Luke got close, his patience visibly waning. “Ava.”
“All right,” I said and leaned back. Then I told him the story of Dom flirting, Dom touching, Dom cornering me in the kitchen and that being the reason Sissy left him. I told him about Dom’s threat to “get what I want”. I finished on a description of the last forty-five minutes.
Luke was silent after I stopped talking. His face was hard but I saw his eyes were working. I also saw his jaw was working too, clenching and unclenching and I did not take this as a good sign. I held my breath while this happened.
Finally he said, “Pack a bag.”
“Excuse me?” I asked on a gush of air.
“Pack a bag.”
“What? Why?”
“You’re movin’ in with me.”
My eyes bugged out. “What? Why?” I repeated.
“Just do it.”
Ho-ly shit.
Lee had made Indy stay with him to keep her safe when she was being shot at and kidnapped. He moved into her duplex after it was over and now they were getting married. Eddie had also made Jet move in with him to keep her safe. He never let her move out and she had just bought a new blender. Roxie had stayed with Hank during her troubles because, at the time, she lived in Chicago. After she was safe, she had decided to move to Denver to be with Hank, thinking to move into an apartment for six months to “see how it went” but he had talked her into moving in with him. Now she was entering his dog into a Frisbee competition.
I felt panic seize my chest. “I’m not moving in with you.”
“You’re movin’ in with me.”
“I’m not.”
He reached behind his back then his arm came forward and I saw the cuffs.
Oh no.
I started to take off but didn’t even get by him. He whirled me back around, hand wrapped around my upper arm. I yanked at my arm but he grabbed my wrist and slapped the bracelet on me and then he slapped the other bracelet on him.
“I can’t believe you cuffed me to you again!” I shouted.
“Now, we’re packing.”
“I’m not moving in with you,” I pulled back, putting all my weight into it as he started walking. He dragged me, and all my weight, into the bedroom.
“This is too much,” I snapped as he went to the closet and threw open the door.
He turned to me. “Pack.”
“I have my office here. I have my yoga mat here. I can’t move out,” I babbled.
He jerked on our cuffed hands and I flew forward, slamming into him.
His arms went around me (thus taking one of my arms and twisting it behind my back) and he held on tight, his face dipping to mine.
“Since I seem to have to repeat myself every time I need to get something through to you, I’ll keep doin’ it.” His eyes were shining dangerously and it was clear his patience was at an end.
Eek.
“First, I’m not gonna fuck around with this shit. You’ve been kidnapped twice in two days and shot at. As of now, that shit is over. My building is secure, your house is not. You’re movin’ in, end of discussion. Second, I want you in my bed. I want you to look at me the way you looked at me after our first kiss but I want you to do it when my cock is buried inside you. Third, you owe me and you’re gonna pay. The first one is happening now. The last two are gonna happen tonight. Do you understand me?”
I understood him. I so understood him.
I stared at him, my chest seemed to have expanded and my eyes seemed frozen in a wide-open position. Unable to speak after what he’d just said, I nodded.
“Good,” he clipped. “Now, pack.”
At that juncture, I thought it prudent to pack.
So I packed.
*
I was drunk.
I knew it wasn’t smart but I didn’t care. I’d been kidnapped (twice), wrestled with my best friend’s husband in a parking garage and moved in with Luke. I needed to get drunk.
Screw the consequences.
*
At my house I packed. Luke uncuffed me so I could do it.
This was after, still attached to him, I threw a few things in a bag and muttered, “Done.”
He looked at the bag and back at me and demanded, “More.”
I sighed, he uncuffed me and I packed more.
We toted my two suitcases (and my yoga mat) out to his Porsche. The Bad Boy Bunch was still hanging around outside likely for moral support. They all looked at Luke with understanding and at me with impatience. All except Tex who was grinning at me like the crazy guy I was thinking he was.
For some reason, even though I didn’t know him (at all), he put his big hand on the top of my head and said, “Been a long time since we had some excitement, darlin’.”
Luke glared at him, obviously not sharing in Tex’s excitement. Tex chuckled as he took his hand from my head.
While I thanked Mr. Kumar for saving me from dastardly Dom, Luke talked to Matt who peeled off and went back into my house.
“What’s he doing?” I asked as Luke led me to the Porsche.
“Your computer,” Luke said.
Shit.
He had it all covered. I was so screwed.