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“Not happening,” Mack replied.
Her eyebrows rose. Just like that? He thought he could control her with two words? “We’ll see.”
“Yeah, and what we’ll see is that you’re not going. You can’t always get your way, baby.”
She’d leveled him with a cat-that-ate-the-cream grin. “Oh, I’ll get my way. I always do.”
Mack held her gaze a heartbeat, his eyes stone cold, and then he quietly ordered, “In my office, now.”
She watched his back as he stalked across the room. Throwing the door open, he turned back to her, his arms folding across his chest as he watched her slide off the barstool and walk across the room. Biting her lip, she walked through the door. He slammed it, his hand resting on the door. His eyes leveled her. “Are you fucking kidding me with this shit?”
She just stared back at him. She’d obviously pushed his buttons, but she was beyond caring. He’d pushed hers, too. Her chin lifted.
“Goddamn it, woman. You can’t pull that shit. Not in front of them. I can’t have you acting that way in front of the boys. You hear me?”
“Maybe my being around is becoming a problem for you,” Natalie whispered.
“What the hell are you talking about?” He prowled further into the room.
She’d tried not to challenge him, tried not to disagree with him or argue with him in front of the club, but she was a green-eyed, redhead after all and with that came a quick Irish temper. Normally she was even tempered, level-headed, but he could try the patience of a saint.
He didn’t own her. He just thought he did. And she’d let him. She was as much to blame for this predicament as he was. Cole had said something to her a while ago, and it had been eating at her ever since. He’d told her the simple truth. Mack hadn’t taken this relationship any further, because she hadn’t demanded it of him. And he was right. She wondered if Cole also saw so easily the reason why she hadn’t. It was because she was afraid what that next step would mean.
Terrified, really.
But she couldn’t go on like this, stuck in some kind of limbo. Not really his, not afforded the respect of an ol’ lady, but not some cheap hanger-on either. What did he want from her? Was he in so deep that he’d stop her from walking away? Or would he let her go, let her walk out the door like she was nothing more than the flavor of the month? They’d been together much longer than that, but had they really ‘been together’? Did he see it that way? Did he see her as his? The men seemed to think she got away with way too much shit, tossing attitude that wouldn’t be tolerated by any other woman.
“I’m not under your control. Not like they expect,” she elaborated with a nod of her head toward the men outside the door. “It’s all about perception, isn’t it? Can’t have them thinking I’m yanking your chain, can you?”
His eyes narrowed. “Is that what you want, Natalie? A man so weak he could be led by his dick? You’re in the wrong place, baby. And you’re sure as hell with the wrong man, if that’s the case.”
“No, it’s not what I want. It’s not what I think. Maybe you won’t admit it, but I think that’s what you think. And more importantly, it’s what you worry they think, isn’t it?”
When he didn’t respond, perhaps so stunned by her words that he couldn’t respond, she gave up. Spinning toward the door, she got three steps, before he was across the room, yanking her back by the arm. He whipped her around and pushed her hard up against the door.
Her eyes flew open. He’d never manhandled her before.
His arms caged her in. “Maybe I do. Maybe that’s my worry. And maybe something else is my fault, too.”
“I didn’t say it was your fault, I-”
He cut her off roughly. “Quiet! It’s my turn to talk. And you’re going to listen.”
Stunned, she stared up at him, her mouth snapping closed.
His eyes dropped to her mouth and then back up to her eyes. “I’ve let you get away with far more than I’ve ever let any broad get away with, with me. And, yeah,” he nodded toward the door. “They see it. They watch us together. I think at first you didn’t even realize. Now you’re starting to see, to understand you’re different.”
“Maybe I don’t want you to treat me different.”
“You are different.”
She huffed out a frustrated breath. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe I’m so different, you don’t know how to deal with me. I just know I don’t want to be in this limbo anymore.”
“Limbo?”
She couldn’t say the words. “Just let me go.” She pushed against him, pushing away from the door. He pushed her right back, his hand over her breastbone. She looked down at it.
“Look at me.”
