Fire Inside (Chaos #2)(17)

Scared to speak in the face of his anger and the not insignificant fact it looked like he was preparing to leave, I nodded.

“Thank Christ for that,” he muttered as he yanked his jeans to his h*ps and, not bothering to button them, he bent to tag his tee.

Okay, I didn’t know why but that kind of hurt.

I stopped trying to speak and watched him dress.

Night two of thirteen that he would leave me before dawn.

He snatched up his socks and boots, prowled to the bed, sat on the side but down toward the end where I wasn’t close and he pulled them on while speaking.

“Sharin’ info I’d rather not and wouldn’t have to if you didn’t pull that shit. Since it began with you, it’s only been you.” He yanked on a boot but twisted his neck, still bent toward his feet, and pinned me with his eyes. “Before you, babe, I was not abstaining. I use protection but shit happens.”

I pressed my lips together.

“Like tonight,” he went on.

My teeth came out to skim my lower lip. His eyes dropped to them like they always did when I did that but this time his face didn’t get soft and gentle or hard and hungry. He looked angry(er).

Then his eyes came back to mine. “Though not as good, which sucks ’cause I liked it even if I’m pissed as all f**k about it,” he finished, turned back to his boot, and tugged it on.

All right, maybe that was good news. He liked it.

He straightened from the bed, turned and glared down at me.

“Later, Lanie,” he grunted.

He was leaving.

As usual, without a word, he stalked out of my room, but not as usual, he didn’t pull the covers around me, tuck me in, turn out the light or kiss me.

He was just… gone.

I looked over my shoulder toward the door and I stared at it.

I did this a long time.

Hop didn’t come back.

I kept staring.

Hop still didn’t come back.

As I stared, I refused to process how much I didn’t want him gone. I refused to process how disturbed I was by that scene. I refused to process how upsetting I found it that I made him angry. I refused to process how troubling I found it that he was angry but he didn’t let me speak and then he stormed out still not letting me speak.

Instead, in order to keep successfully not processing all that, I shifted off the bed and moved to the bathroom to clean up. Making light work of that, I moved out of the bathroom, grabbed a clean pair of panties, pulled them on and grabbed a short, pale pink, satin nightie with thick black lace at the bodice and hem and tugged that on.

Still forcing myself to think nothing, I moved to the bed, got in, pulled up my own damned covers, tucked in my own damned self and turned out the light.

I settled in and stared into the darkness.

Hop was pissed.

Hop was gone.

Hop was the kind of man who didn’t let you get a word in edgewise when you were somewhat arguing but you were also somewhat not arguing because he wouldn’t let you get a stinking, stupid word in edgewise.

Hop was the kind of man who got mad at you because you gave head too good. Then he stormed out because you gave fantastic blowjobs that made him so wild, he buried himself inside you and forgot to put on a condom.

Therefore it was good Hop was gone because if Hop was there, I would have kicked him out.

“So that’s it. You got nothing?”

My body jerked in the bed as his voice came from the door and something occurred to me.

I was so busy trying not to think, I didn’t hear his Harley roar.

I switched on the light, got up to my booty in the bed, shoulders to the headboard, and saw him casually leaning against my doorjamb. There was nothing casual about the look on his face.

Still pissed but now, more.

“Two weeks, you got nothing?” he asked.

“What?” I asked back.

“So that’s it,” he said again and I stared at him, perplexed.

“What’s it?” I queried.

He pushed from the doorjamb, took one step into the room, stopped and planted his hands on his hips.

Unfortunately, all his hotness heated up significantly, hands on slim h*ps and handsome face angry.

Fortunately, I was not only perplexed, I was getting angry, so this didn’t affect me as it normally would.

“Lanie, you throw a shit fit when your soda fizzes over. The man you’re f**kin’ gets pissed and takes off, you got nothin’? You just put on a nightie, turn out the light and go to sleep?”

I felt my eyes get wide as I pointed out, “Hopper, you didn’t give me the chance to give anything.”

“You didn’t take your chance,” he shot back.

“Are you serious?” I asked, hoping he wasn’t.

“Do I look serious?” he asked back and I studied him.

He did. In fact, he seriously looked serious.

Something else hit me and I felt my brows shoot together. “Was that a test?”

He shook his head as he took his hands from his h*ps and crossed his arms on his chest, which was unfortunate because that pose assumed by a badass biker with kickass tattoos of flames on his sinewy forearms was even hotter.

By… a lot.

“No. Don’t play games,” he announced. “Don’t wanna know what kind of men you’ve had in your bed before me outside of the one I do know so, since I know about him, you gotta know, I get it. No offense to the dead but unless he had Superman under all that geek, babe, I know whatever you got from him you liked but it wasn’t what you get from me.”