Page 3 of The Man I Hate

“There’s a button on your door panel,” he said calmly, pausing at the back of his SUV. “Beneath your window switches.”

Mildly confused, I lifted the silver switch. The trunk shot open. Relieved that the task was complete, I glanced out my car window.

Choking the carjacker with one arm, the well-dressed stranger rummaged in the back of his SUV with the other. A few seconds later he produced several long white plastic straps. Perplexed, I watched as he zip-tied the ankles and wrists of the semi-conscious thug.

No differently than if he were taking an armload of groceries across Target’s parking lot, he dragged the tattooed thug toward the back of my car. I gawked in disbelief as he tossed him into the trunk with a thud! After situating things, he carefully closed the lid. Obviously, subduing bad guys was tritely familiar to the suit-wearing badass.

With some hesitation, I got out of the car. The courteous stranger took a step in my direction and then paused. He brushed the wrinkles from his suit. Once satisfied, he looked up.

His presence was undeniable. He just as well held a neon sign that flashed the words “KEEP YOUR DISTANCE”, yet there was something about him that I found extremely comforting.

He offered an apologetic smile. “Sorry about all of this.”

I glanced beyond him, at the attacker’s gun. I’d witnessed a few drunken barroom brawls in the bars while in college and seen two cowboys get in a fistfight at a rodeo once, but I’d never been directly involved in any kind of violent act. I wiped my clammy hands against the fabric of my dress.

“It’s not your fault,” I replied.

“I live next door.” He reached inside his jacket pocket with his left hand and extended his right. “Braxton Rourke.”

I was bewildered by his calmness. I cupped his hand in mine and shook it. “Thank you…for everything. I’m uhhm…my name is Anna,” I stammered. “Anna Wilson.”

He gave me a thorough once-over. One side of his mouth curled up slightly. “Nice to meet you.”

“Is this a common thing?” I glanced at my car. “Being carjacked?”

“In Sherman Oaks?” He tapped his finger against the screen of his phone. “No.” He raised the phone to his ear and turned away. “Attempted carjacking. Yes. No. He’s been subdued,” he said matter-of-factly. “Yes.” He glanced at the carjacker’s pistol, which was ten feet away on the edge of the concrete. “With a pistol. No. Yes. 15021 Valley Vista. I’ll be standing beside a white Mercedes E-Class. Sure. Braxton Rourke.”

He slipped the phone inside his jacket pocket and faced me. “The police will be here in a few minutes.”

The suit he wore accentuated the shape of his very athletic body. A trim waist, broad chest, and well-toned arms were hidden beneath the fine Italian fabric. His silver hair was disheveled from the scuffle yet managed to look perfect. I wondered how many pictures of him were floating around Instagram with #silverfox attached to them.

Thousands, I decided.

Overcome by everything, I muttered my response. “Okay.”

I was nearly shot to death. A criminal was locked in the trunk of my new car. I was now waiting on the Nation’s most trigger-happy police force to show up, and there was a loaded gun in my driveway ten feet from where I stood.

I was a bundle of frayed nerves.

Braxton Rourke, however, acted as he had just called in a dinner reservation.

My thoughts went to the pistol that was sure to be the focal point of the soon to be arriving police force. Visions of overzealous officers with weapons drawn screaming demands came to mind. Me dying in a hail of gunfire while a ten-year-old with an iPhone recorded the atrocity from his second-story window would be the closing chapter on my life.

I glanced at the gun and then at him. “Are you going to pick that thing up before they get here?” I asked. “It’s making me nervous.”

“I’ll leave it there.” He curled his fingertips toward his palm and studied his fingernails. “Don’t worry,” he said calmly. “Everything will be fine.”

I wished I had his sense of being. While he repaired an errant cuticle, my heart was thrashing against my ribs. I couldn’t decide whether to scream, cry, or ask my sexy neighbor for a mercy fuck.

“Are you always this calm?” I asked.

“Depends on the circumstances,” he replied, not bothering to look up.

“These circumstances,” I squeaked, coughing out a nervous laugh as I spoke. “A Saturday morning carjacking. Disarming a pistol wielding maniac. Choking someone half to death and then locking him in a trunk?”

He shifted his gaze from his fingernails to me. His face, which had remained rather emotionless, now seemed slightly amused.

“I spent nearly fifteen years being shot at by people I often couldn’t see.” He raked his fingers through his silver locks. “Surviving that makes this seem like a cakewalk.”