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"Are you okay to drive home?" he asked.
Her face was still flushed, and her lips were begging to be kissed as she asked, "What?"
Knox put his hands in his pockets because he didn’t trust himself not to reach out and touch her, and if he did that, he knew it would be game over. The thin thread of restraint he was holding onto would snap. "You had two drinks; are you okay to drive home?"
"They were Arnold Palmers."
"Okay, goodnight, Laura."
For a moment, he thought she was going to say more. Maybe call him on what he’d just pulled. But instead, she just stared up at him with bewilderment and repeated, "Goodnight."
He walked past her and up the steps to the apartment. When he got inside and closed the door, he automatically turned and looked out the peephole. He saw Laura staring up at the steps with a confused expression on her face before she shook her head in what looked like frustration, got in her car, and drove away.
Confused and frustrated, that was how he’d left things with Laura. Knox had always taken pride in leaving women happy and satisfied, but this, whatever it was with her, had him out of his depths. He wasn’t himself, and until he figured out how to find his footing, he was afraid that being confused and frustrated was the best he could do.
11
Knox scrolledthrough properties on Zillow as he sat at the small kitchen table in his rental. Everyone had been asking what his plan was now that he was out of the Navy. He’d been smart with his money and invested well during his time in the service. His grandad always told him that true wealth was in owning land. So, for the last ten years or so, that is what he’d invested in. His plan was to continue buying properties and renting them as passive income streams.
When he was in Florida visiting his mom, he’d acquired a duplex and hired a property manager. That was the key to his investments being so spread out in different states—having reliable people running the day-to-day.
Whisper Lake was a tourist town, which meant that his property would most likely be used for short-term rentals for people on vacation. Long-term rentals were easier to handle remotely by using a property manager. More turnover meant more work. It wasn’t impossible to find someone to handle it; it was just more of a headache.
He wouldn’t even consider having a short-term rental if he didn’t have family he trusted in town that could be called on if there was an issue. He grinned, thinking of how happy it would make Ford that he was considering making his brother available if something needed taking care of. He would not appreciate it at all, which almost made Knox want to do it more.
Closing his computer, he reached his arms above his head to stretch and attempt to not think about Laura Lopez, which, of course, failed miserably. It had been five days since he’d crashed Laura’s date, and in those five days, he’d only caught brief glimpses of her.
He’d done his best to keep his distance. He didn’t trust himself around her.
When he’d been at Lantern's, he still couldn’t believe the primal instincts he’d had. It had taken every ounce of self-control not to tell the guy to kick rocks, pick Laura up, toss her over his shoulder, and carry her back to his cave.
Which, besides kidnapping being a felony, was such an out-of-character impulse that Knox had to question his sanity around the woman.
It wasn’t just those feelings that were scaring him. When he’d walked her back from Lantern's, he’d wanted to kiss her so bad that it had actually scared the shit out of him.
Mostly because he wanted to do more than kiss her, and he wasn’t talking about physical things. If it was just that, he’d be in familiar territory. No, this woman made him want to say and promise things he had no business saying or promising.
And that had sent him into hiding.
Knox had always been calculated in his actions. He thought everything through and weighed out every possible outcome before making a decision and especially before acting on it.
But with Laura, he felt wild. Impulsive. Jealous. Possessive. Obsessive.
Those adjectives were wholly foreign to him, not to mention extremely unhealthy. Since meeting Laura a week ago, he’d hardly slept; his mind had been occupied only with her day and night. He was barely eating. That woman had infected him like a bad cold he couldn’t get rid of.
Knox had been trying to keep busy. His days had been spent either with Keaton at his gym or seventh wheeling it with Ford, Chrissy, and her kiddos. He’d been doing his level best to distract himself from the sexy, sultry siren who had invaded his every waking and sleeping thought, but he had not been successful.
He’d done everything he could to focus on something other than Laura, but nothing was working. Not running, not real estate, not his family, not rolling on the mat. Just like the '90s hit from the R&B group Troop, all he did was think of her day and night. That’s all he did. He couldn’t get her off his mind. All the time.
Knox decided, in that moment, to take another approach to try and get over the obsession he’d formed for Laura Lopez. He grabbed his phone and keys and headed downstairs to the shop.
Exposure therapy. For the past week, he’d avoided Laura and done his best not to cross paths with her. That obviously hadn’t worked since he couldn’t go two seconds without thinking of her. So he’d flip the script. He’d hang out with Laura and spend time around her, and surely she’d lose her appeal.
He was infatuated; that was all it was. Once he was around her, he would bet his life savings that, just like every other woman he’d dated, the shine of newness would lose its luster and the hold she had on him would be released.
Not that he’d ever felt about anyone the way he’d felt about Laura. But he had felt attraction before, and like clockwork, it always faded. He was sure that would be the case in this situation.
As he took the steps two at a time, he heard his name being called out.
