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I only make it five more steps before I trip over something.
Jace’s hand shoots out, grabbing my arm and stopping me from falling on my face. My hair swings over my eyes as I look down. I drag a clumsy hand through the long strands, pushing them away from my vision as I raise my head again while straightening.
A deep sigh sounds from right next to me.
Then Jace scoops me up into his arms instead.
Lightning pulses through me.
While shock still rings inside my skull, I tilt my head back and stare up at Jace while he starts us down the street. But he doesn’t look down to meet my gaze. Instead, he simply keeps carrying me in his arms as he walks back to my apartment.
Heat, both from embarrassment and something else, washes through me at the way my body is pressed against his chest and the way his strong arms are wrapped around me. I study his handsome face in silence for a few minutes. The streets are dark and deserted around us.
“I didn’t mean it, you know,” I say quietly after a while.
“Mean what?” Jace asks, still not looking down at me.
“I don’t think you’re a whore.”
He says nothing for a few seconds. And he still isn’t looking at me. Guilt and regret twist inside my chest like snakes.
“Then why did you say it?” he asks at last.
“Because I was jealous,” I admit in a soft voice. “Because I wish that I was more experienced.”
Finally, he glances down at me. His steady gaze searches my face, as if checking to see if I’m just making this up. I’m not. I do wish that I was more experienced.
I want to do stupid shit and have kinky sex and try crazy things too. But it’s very difficult to do that when there is always a man in a suit watching my every move. I’ve had a few boyfriends, of course. And I’ve had sex with them. But it’s always hard to get in the mood for that when I know my bodyguard is standing right outside the apartment door.
Jace can apparently tell that I was being sincere, because he nods in acknowledgement. Then he returns his gaze to the street ahead.
The warmth from his body wraps around me, seeping into my bones and soothing my soul, as he holds me tightly to his chest while he carries me down the next street.
Countless questions swirl in my mind, but I know that I shouldn’t ask any of them. I shouldn’t make any effort to get to know Jace. Not when I’m trying my best to get rid of him. But there is one question that I can ask. One question that I can convince myself is strategically important for my plan to make him quit.
“Why did you take this job?” I ask.
Jace says nothing. Only turns the corner and starts us down the street that leads to my apartment.
“You’re an assassin,” I push. “You kill people. You don’t protect them. So why did you agree to take this job?”
Only silence answers me. From a few streets over, a car alarm starts beeping. Someone honks their horn from that direction as well. Mist and car exhaust mingle in the night air that fills the city.
Just when I think that Jace is not going to answer, he replies with a single vague sentence.
“I have my reasons.”
10
JACE
“Who pissed in your cereal this morning?” Eli says. And even though I have my arm draped over my face so I can’t see him, I can still hear the smirk in his voice.
I groan, still slumped on the couch with my arm over my face. “Kayla fucking Ashford.”
“Wait, seriously? She actually pissed in your cereal?”
A huff that is half amusement and half exasperation rips from my chest. “No. But I’m sure the only reason she hasn’t done that yet is because she doesn’t actually eat breakfast. She does everything else she can, though, to be a fucking menace who?—”
