AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“What the heck is going on, Wade?”
“Sorry. Didn’t mean to scare you.”
I give him my best death stare. It’s not easy to maintain a stony face when a sweaty, dirty, hard-working hulk with a face like that looks back at me. I’m more interested in climbing him like a tree and tasting that salty neck.
“You didn’t scare me. I’m asking why are most of my wardrobe and personal items here? I thought you were only keeping me here for a day or two.”
A heated stare fills the silence that follows my interrogation.
How dare Wade take up all that space in the doorframe? How dare he lean against it and look at me like that. Not that I don’t enjoy looking at him — anyone with a pulse could appreciate this sweaty, tatted-up hulk with the glowering eyes — but there’s no way I can stay here as long as he thinks I can. Not unless he wants me to fall in love with him. Or murder him.
He clearly sees me as someone to protect, like a little sister. Murder it is. What a pity.
“You can’t go back to that death trap of a house,” he says. “I’ll send a crew to get the rest of your stuff.”
I can’t believe what I’m hearing. “Why can’t I go back to my house? Does it have bedbugs or something?”
Wade stands up straight and reaches his arms skyward to grip the top edge of the doorframe. I don’t know if he realizes I can see every glistening muscle flexing on the inside of his upper arms when he does that. The tattoos ringing his biceps and triceps undulate under the bunching of muscles and tendons. Why does he have to walk around in a dirty, too-small tee-shirt? Whatever happened to a nice baggy hoodie?
“Not bedbugs,” Wade says. “It’s not up to code. It’s not safe. That house should be condemned, actually.”
I roll my eyes. “I thought you Wood brothers were in the business of saving old houses.”
He’s suddenly astounded as if I’ve just said something amazing. One hand lets go of the doorframe as his eyes brighten, and I try not to swoon. “You know what? You’re right. We should buy that building and fix it up next.” Wade stares off into space and lists off the next steps. “I’ll have to talk to Harley, who should be on board. We don’t have to bother Buck with this while he’s on family leave. He might be pissed for a day or two that we didn’t consult him, but he’ll come around. As long as the inspection report isn’t too terrible…”
“This is all great, but where am I supposed to live?”
He lifts one shoulder and points behind me. “In that bed. Which is where you should be right now.”
“I need some water,” I tell him.
“I’ll get it for you.”
I hobble toward the door and try to push past him, but I’m no match for this brick shithouse of a man. “Not necessary.”
“Yes, it is,” he says, towering over me in the doorway. He smells like the outdoors and sawdust, and I would very much like to lick him clean from head to toe if he weren’t such a pain in my ass. “You need to keep that foot elevated, baby girl.”
I shove at his chest, but Wade’s face turns more resolute. His jaw tics like he’s angry or…something else. Horny maybe?
However, I know it’s not horny because of what he said earlier.
“I’m not your baby sister,” I say, trying to shove at his midsection since pressing on his chest doesn’t seem to budge him. His tee-shirt is damp with sweat, and he looks tired.
Wade barks out a laugh. “What? Who said you were my sister?”
“You said Iremindyou of your sister. You’ve been calling me baby girl and sweetheart instead of using my name. Clearly, I’m a child to you, but I assure you I am not.”
If watching him lollygag in the doorframe makes me feel heated, then pressing my hands against his abs turns my insides into a furnace. His torso is immovable. Up close, the man is big all over.
Wade angles his face toward me. “Is that what you think? That I look at you and see a little girl? Or that I think of you like a sister?”
I curse my bottom lip as it trembles of its own accord. “Don’t you?”
He looks so angry I should back away. So, I’m wrong. He doesn’t look at me like a sister or a child. He doesn’t regard me as anything but an obligation, I suppose.
I get things wrong so often that I should keep a list to stop repeating the same mistakes. No one ever taught me how to see the toxic signs in people. I wasraisedby toxic people. Ha. “Raised” is a bit of a stretch.
The more I interact with people, the more I realize I know nothing about them. I’ll never understand another human’s motives.
