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“Oh my god,” I uttered. “There are cameras in here.” My head went to the corner of the ceiling where a camera was pointed right at the cash register. Where I’d just been fucked.
“Oh my god,” I rubbed my temples. “We made a sex tape. And not in a good way. Like, a sex positive way. Plus, Julian is cool and very open minded, but I don’t think he’d approve of me having sex where we serve food and coffee.”
“Violet,” Elden’s voice was even, void of any concern. “You think I’d fuck you in a place that was recording the act, riskin’ anyone else seeing you coming for me?”
I regarded his face. Whenever I looked in his eyes, I felt a palpable and overarching sense of calm. Like I didn’t have to worry anymore. Like outside problems didn’t exist in his presence.
“No,” I chewed on the inside of my cheek. “No, I don’t think you’d do that. But I also don’t think you have power over all electrical devices.”
“I don’t yet have that power, no.” His mouth ticked upward ever so slightly. He was losing control more, yes, but I was also getting more of those half smiles that only I got. “But I do have contact with a brother in Amber who happens to be able to hack into security camera systems as easily as someone can update a Facebook status.”
“You’re so old,” I grinned back at him. “No one uses Facebook anymore.”
Elden’s jaw flexed at my mention of the years between us, but the twinkle didn’t completely leave his eyes.
The moment remained … light, if that was possible after being fucked so hard.
But things couldn’t and wouldn’t stay light for us. That wasn’t our story. Not since the start.
“I don’t want to say goodbye to you,” I whispered. I was breaking whatever unwritten rules we’d created when we started this thing.
There was no mention of how dangerous the thing we were doing was, and there was definitely no mention of the future outside of that moment.
But there was no escape now. I was leaving tomorrow.
Elden was staying here.
There would be no repeat of this. The next time I came home, there would’ve been time, distance, Elden would’ve had time to think about his decisions. He’d try to protect me. And he’d do that by hurting me. I could see it already.
Elden’s features hardened, and all light left his eyes. He was no longer the man who’d fucked me like he’d never touch me again, whose lips had twitched in a half smile, who gave me parts of himself that no one else knew existed. No, this was the surly, badass biker with rigidly enforced control over his emotions.
“This need you have for me, it’s a reaction to all of your trauma.”
I glared at him, my stomach dropping at how abruptly things had changed. “So you think this is purely because I have daddy issues?” I asked with a bite. “You’re going to reduce it down tothat?”
I shook my head, pushing at his chest, communicating my need for him to get the fuck away from me.
He ground his teeth, obviously pissed that I was getting physical with him even though he was not afraid to do the same to me.
Luckily—for him—he moved enough for me to turn my back on him and go back to the cash register, restarting my count. I needed something to do with my hands. Needed something to chase my angry tears from my eyes.
“Okay, yeah, I’ve been attracted to older, powerful men my entire life, long before I found out what a piece of shit my father was,” I shuffled the cash, most likely fucking it all up because my brain was cloudy from the anger and the orgasms.
“Probably because on some level, Iknewhe was a piece of shit,” I admitted, thinking of all the little things my father had done, things I’d cataloged and ignored because I was unwilling to face the truth.
The subtle but demeaning way he spoke to my mother. How rude he was to waitresses. The cold glint in his eye when I called him out for it. All of the affection that was only present when other people could be watching.
I abandoned the cash counting, really hoping that it was right. I put it all back in and slammed the register shut, whirling so I could face Elden.
His arms were crossed over his expressive chest, regarding me with intensity. Although he wasalwaysregarding me with intensity.
I ignored this. “When I first met you, whatever damage done to me impacted my reaction and attraction to you,” I confessed, giving him an intense stare of my own. “Just like whatever trauma you’ve had attracted you to me.”
I put my hand on my hip and tilted my head. “Honey, if you’re gonna start slinging mud, you better be prepared to get dirty. Both of us are fucked-up in different ways. Which is the reason we sought each other out. It’s something in our chemical makeup that explains our initial reactions.”
I narrowed my eyes, wishing I could get through to him with my stare. Wishing I could shake some sense into him. “But not now, not aftertwo fucking yearsare you going to tell me I’m just a little, damaged girl with issues and no real control over her emotions.” I shook my head rapidly. “No. I love you because you wear reading glasses and because you like everyone to think you’re scary and damaged when you rescue fucking puppies. You call me when it rains. You quit smoking the second I let it be known it bothered me.”
Inexplicably, tears stung the back of my eyes.
