AllFreeNovel
Share Us
How he took charge. Made her feel safe when her job was sometimes risky. More than once she’d had run-ins with people who refused to leave the country they were committing crimes in.
She didn’t realize her fist loosened until Apollo extracted the keys from it. The security system beeped as he unlocked the vehicle and he held the door open for her.
She glared. “This is it, Apollo. The last time I’m spending aminutein your company. I mean it.”
He gave her a steady look as she slipped into the passenger seat.
After he shut her door and climbed in behind the wheel, she gripped her fingers in her lap, fighting impulses she never thought she’d be faced with again. He was dead, gone from her life. She’d moved through the stages of grief and was just reaching acceptance…and now this.
Her gaze snagged on his thick, muscled thighs in those perfectly worn jeans and she wanted todragher fingertips up them. To crawl up his big body and feel his strong arms lock her against him while their lips fused in a never-ending kiss.
He started her car and backed out of the space. She snapped out of her unwilling daydream.
When he started to pull into traffic, a private smile hit her lips. Joke was on him—he didn’t know where she lived. She moved not long after he vanished, trying to outrun the memories.
A few months after his reported death, all the signs pointed to him being alive. She’d heard the chatter that Apollo had been spotted—on video, in the streets of Paris. But her traumatized brain shied away from all those possibilities. To her, he was dead. End of story. The reports were wrong.
Only he was very much alive, seated next to her, smelling like fresh laundry and looking even more rugged and gorgeous than ever.
Being deep undercover for years had aged him, but like with most men, the small lines at the corner of each eye and bracketing his hard lips only enhanced his appeal.
When he took a right, heading away from her last apartment, her lips parted on a gasp of shock.
Heknew.Of course he did. She got the feeling that she could move halfway around the world and change her name and he’d still manage to find her. Probably show up and pick up the same thread of conversation they’d left on.
She tilted her jaw up. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of bringing up his knowledge. That would only feed his enormous ego. She’d act cool, likeeveryoneknew she lived in a new building, so why shouldn’t he?
He pulled up in front of the building and shocked her further by parking in her assigned spot.
Cutting the engine, he glanced over at her. She held out a hand. “Give me the keys and then you can call for an Uber.”
He closed his long fingers around the bundle of keys. “I’m coming up.”
She started to say, “Please don’t,” but he opened the door and she had no choice but to follow. With as much show of indifference as possible, she strode to the front door and entered the code to get in. As soon as the door shut behind him, he let out a snort.
She whirled. “What was that for?”
“Nothing. Continue on.”
She hated taking orders from anyone, let alone a man she didn’t want in her life. But she couldn’t see a way to get rid of him until he got what he wanted. If that was her, good luck to him. She had a weapon and training enough to put him in his place.
Not that Apollo would ever force himself on her. For all his wildness, he was always a gentleman.
They moved past the mailboxes to a staircase. She took the steps faster than usual, yearning for the sanctuary of her space. If she were to face this man properly, she needed it. This time, she’d make itcrystal clearthat she was through with him, that they didn’t have a chance, and he could ask her for help but that didn’t mean she’d give it.
She pictured him leaving her place, knocked down a peg from when he’d come in. Ha! That would be a victory.
He waited for her to unlock her door. When they stepped inside, the entryway was already illuminated by a table lamp she had set on a timer.
While she set down her handbag, Apollo closed the door and locked it.
Her nerves prickled with awareness that they were very much alone and anything could happen.
A tiny knot of heat stretched in her core, pulling tauter than she cared to admit.
Turning to him, she folded her arms over her chest. “Let’s make this clear. You and I? Aren’t a thing. You have no hold over me, no claim to me.”
He met her gaze, but only for a blink before he brushed past her to inspect her apartment.
