Better When He's Brave (Welcome to the Point #3)(23)
“Of course I have pants on. It’s not my fault your neighbor is a midget.”
I stepped away from the door and he followed me inside, immediately making the room feel a hundred times smaller.
“Did I say my neighbor? I meant my neighbor’s daughter. My neighbor weighs well over three hundred pounds, but her teenaged daughter is about your size, just shorter. I would’ve asked Dovie or Brysen, but I wanted to make sure we had a secure place to go before the charade starts. Dovie would have told Bax, and I’ve had enough of him being all over my ass where you’re concerned as it is. Brysen would have been game but I already pulled in all the favors I had where Race is concerned and I didn’t want to owe him any more.”
“Well, I’m glad no grown woman was trying to wear hot-pink short-shorts as actual clothing.” I lifted the hem of the hoodie to show him I did indeed have pants on, and noticed the way silver sparked in the center of his irises. “But I am going to need to get my hands on some real clothes in the near future. If the plan is to flaunt this affair in Conner’s face and to get him to come out of hiding, then I need to look like I look normally do.”
“How is that?”
He jerked his gaze away from my legs and lifted them up to look me in the eye. “How’s what?”
“How do you normally look?” He shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans and I had to bite the tip of my tongue as the action pulled the top of his jeans down just enough that a sliver of skin was exposed between them and the edge of his T-shirt. Corrugated abs and that vee that was bound to make woman drool danced in front of my eyes. I had to count to ten to keep myself from reaching out and trying to touch the exposed skin that was dusted with just a hint of dark hair. Of course Titus wouldn’t be all baby smooth and perfectly manicured like so many men were today. He was too much of a man for that. It was just one more way in which Conner had been a sorry substitution for what I really wanted. He had been polished and primped even more than I was.
“I normally look good. I normally look like I want a man to want me. I definitely don’t look like this . . . like I’m not even trying. Conner would never buy that you were suddenly infatuated with me if it doesn’t even look like I’m making an effort. How do you think I caught his attention so fast?”
Titus did that guy thing where his lashes lowered and his eyes started at the top of my head and skimmed all the way down to my toes in a way that I could almost feel. I saw his chest rise and fall and his pulse jump a little at the side of his neck.
“You look just fine the way you are. You look better like this than most women do when they put in the effort. You don’t need to try, and if a guy makes you think you do, then he’s a dipshit. Get whatever you need and let’s get out of here.”
I might have fallen over or stripped off all my clothes and thrown myself at him if I thought there was a chance he would catch me in either scenario. No one had ever said anything that nice to me in my life. Sure, I had heard I was pretty. I had heard I was more than pretty, but they were hollow words when they came from mouths that spewed lies fair easier than the truth. If Titus said it, then he believed it. There was no hidden agenda, no subterfuge, and there was just something so powerful and alluring about that raw honesty and the lack of artifice.
I gathered my composure and the few things I had left strewn around the apartment and followed him out into the hallway. I dropped my gaze to the gun he still wore clipped to his belt. It was a stark reminder that even when he was dressed down and off duty he was still one of the good guys and I was not. We could want each other all day long, but there was no bridge strong enough or long enough to cross that fundamental divide that kept us separated.
He was alert and stiff as we hit the front of the building. Even though I was facing his back, I could almost feel the way his gaze scanned every single shadow and hidden place that stretched out in front of us.
He stopped in front of a massive, sparkly blue-and-white car that looked just as big and badass as he did. The windows were tinted almost black and the tires didn’t look like anything I had ever seen on any other kind of car.
“This doesn’t look like any kind of car a cop should be driving.” I couldn’t keep the disbelief out of my voice as he pulled open the door for me.
“It’s not a cop’s car, it’s this cop’s car. When we were younger Bax and I couldn’t manage to spend five minutes in the same room without wanting to murder one another. Our mom had a guy that she saw on the side that owned the garage Bax is running now. Gus put a wrench in each of our hands and told us to figure our shit out. The only time we didn’t fight was when we were working under the hood. Bax was always better at it than I was, but I couldn’t let my little brother be the only one with a sick ride. I built the GTO after he got locked up. I think it was how I dealt with the fact that I was the one that put him behind bars.”
I gaped at him as he walked around the hood and then climbed in on the other side. Everything on the interior of the car was just as pristine as the outside. The gauges were all shiny with chrome inlays as they glowed to life when he cranked the motor on. The car made the entire block shake and I saw a bum startle awake when Titus put his foot on the gas and roared away from the curb.
“You felt guilty you had to arrest Shane?”
His eyes cut in my direction and I instinctively braced my hand on the dashboard as he whipped the monster of a car around a corner with the tires squealing.