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One of his hands found its way into her shirt. He mauled her breasts through her bra, the feel of them against his palms and the bump of her hard nipples between his fingers inciting his cruelty. Rough handling didn’t seem to bother her. She whimpered, her kisses punctuated with small sounds of desperation.
“What’s wrong? Should I stop?” His voice was rough, but he wasn’t feeling very civilized.
“Oh god, no. Please don’t stop.”
The words sent an electric surge through him, and he felt like Frankenstein’s monster waking from death—alive, out of control, in danger of going on a rampage. He wanted this woman in every vulgar, uncivilized way he could think of. He wanted to show her body, and her, who the alpha was in this equation. It sure as fuck wasn’t her. At that moment, it might not even have been him. His body was trying to take over his good sense.
Shit. He was supposed to be getting rid of her, not making out with her.
Unable to resist, he kissed her one more time, long and gentle, which wasn’t what either of them wanted.
When he pulled away, he forced himself to give her a cold look. “Stop following me.”
She stumbled a few steps away and stared at him in confusion.
“But what—why?” She blinked at him.
“Because this isn’t a game, little girl. If you keep following me around, you’re going to get hurt. I don’t want that on my conscience.” He got into the car and put it in drive, but kept his foot on the brake.
Brow furrowed, she stood there, looking lost.
He drove away before he put the car back in park and did something he wouldn’t regret in the slightest.
Chapter 3
Addison poked at her roast beef with her fork. Sunday dinner at her parents’ house meant one of the three meal options: meat loaf with frozen French fries, overcooked roast beef and potatoes, or chicken casserole. Predictable made her father happy.
“How’s school?” her dad asked.
She took a break from playing with the last potato on her plate and looked at her dad. Years in middle-management hadn’t done Roger Kennedy any favors in regards to his health. His big gut and pale skin spoke of hours spent in an office of, coincidentally, an office supply store. His thick glasses and growing bald spot made him look older than he was. She wished he’d take up hiking or something to keep himself active. Even bowling would be better than TV marathons. But, the man had a heart of gold.
“Good,” she answered.
“Only a year or so until graduation.” He grinned at her. “Have you thought about where you want to do an internship yet?”
The reminder that her future loomed made the overly familiar roast beef less palatable. “It’s on my to-do list.”
Truthfully, she’d been avoiding the internship thing. She was hoping if she ignored the fact that graduate school was more than almost over and she had unpleasant decisions ahead of her, maybe it wouldn’t happen. Maybe the universe would hit the pause button and things could stay as they were for a little while longer.
Giving her classes a half-hearted effort hadn’t affected her test scores enough to lose her STEM scholarship. She felt a little guilty wasting it, but it was only March. Graduation was still over a year away, but that still didn’t leave much time until the end of life as she knew it. She’d already postponed it by entering the master’s of electrical engineering program and dropping to part-time. But she couldn’t hide from life by staying in school forever.
The lure of a regular paycheck—more than the minimum wage she made at the electronics store—tempted her to suck it up and face the real world. With more money coming in, she could pursue other . . . hobbies that gave her the charge she needed to avoid feeling dead inside.
The topic of careers made her stomach churn.
A buzzer went off in the kitchen and she was glad for the distraction.
“That’s the pie,” her mom said, placing her napkin on the table. “Oh! Before I forget, Addison, there’s an Extreme Scrapbooking class on Saturday at the community center.”
Her fork paused its poking. “Extreme Scrapbooking?”
Her mom bustled into the attached kitchen. “Twenty pages in six hours!”
Normally, Addison would be up for anything with the word “extreme” in it, but scrapbooking didn’t exactly evoke much of a sense of danger. What was so extreme about scrapbooking? Paper cuts?
“Do you want to go, sweetie?” she said, bent over the open oven.
I’d rather stick this fork in my eye, Mom. She felt bad for thinking it as soon as the thought crossed her mind.
