No Perfect Hero(51)

I want to lash back at him, fight him, tell him to shove his accusations you-know-where, but I can’t find the words.

Because this actually hurts.

God damn it.

It hurts so bad because I'm past even lying.

I think I have a rebound crush on this asshole.

When I don’t answer, he glares at me. “What the fuck are you trying to do to me? Are you happy now? Will you just go away?”

I don’t know how to answer that. I don’t know what I’m doing, when now that the dizzying, simmering desire between us just exploded on the launch pad, I can’t ignore the tension clouding the air as thick as mist.

I can’t lie to myself about what I’m feeling every time he pisses me off.

That magnetic energy builds violently between us, drawing me in like gravity. If I’m not careful, I could let this man swallow me up in his intensity. All thanks to my desperation to feel something besides frustration, hopelessness, the shadows of the past.

And I don’t have words for that, or for what that seething, sparking blue glare of his does to me right now.

Parting my lips, I try to say something, but Warren only sighs, and I fall silent again.

He looks away, glaring across the room – at my painting, I realize.

He’s glaring at the painting I gave him on an impulsive whim, but some of the fury seems to bleed out of him to leave his shoulders sagging, his hands hanging helplessly at his sides.

“I’m sorry,” he grinds out, deep and gravelly and scorched at the edges. “I shouldn’t have said that. Any of it. Fuck. It’s not you I’m mad at, Hay. It’s Flynn for hiding shit. It’s my grandmother. It’s Dennis Bress. It’s this whole clusterfuck situation, and you shouldn’t be stuck in the middle of it, dealing with me being Captain Asshole.”

That actually gets me to smile a little, though it’s not easing this crack in my chest. “You could try not being an asshole,” I venture. “Then you wouldn’t have to apologize. Funny how that works.”

“You might as well ask me to change my genetics.” But his lips crease slightly, a rueful grin before it fades. “I’m just trying to keep people safe. You. Grandma. She’s getting mixed up in business with people who could hurt her, and Flynn knew and didn’t tell me.”

“What business, Warren?” I ask, knowing I’ll probably get some evasive half answer or he’ll just completely shut down.

It’s not his job that makes Warren like this, I realize. He’s evasive because it's who he is.

So stubbornly determined to handle everything himself.

And I wonder if there’s someone he relied on once, who betrayed him.

Or someone else relied who on him? Maybe he feels like he let them down and has been carrying that around for so long it’s molded the shape of his burden into armor.

But before he can cut me off, shut me down, there’s a knock at the door. We both tense, glancing up sharply, but it’s just Tara on the other side of the door, peeking in drowsily.

“Auntie Hay?” she calls softly. “I’m hungry.”

“Just a minute, baby. I'll be there,” I say, forcing a smile for her sake. “I’ll make eggs.”

“I have a better idea,” Warren says. “Let me take you both into town for breakfast. You must be tired from your shifts. You shouldn’t have to cook when you’re exhausted.”

It takes me back a little that he’s noticed. I don’t want to get hung up on little details.

I’m not the type to jump into reckless flings on the rebound after a major breakup.

If I’m honest, I’m scared.

I’m scared if I give in to the strange feelings I get around him, I might start feeling something that seems real.

Way too real, when I’m still licking my wounds from Eddy, only for it to all go south when my temper and Warren’s temper turn what could be an easy comfort thing into bitter fights until I snap out of it and walk away from him once his purpose is served. I don’t even like thinking that, like it’s okay to just use him to ease my own hurt and distract myself, so I just won’t let myself do it.

But he’s making a peace offering, waiting for my answer. And I am hungry.

“Sure,” I say, with lips that still throb with the taste of him, the heat of him. “Let me put some clothes on.”





*



I think it’s for Tara’s sake that we’re pretending everything is normal.

As normal as it can be when I don’t know what normal even is for us. That hot, grasping kiss sure didn't help define it, either.

It's just another reminder that Warren and I don’t know each other. Not really. And maybe we shouldn't.

We’re barely what you'd call friends. Still we’re trying to be friendly over breakfast at a sunny little fifties-style diner twenty minutes later. It looks like the last nice, wholesome place people stop before they drive on to get murdered in a bad thriller novel.

Or maybe the fact that I think it does just says more about my state of mind.

We're so freaking strained, but managing. There’s even a few smiles, this gentle teasing mostly centered around Tara being picky over the kinds of napkins she’ll use. Funny, because I know her mom taught her something weird about textured paper and chapped lips.