.
“Where the hell did you get that at?” His head tilts as he looks back at me.
“I dunno. Where was the last place you had it?” I match his tilt as I walk over to the desk, placing the ring on the top as I look at him.
“Shit…” He trails off as he says it and then picks it off of the top, seeing the speckles of blood that sit on the inside. “How’d you get it?”
“I have found myself in the market of cleaning up some less than optimal scenes.”
This time, he smirks. “Crime scenes.” He fingers the ring as his eyes widen, looking across the desk at me. “Tatum.” He shakes his head as he makes a tsk noise a few times. “Aren’t you like supposed to report if you find anything like this?” He asks while slipping the ring back onto his finger, without taking his eyes off of me.
“Probably.” I shrug, nonchalantly, not wanting to give him that much power at the moment.
“Probably?” He laughs out loud this time, leaning onto his forearms, pressing them into the top of the desk. “I think you know the actual answer to that, and why didn’t you report it?”
My eyes shift from side to side, but he doesn’t move his eyes from their lock on me.
“Tatum, look at me.” His voice deepens significantly from when he was just talking. He’s so assertive that I can’t help but bite onto my lip, nearly drawing blood, but I still follow his command, looking up and seeing the look in his eyes. He doesn’t need for me to tell him why I didn’t turn it in, he already knows. He just needs to hear me confirm it. “Come here.” He motions at me with his index and middle fingers. His husky tone makes it difficult to push myself up from where I’m sitting. But just like it’s always done, my brain follows his commands, even if my Bambi-legs shake as they push their way up and around the desk. He pushes his chair back slightly, reaching over for me and guides me to in front of him. His legs caging me into this spot. I lean backwards against the wood to stabilize myself so I won’t just collapse in front of him. “Tatum?” His hands fall from my hands down to the tops of my thighs, his hand then skimming its way in the opposite way I really want them to be.
I appear to take too long to answer him though before he pushes himself up, towering over me just as he always has, and looking down at me.
“Tell me.” His voice lowers somehow more, somehow vibrating right through me to my core.
“Because it’s you.” My eyes trail up his chest until I land back on his face.
A small voice in my head tells me he didn’t want to put distance between us last time. Maybe I just desperately want to believe that.
It almost takes me by surprise when he leans into me, pressing his lips to mine, using my hip to hold me close to him.
Out of instinct, my hands fall down to the waistband of his jeans, tugging on them and popping the button open. I’m surprised as he pulls back away from me, breaking our kiss and smirking down at me.
He chuckles out as he leans into me again, his lips lingering just above mine and I can feel his breath as he starts to whispers. “If I knew you could be this needy, I would have left things around crime scenes way more often.”
“That’s how you get caught.”
“Worth it.” He whispers just before his lips connect with mine again, his hands skimming down the side of my body until I can feel them squeezing on my ass as he slides me backwards on the desk. His hand coming up to the top of my own jeans and flicking the button open, slipping his hand inside.
His words ring in my head longer than I care to admit to. Him telling me that getting arrested again, going to prison… again, would all be worth it for this quick moment.
Or maybe he simply means that I’m worth it.
