“For help,” he clarified, his voice tight.
Oh. “I figured you would tell them to help me.” I kept my voice even, calm, controlled. “It’s what you always do.” Then I couldn’t help it as I glanced toward the door one more time. “I didn’t want to waste your time when I can ask myself.”
His nose wrinkled again right around the time I said the middle sentence, and it didn’t go anywhere as I spoke. What I did notice was the way he crossed his arms over his chest, that gaze still locked on mine like he had no intention of moving it elsewhere. He tipped his chin back, giving me a good view of his long and strong neck. “What have I told you about wasting my time?” he asked in that same voice.
The skin along my spine instantly prickled, and I couldn’t help but feel this tiny stab of pain right in my heart. Indignation. That would have been the perfect word to describe how I felt right then.
That and betrayal.
And anger.
But mostly indignation.
I didn’t let myself get riled up as I said, “I don’t want to assume anything, Mr. Ripley.”
Okay, maybe the Mr. Ripley part was a little petty, but I wasn’t going to beat myself up over it.
When I glanced at Ripley’s face as I said the words, and watched the way the entire length of his jawline went tight, it didn’t make me feel any better. It made me feel like crap. I wasn’t trying to make him feel bad. I didn’t want that from him.
I didn’t want anything from him.
So I got myself back on track. “You have better things to do with your time. You have enough going on right now with Mr. Cooper being gone.” His dad. Not just Mr. Cooper. His dad.
He didn’t say a word. This massive man just stood there, watching me.
I kept going, my voice even… maybe a little monotone. “If there’s an issue, I’ll let you know, of course.”
Rip still didn’t respond.
Sliding my gaze toward the door, I willed it to open and Ashton and Owen to be there, ready to help.
But nothing happened. The story of my life.
“I appreciate you checking though, but we can move it on our own, I think,” I finished, keeping my voice the same businesslike way I would have used on any other boss I would have, except Mr. Cooper—and Rip if this had been months ago.
But this was what he wanted, and this was what I would give him.
So when he took four long steps toward me, stopping the exact moment the tips of his boots met mine, his hand nudging my chin upward, I held my breath. Because Rip was right there. In my space. Forcing me to look at him.
And look at him I did.
I looked at the tattoos peeking out from just above the hem of the slight turtleneck coverage his compression shirt gave him. Took in the tiny dark shapes just above the hem. I took in the very faint stubble across the underside of his chin and over the lower half of his face. I took in that almost thin pink mouth pulled into a line at the angry expression he was shooting my way.
And I took in the way his eyes seemed to be blazing down at me.
Like he either wanted to yell at me or something else.
I didn’t know what that “something else” was, but from the line of his jaw, I wasn’t sure I wanted to know.
Rip’s chin tipped down lower, drawing his face even closer to mine. “Can we be done with this?” he asked, his voice rough and so low I could barely hear him.
I held my breath. “With what?”
That incredibly handsome face stayed remote, but those eyes… “With the Mister Ripley shit. With that tone. With you not wanting to talk to me or ask me for fucking help.” That chin dipped, and I’d swear I could feel his breath on my face in tiny puffs. “With you freezing me out.”
I wanted to raise my eyebrows, but I didn’t. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I only partially lied. Because it couldn’t be a complete lie when I didn’t understand why he would be saying these things to me when he was the one who had asked for them.
“You know exactly what I’m talking about, Luna,” Rip replied, his voice still this low hum I almost had to strain my ears to hear.
The tips of his boots edged over mine even more.
It didn’t matter. It didn’t freaking matter.
“You are Mister Ripley,” I said, still wound tight. “I’m talking to you like I would anyone that was my boss, with professionalism, because that’s what I should have been showing you from the very beginning.”
This hoarse sound escaped his throat, sounding almost like a… grumble? A growl?
“I’m not going to bother you when I can handle things myself.”
His boots tapped into mine so roughly, it scooted my own boots back a half inch.
“I’m just treating you the way I always should have,” I cut myself off before adding another “Mister Ripley” to the end. Something inside of me said it would be a terrible idea, like baiting a starving lion or something. “You’re my boss, and I shouldn’t have forgotten that.”
I could have sworn his neck swelled bigger and bigger with each word that came out of my mouth. His face might have gotten redder too.
But when had his face gotten red in the first place?
The hand on my chin drew my face up even higher, until I almost strained with the pressure, with the stretch. Then I could definitely feel his soft breathing on my face. On my mouth. I could feel the heat of his body along the front of mine. A month ago, this would have made my freaking year. A week ago, it would have made me want to swoon.
But now…
Now I forced all that crap down and away. I buried it with a shovel and a half ton of dirt. Gone. Gone, gone, gone.
He had asked for it, and I had given everything I’d been willing to part with for too long.
Only an idiot kept giving after a certain point, and I was no one’s fool. No one’s punching bag. No one’s temporary entertainment.
I had given him more than I had another person ever, and he’d burned that bridge between us once and for all. He had told me the same thing that other people had: leave me alone.
“I’m only doing what you asked,” I told him slowly, each word drawn out, syllable by syllable. I kept my gaze on his for a heartbeat, and then two, and then drew it back down to his chin as I let myself take a breath through my nose.
Then I took a step back. Then another.
“I appreciate you coming to check and see if I need help, but I don’t. Ashton and Owen are coming,” I explained to him. “Anything I can handle on my own, I’ll do. But thank you, Mr. Ripley.”
Mr. Ripley didn’t move an inch.
Then he opened that mouth and said, “We need to—”
And I would thank a God I wasn’t sure I believed in for the fact that the door opened in that exact same moment and Owen said, “Sorry about that, Luna. Let’s move the rotisserie—Oh.” He stopped there. He looked from one of us to the other, eyes widening as the new guy came in right behind him.
I smiled at my coworkers and took a step toward them. “I’m ready if you two are.”
*
Determined as hell to keep my distance from my boss, I grabbed my lunch for the third day in a row and headed to the chairs and table in the parking lot of CCC.
It was another hot day, not that it wasn’t a hot day every freaking day in Houston, but under the shade, it wasn’t too unbearable. Since there weren’t any bugs either, it was about as good as I was going to get. Fresh air. Some open space.
I should have been coming out here years ago.
Which reminded me…
I picked up my phone and dialed the same number I had every day for a week now.
It rang.
Rolling up my pant legs and the sleeves of my T-shirt up to my shoulders, I held the phone between my ear and shoulder, taking in the continued rings. I stretched my legs out to get some sun and slouched in the chair as I pulled my lunch out of my bag. I’d barely opened my container of three-day-old casserole disaster, when the door leading outside opened and a familiar figure in a long-sleeved shirt that clung to every single muscle on his chest and dark jeans made his way over.
I didn’t narrow my eyes, but I did watch him a little too carefully.