Page 51 of One Step After Another

Why did he have to be right?

“Yeah, well—”

He interrupted her mutter with a quiet, “I get it.”

She did look at him, then, angling her body in the chair just enough that she could observe him from the side. He’d lost the leather jacket and hoodie, instead, now wearing his dark-wash jeans and the black shirt he’d been sleeping in since they arrived. At least, whatever soap he’d managed to find to use in the shower upstairs left him with a fresh, crisp scent. One she couldn’t stop trying to inhale.

Another problem.

Perfect.

“I told Freddie we might be here a while longer,” Luca said.

“You don’t need to be here at all. In fact, you would make shit a lot easier for me if you do leave before someone finds—”

Luca sucked air through his teeth, jumping in to say, “Yeah, probably not.”

“Why are you so ...”

His head tipped her way, those shockingly intense green-blue eyes of his watching her like he was trying to dissect her. The shadows from the lack of lighting in the bar only hardened the lines of his handsome face even more. If there was a God, then he spent a little more time creating Luca.

Unfortunately for her.

“I’m not anything,” Luca said, “and maybe that’s the problem. I’m not all that different than how I used to be, Penny, but you ... well, you’re entirely new. I mean, look at you.”

She blinked. “I don’t under—”

“I spent the last five years chasing after a ghost. I was trying to find someone who didn’t exist anymore. Everything you are is not what you were, and that’s fine. It’s certainly for the better, but it took me a second to catch up to speed. Don’t fault me.”

“Is that ... an apology?”

Because she wasn’t sure.

Luca chuckled, the sound a sinful tease to her senses. “What would I be apologizing for, exactly?”

“I don’t know. Finding me?”

“Nah, that was just my job. Anything else?”

Penny didn’t reply.

What could she say?

Luca lifted one shoulder, saying, “There’s your answer.”

Penny rolled her eyes. “Prick.”

Maybe it was the alcohol doing stupid things to her already foolish brain, but when she found Luca looking over at her with the kind of smile that could make women swoon, a soft giggle escaped her mouth. The sound only made his gaze drop down to her lips while his smile dipped into an all too knowing smirk.

“We’ve got a problem,” she told him.

Luca arched a brow. “Do we?”

“I think so. Starting with the fact you’re an issue that’s going to cause me even bigger problems if I don’t get you under control. No matter how many times I tell, and ask, you to leave me alone, you won’t. What happens if someone doesn’t give you a choice in the matter?”

“The tracking you thing?” Luca shook his head. “Again? That’s nothing.”

She didn’t think so. The man couldn’t possibly know it but every second he spent around her put his life in danger. And not just him ... his family and friends. Anyone who might cause issues for The League but especially those that became visible to the people she was hunting. Because if the monsters couldn’t find her, then they would move onto the next best thing. People she cared about; anyone attached to her life that they believed would hurt her to lose.