I’d promised I wouldn’t take from Clare, but I was willing to bet that jerking my dick to visions of her would most definitely fall into that category. Son of a bitch, I was an asshole.
“Yeah. I’ll be right back,” I replied, hauling ass from the room.
What was I doing? I’d been able to contain myself for three fucking months with this woman. And, after one night and sleeping in an uncomfortable hospital chair at her side, I was losing it?
Or maybe it had more to do with the fact that she was finally away from that maniac and my head wasn’t filled with worry and fear that something would happen to her.
Or maybe I was a head case who was falling in love with a witness who had worked her way under my skin with nothing more than a brave heart and a smile I felt all the way down to the marrow in my bones.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
It was a good five minutes before I’d collected myself enough to make my way back over.
“Hey,” I said, fully intent on telling her I was going to call it a night. We could talk later…after my lobotomy…and my castration.
“You bought me a sausage-and-onion pizza,” she stated with sparkling eyes as I entered the room. The blanket was thankfully wrapped tight around her shoulders as she perched on the corner of the bed.
I shrugged. “Actually, Roman’s assistant, Seth, bought you a sausage-and-onion pizza, but yeah, I asked him to get it.”
Her lips pursed, and for a split second, I thought she was upset.
A tear rolled from the corner of her eye.
My whole body came online as I searched her face. “What’s wrong?”
She dried her cheek. “You hate sausage. You gagged when I told you this was my favorite.”
I chuckled as relief flooded me. “I can pick sausage off. And besides, I ate that weird pork stuff Elisabeth made.” I tipped my chin to the box beside her. “That pizza’s for you. Well, half of it, anyway. That weird pork stuff Elisabeth cooked was shit.”
She giggled, and just the sound soothed my exposed nerves.
“How old are you?” she asked out of the blue as she started picking sausage off a slice.
“Thirty-four,” I answered.
Her eyebrows popped up. “Wow, gramps.”
“Ass,” I teased, walking over to Tessa. I gently removed the headphones and tucked her under the blankets.
When I turned back to face Clare, she was smiling.
“Thanks for the pizza, Heath.”
“Thank me by passing me a slice.”
“Are you sure you should be eating pizza? My grandpa always got indigestion if he ate too late.”
“Aren’t you just hilarious,” I deadpanned.
She giggled again, and I knew there was not a chance in Hell I was calling it a night.
Not when I had the opportunity to spend even a minute with her.
Snagging the sausage-free piece she was working on from the box, I asked, “All right, what else do you want to know about me?”
“Where are you from?”
“Augusta.” I took a bite and settled in the chair across the room.
“Parents?”
“Mom died when I was sixteen. Breast cancer. Dad didn’t take it so well, became a drunk. He and I don’t get along so well. Next.”
“How old are your sisters?”
“Shit. You gonna make me do math while I’m enjoying some onion pizza?”
She laughed before taking a bite. A sexy-as-hell moan rumbled in her throat as she chewed.
Christ, she was beautiful. The blanket was doing its job up top, but her petite feet crossed at the ankle drew my attention up to her toned thighs.
Yep, time to talk about my sisters.
“So…Jenna’s three years younger than me, thirty-one. That would make Laurie twenty-nine, Melanie twenty-five, and Maggie twenty-two. Despite the age gap, I’m closest with Maggie. She came to live with me after high school so she could go to Georgia Tech without having to sell her organs to pay for room and board. She graduated last May and moved into her own apartment over the summer.”
“Where do you live?” She took a bite.
“House in the northeast burbs.” I took a bite.
She finished chewing. “College?”
I finished chewing. “University of Georgia.”
“How’d you become a DEA agent?” Another bite.
My hand froze in midair, the pizza halfway to my mouth as a slow grin pulled at my lips. “A ‘show me your titties’ sign.”
Her chin snapped to the side as she laughed. “Um. What?”
“St. Patrick’s Day, downtown. I was a rookie cop, and we’d gotten word from the Captain that we were cracking down on the Mardi Gras–style flashing for beads that year. You know, trying to keep the biggest drinking day of the year family friendly and all,” I joked.
She rewarded me with another soul-soothing giggle.
“Anyway, I concocted a plan. Captain agreed. I drove my truck down and parked along one of the main strips with a fuck-ton of beads and a handwritten ‘show me your titties’ sign. Chicks walked by, showed me their titties, then my boys picked ’em up for indecent exposure. Eighty-seven arrests. Captain was so impressed he threw my name out to the DEA. Rest is history.”