His eyes begin to soften, just as Mr. Fowler opens his mouth. “Who is this clown? One of your dimwitted friends?”
I groan because I can pinpoint the second Dax hits his breaking point. I saw it that day in the cafeteria, when Stephen came up behind me and whispered You know you want it in my ear when Nevaeh wasn’t looking. Dax had been halfway across the vast, crowded room filled with kids eating lunch, and yet he was the only one who saw it. In that whole place, he was the only one who took notice. Now, there might as well be steam radiating off of every bare inch of skin.
This isn’t happening, I think. Not again.
But it is. Dax whips around to my boss, staring down at him. He’s a full head taller than him, and his shoulders are twice as broad. “You fuck with her, you fuck with me, you got it?” he breathes, his eyes like cold steel.
For the first time, I see a glimmer of fear in Fowler’s eyes. He swallows and adjusts his tie. “Don’t threaten me. I’ll fire her quicker--”
“I don’t think that’s a wise choice,” Dax says, his voice very calm and measured. “Like I said, you fuck with her, you’ll be fucking with me.”
Fowler owns the boardroom. He thrives on having complete control of the company. He can hand asses to an entire room full of attorneys with a simple raise of the finger. And I’ve never seen him look so nervous. He regards his opponent carefully, then backs away from the solid wall of a man in front of him and clears his throat.
“Have a good vacation, Katherine,” he says reluctantly, not even looking at me. “Be in at seven sharp next Monday.”
I nod, dazed, and manage a “Yes sir.”
He starts to walk away, adjusting that too-tight starched collar of his again, his shiny loafers gleaming, leaving my mind racing, trying to come up with some way to make it up to him. I think of calling out to him, apologizing, but I’m just too humiliated. I wipe the stray tears out of my eyes, knowing nothing will be enough. Dax tries to plant himself in front of me, but I whirl and start to stomp off in the other direction.
“You can’t do that stuff here,” I mumble, head down, wiping away the tears as they start to fall.
“What?” he asks, again trying to plant himself in front of me.
“Talk like that to him.” I bristle as I remember the look on Mr. Fowler’s face. Oh, hell, I’m in such deep shit. I look up and see an entrance for the T so I scuttle around Dax’s broad form, toward my escape. “He won’t allow it.”
Dax picks up, right on my heels. He grabs for my arm, trying to spin me around, but I lurch my arm away and move faster. “Where the hell are you going?”
“I’ll find my own way home.”
“What? Because I told that asshole off?”
I whirl back to him, incredulous. “That asshole was my boss! He’s only the second most important person at the firm and a freaking senior partner!”
Dax shrugs, eyes narrowed. He thinks I’m making a big deal of nothing. Oh, god, he doesn’t know anything! He doesn’t know that at work, you toe the line and don’t make trouble, even if you do have an asshole boss, or else you can very well end up on the street, in a cardboard box.
I scowl at him, annoyed. “You really don’t know how the real world works, do you?”
“Maybe I don’t, Katydid. But in my world, if I see someone treating you like shit, I’m not going to stand for it,” he says, breathing hard. “You should know that by now.”
I guess I should. After all, this isn’t the first time he’s done it. But he should know that I’m still feeling the repercussions from the last time. “You just don’t get it, Dax,” I say, shaking my head.
“Maybe I get it too well,” Dax fires back. “And so maybe I shouldn’t be around. Because hell, Katydid, I can’t stand there and watch anyone treat you like shit,” he growls. He stares into my eyes with an intensity that nearly takes my breath away.
And then it hits me like a ton of bricks. Dax Harding is trying to protect me and I’m choosing some asshole boss over him—a person who truly cares about me.
But he can’t just hit someone every time he feels like I’m being mistreated!
At least he sticks up for you…
The voices in my head are having a full-on argument and I feel shaken.
I feel every ounce of resolve I have slipping away. When he speaks again, his voice is low and deep and soft. “Do you want me to go?”
I look over his shoulder, at the T station, and suddenly it’s no longer an escape. It feels like the worst mistake ever.
Well, the second worst mistake ever. The first one kept me away from him for four years.
Goddamn Dax Harding. He’s doing it to me again.
Right now, the last thing I want is for him to leave me alone.
Chapter 7