HARD KNOX(9)

A smart woman would have ran, but I had to see who the hell tried to attack me.

I turned, fist ready to swing, and froze when I saw him.

Him.

The Him.

“Knox?” I asked.

He stood with a cocky grin on his face. He touched the right side of his ribs. “Damn, darlin’, you got me good.”

“What the hell are you doing here?”

I was outside a fancy restaurant. Porter had to stop in and talk to his cousin. I was told to keep my ass outside and wait. His words, not mine.

“Thought I saw you,” he said. “So I thought I’d stop and check on you.”

“We haven’t talked in a long time.”

“I know, darlin’. I know. I’ve been busy.”

He nodded to his leather cut.

Why did he have to look even hotter wearing that thing?

He pointed to a patch that said enforcer. “That’s new.”

“What’s it mean?”

“Nothing you need to worry about,” Knox said.

He was as cool and smooth as ever.

When he smiled, my panties were soaked. I wasn’t ashamed to admit it. Knox was my first, okay? He wasn’t necessarily the first to touch me but the first to have me. There’s a big difference between the two. No matter what, he had a piece of me and a piece of my life.

“You look nervous, darlin’,” Knox said to me.

“Are you serious right now?” I asked. “You know…”

He reached forward and grabbed my arm. “Hey. I heard about your mother. Goddammit, I’m sorry. Cancer?”

I nodded. I felt the same gut punch as when she told me about it the first time. “Yeah. Crazy. We, uh, I don’t know. We at least talk now.”

“Shit. I didn’t know it was that bad between you two.”

“It’s always been bad, Knox. Even when she was with my father, it was bad. I was just strung along, you know? That was my life then. When she split up your parents? That was it for me.”

Now Knox grabbed my other arm. He was holding me. Fuck, it was so good. So comforting. I wanted him to pull me close. Kiss me.

“Listen to me, Ana. Your mother did not split up my parents. My old man always had problems. So did my mother. She worked herself ragged for nothing. He always looked for the next big thing to go for. They never once saw eye to eye. It doesn’t make what happened right. Yeah, they were f*cking each other. He was married. Maybe your Ma is a whore, but I doubt it. She was looking for something and found it in my old man. Just a temporary fix to a bigger problem. Don’t you ever think that she split them up though. Or that it did anything to me.”

I swallowed hard. I felt like I could cry. “But you were gone, Knox. I saw them right before they got caught. Then everything happened. I had to live next door to your mother. I had to see her.”

“I’m so sorry, darlin’. I really am.”

“Now my mother gets hers, right?”

“No. Cancer isn’t the same as sex with your neighbor.” Knox smiled. He always made me smile. “Okay?”

“Okay.”

“How bad is it?”

“They said it’s early enough she should be okay,” I told him.

Thinking about all that now, I was so far wrong. So were the doctors. Everyone was wrong. At that exact moment with Knox, my mother’s life was counting down. Hundreds of days were left for her to live. And toward the end, those days weren’t even living. They were simply waiting to die.

“She’ll be fine,” Knox said. “She’s tough. Like you. Right? You doing okay?”

I forced a nod. “I’m okay.”

“All this shit… it works for you?”

I shrugged my shoulders. “I don’t know what you want me to say, Knox. I know what I want.”

My bottom lip started to quiver.

A second later, his lips touched mine. The softest, most perfect touch ever. We froze for a few seconds and then he started to pull away. I hurried and touched his face. The scruff of facial hair and the steel like line of his jaw. My body ached for him. The craziest desire stirred up like a hurricane in my core. He made my inner thighs tremble and my breasts shiver so that my nipples were rigid.

He kissed me again, this time like the outlaw he was. His tongue commanded me back, pinning me against the very restaurant my boyfriend was inside. His hands grabbed my hips and slammed my ass against the wall. As his hands moved down and between my legs, he forced my legs open and bent his legs, thrusting forward, lifting, making me feel his thick cock through his jeans. He pressed so hard that my panties rubbed my clit, making me sigh.

Knox’s left hand then touched my face while his right hand eased up my body, cupping my breast over my shirt.

We stood there, me slightly arched, offering the lower half of my body to him as he towered over me, kissing like fools. We were making out like the world was coming to an end. Hell, the world for us had already ended. So much stuff put time and space between us, all we had were these little flirty moments of wildness.

As his hand moved back down my body, his fingertips touched the top of my jeans. He drew a line right to the middle of my belly and then slipped down. I think it was his middle finger (not like it f*cking mattered) that touched me first. Curling, pulling, exposing my dampness for his liking. His mouth opened over mine and we stood there, breathing into each other’s mouth.