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My jaw tightens even harder as I curse inwardly. “Nothing,” I mutter, shaking my head, then gesturing towards the stacks of cookie-cartons. “You’ve got hungry customers waiting for those cookies. Start driving. We can talk on the way to your deliveries.”
Pulling the pink sweatshirt hood down over my face, I glance at the closed hatch that leads to the truck-cab. It’s risky to sit up front with her, but it sounds like the Warden doesn’t suspect Connie is involved, so unless we get pulled over for a traffic violation, I should be all right slumped low in the seat with my hood pulled up.
Connie’s breath catches behind me as I pull open the hatch and clamber into the truck cab, buckling myself into the passenger seat, then glancing back over my shoulder, eyebrow raised questioningly.
“Coming,” she says with a sigh. After securing some of the boxes that got dislodged during that surreally sexy moment, Connie squeezes her beautiful body through the hatch, slidesinto the driver’s seat, buckles her belt, then looks over at me. “Keep your head down. Don’t make eye contact with the drivers of any passing cars.”
I chuckle as Connie starts the engine, puts the truck in gear, then slowly pulls out of the gas station and heads back to the Massachusetts Turnpike. “I’ve been a criminal since I was eleven, Connie. I know how to stay under the radar.”
“Clearly not, since you got caught,” she points out as we get on the Turnpike, the little cookie-truck picking up speed as I pick up a hint of playful teasing in her voice. “Besides, I know a thing or two about staying under the radar myself.”
Glancing over at her, my left eyebrow rises. “Has there ever been a need for you to stay under the radar?”
Connie shifts in her seat, her grip on the steering wheel tightening briefly. “It’s nothing. It’s fine now.”
“What’s fine now?” My gaze narrows.
Connie shifts on her seat again, then sighs and tries to shrug nonchalantly but can’t pull it off because she’s clearly tense. “Nothing, Xavier. Just some guy I dated a few years ago.”
My head almost explodes as the jealous rage rises like a serpent bursting out of its hiding place, fangs poised and ready to strike. “He hurt you? Who is he, Connie? What’s his name. Tell me his fucking name, Connie!”
The last sentence comes out in a snarl, and Connie whips her head towards me, her eyes wide with surprise at my violently possessive response.
“Patrick,” she says hurriedly, blinking twice and swallowing hard. “His name is Patrick. We met at some event at my mother’s church about five years ago. He was a few years older . . . around your age, I guess.” She shrugs nervously, shifts her butt uneasily. “We went on a couple of dates. It didn’t work out. He . . . he didn’t like that I turned him down. It got a bit scary for a while.”
My entire body tenses like a wire about to snap, my eyes narrowed to a violent focus. “Scary in what way? Did he hurt you? Did he touch you? Answer me, baby. Did he fuckingtouchyou?!”
Again Connie stares at me in wide-eyed shock at the unrestrained jealousy that’s burning too hot to hide. She blinks rapidly, then turns her gaze back to the road.
But not before I see a strange thrill streak across her face, like something in her is excited by the green-eyed beast of violent possessiveness that’s growling in me, pawing at the ground, hungry for the blood of any man who dares touch what it owns.
“Um, no, he didn’t touch me, Xavier,” she says softly, her voice trembling a little as she shoots a cautiously shy glance up at me, her cheeks blushing bright red. “Well, not really, not in that way, at least. I . . . I wouldn’t let him. That was the problem, in fact.” She sighs. “On our second date we kissed. And then he wanted more, but I—”
“Hekissedyou!” My vision splinters to shards of blood-red rage. “Oh, he’s a fucking dead man.”
A shocked giggle bursts out of Connie. “Well, I let him kiss me, so that was all right, I guess. I just didn’t want to go any further, and when he grabbed my breasts and tried to push his hand up my skirt and down my panties in the movie theater, I told him to stop and he got mad. But—”
“You said he didn’t touch you, Connie!” I bark out the words like a deranged dog, my chest expanding so fast that the seatbelt stretches and locks. “What’s his full name? Where does he live? Drive there now, baby.”
“Ohmygod, you are so ridiculous! I don’t know where he lives, Xavier. It was five years ago, and we barely even dated. I never went to his place, have no idea where he lives.” Connie shoots another wide-eyed glance at me, her face scrunching intoa curiously amused frown, like she’s trying to figure out if I’m joking or if this murderous rage is for real.
Hurriedly I crack a sideways grin and force myself to wink. It takes some serious effort to twist my face into any semblance of a smile, but I can’t let this sweetheart see the manically possessive beast that’s rapidly taking over my sanity, resetting all my priorities. Fuck, I shouldn’t have allowed her to touch my cock, shouldn’t have placed my big possessive paw on her sweet ass. Maybe being locked away without a woman for years made me snap, made me fixate on the first female I saw after breaking out, sort of like a newborn chicken fixates on the first moving object it sees and calls it Mama. Either way, what I’m feeling for this sweetheart is dangerous—not just for me but for her as well.
Because what happens after a few days or weeks when the cops back off and I’ve taken care of my unfinished business with Kieran and it’s time for me to grab my hidden stash of money and head south, far away from my last known location in the Boston area? After all, even though the local cops will put my case on the back-burner after a few weeks, the U.S. Marshals will never stop actively hunting me. It’s what they do, and they’re fucking good at it. I’ll be running the rest of my life, and there’s no way a sweetheart like Connie can run with me.
Who are you kidding, I tell myself ferociously. There’s no way she will everwantto run with you in the first fucking place. Just because your dick has taken control of your senses doesn’t mean it’s taken over Connie’s senses. She’s too smart and sensible to stay under this spell for too long. Yeah, she’s temporarily attracted to your darkness and the sense of danger, but that’ll wear off real fucking fast once the excitement of today subsides and she realizes that we’re too different to ever be together, that she’d be miserable living as a fugitive’s woman, always on the run. Besides, she’s got roots here in Boston. A business with a real-life store. She can’t just pick up and leave. She’d bemiserable not being able to follow her passion and bake those divine sweets.
So what’s your plan, you idiot, taunts my brain which is starting to fight back with reason and common sense. You’re going to settle down with Connie and run a cookie-store ten miles from the prison you just broke out of? Are you really that stupid?
Connie’s voice breaks me out of my downward spiraling trance. “Anyway,” she’s saying as I regain my senses and realize that my grin-and-wink routine seems to have convinced her that the possessive kill-him-now thing was an act. “So Patrick backed off at the movie theater, apologized and drove me home. I wasn’t going to see him again, but he kept calling, and finally my mother convinced me to give him another chance. She told me that if Patrick still wanted to date me after knowing that I wasn’t a whore who’d spread her legs for him, he was in the bag, that he’d propose to me quickly so he could get me into bed.” Now that strange plasticky smile comes back to her sweet face. “Mama said Patrick knew he wasn’t going to get the milk for free, and so he’d buy the cow. With a ring.”
I stare in silence, suddenly understanding why this sexy sweetheart is still a virgin. Her Mama did a number on her. Sleeping with a man before marriage means you’re a whore? And what the hell is that crap about cows and milk?
It takes all my willpower to keep my lips clamped shut. No parent is perfect—what little I remember of mine proves that a hundred times over.
“So you went on another date with this asshole,” I finally say in a tortured whisper as Connie takes an exit and drives towards a massive Bloom Foods grocery store connected to a strip mall off the Turnpike. “Because your Mama thought he was going to . . . what . . . propose to you on the third fucking date?” A snort escapes my sneering mouth, and I grind my teeth and try to stiflethe possessive rage that’s still burning hot. “I assume this piece-of-shit tried to get you into bed again on the third date?”
Connie says nothing as she maneuvers the cookie-truck through the parking lot and around the back to the loading docks. All the berths are filled, but there’s a semi-truck just finishing up, so Connie keeps her engine running as we wait for the spot to open.
