7. Ryanne “Shorty” Larwick

7

RYANNE "SHORTY" LARWICK

Taking Khadri to my place and inside was embarrassing. But this wasn't time for my delicate sensibilities.

Still, my knees shook as I opened the door and allowed him to step by me. His large frame took up so much space, he pressed intimately against me as he passed, and I blushed to bite back a moan.

Once the door was closed, he walked over to the window, eased the curtain aside with one finger and stared down.

Something was wrong—I knew that from the way Dude had carried his frame all those years ago. His back straight, his eyes was as if he had tunnel vision and the silence—I remembered the silence most of all.

Without questioning things, I rushed into my bedroom. Yanking my backpack off the hook over the bedroom door, I immediately went to the most important things—panties. Once I shoved a handful into the bag, I packed clothing that didn't take up much space—shorts, summer dresses, a pair of flipflop.

I was dumping hair products in when Khadri called my name.

"Move it." He told me.

I was sitting on the bag to zip it up when the familiar sound of wood splintering caught my attention followed by the loud boom of a gunshot.

Though I wasn't in the same room as the sound, my ears still rang as I closed the bag and began slipping my arms into the straps. I paused long enough to grab my baseball bat then stuck my head up to see Khadri standing with his back to my door.

"Khadri—"

"Stay behind me!" He told me, firing at another man who entered.

As he moved, I almost tripped over one body, then hopped over the other as I tried staying in the shadow of his frame.

In the hall, one attacker got by Khadri, but I took him out with a swing of the bat against his knees. He'd grabbed for me, his nail slicing through my left arm, angering me.

When he fell, I hit him again—this time in the head. And this time, I put my entire soul into the hit.

Khadri had shoved the gun into the holster again and I realized why. The gunfire in such a narrow passage wasn't good.

Instead of calling the elevator, he dragged me down the steps and used the door to take out the man who was standing look-out in the lobby.

By the time we managed to exit the building, Khadri was bleeding from the right shoulder. I panicked and tried looking at it, but he merely shoved me into the truck. I blinked and we were speeding away from the building, a car behind us, chasing us out of the neighbourhood.

"Fuck, I hate this man!" Khadri growled.

No matter how fast he went or where he turned, the vehicle was on our asses.

"Hold on." Khadri warned.

I gripped the seat on either side of my ass.

"No, Shorty," he said, glancing in the mirrors. "Really hold on to something."

Confused, I reached up to the bar over my door and gripped it tightly.

Khadri slammed on the brakes.

The vehicle behind us crashed into the back of the truck, but it barely jerked forward like a regular truck. Khadri was a big man and I guessed that was why his truck resembled a junior form of a monster truck.

While the car behind us had some serious damage, I didn't think the truck had much.

"You okay?" He rested a hand at the back of my head.

"Mm." I replied, my heart racing.

"Stay in the truck—keep your head down." He ordered while pulling his gun and sliding out of the truck.

Though I stayed in the truck, I kept my eyes on him. He was bleeding and while he didn't seem too concerned about it, I would have to explain to Pasha why her man had a hole in him that he didn't leave the house with.

To my shock, the car that had been chasing was badly damaged.

It didn't seem as if anyone in the front had survived.

There was no way they could have.

And even by some miracle, if they were able to be saved, they would never walk again. The front of the vehicle was low and caught the truck and smashed all the way in.

Khadri trained his gun toward the vehicle, but I read his body language.

He relaxed and put the gun away.

He wiped the back of his right hand against his lips as he looked up and around. When he returned to the truck, he was on the phone to Boss.

"It was Hulk and Cider." Khadri was saying. "Apparently, Torez brought them in after the diner incident. Man, I don't know…"

I held my breath, knowing I was missing a part of the conversation since he wasn't on speaker.

"They're both dead." He explained. "Yeah—we're leaving now—we'll talk later."

"What's the—what are we doing with them?"

I thumbed over my shoulder.

"Boss will handle it." He replied darkly.

"And you're sure they're dead?"

He nodded.

He drove us back to the large house. The entire drive had me feeling numb, almost like with each body to fall, I was losing more and more of my humanity.

Thankfully, Pasha wasn't there so I had a little bit of a reprieve before I'd have some explaining to do.

"I'm not going to try talking you into going to a hospital," I said. "Not yet—but where is the first aid kit?"

"Under the island in the middle of the kitchen."

He was a little breathy.

I rushed to get the kit, stopped to get a can of soda then darted back up the stairs. While I was tired by the time I got back, I merely opened the soda and handed it to him, then began undoing the tiny buttons on his shirt.

Khadri held my hands on either side of the material and tugged.

The buttons flew everywhere but that wasn't what my mind was on. It was on the fact that him ripping his shirt open shouldn't have been as sexy as it was—especially since this was to treat his wound.

Swallowing the lump in my throat, I tried focusing but now I had to deal with the massiveness of his chest and the desperate way I needed him to hold me against it.

With shaking hands, I quickly wiped away all the blood I could, before cleaning the wound to see it clearly.

"The bullet went through," I told him. "That's a good thing—right?"

"Yes."

"This is going to sting." I warned.

His jawline tightened as I poured antiseptic wash against the wound. The liquid ran down and soaked into the rest of his clothing, but I wouldn't worry about it.

He clutched my hip with a large palm as he hissed softly, closed his eyes and turned his head away.

"Maybe you should go to the hospital after all." I spoke while blowing against the wound, hoping that would ease some of the sting.

"It's fine—I've been shot before."

"You do know that never makes a woman feel better, right?"

He scoffed. "I'll be okay. Just bandage me up."

"Khadri…"

"I'll be fine." He stressed, drank more of the soda then lifted his eyes to me.

"Pasha is going to kill me for letting you get shot. How mad do you think she's going to be when she realizes I didn't take you to a hospital?"

"Shorty I?—"

"Just know I will stab her—you understand?"

Khadri laughed.

Looking into his eyes drew me in.

His eyes were the typical brown eyes, but they held a kind of fire that I wanted to be consumed by. He looked at me in a way that made me want to crawl for him, that made me want to find a way to lasso the moon and set it at his feet.

Embarrassed, I was looking away when he caught my chin against a large index finger and eased it back so our eyes met again.

"If you keep looking at me like that, I'll have to kiss you." His eyes dipped to my mouth?—

—and lingered.

I licked my lips.

He moaned.

"How am I looking at you?" My voice cracked.

Instead of answering, Khadri moaned and closed his eyes even as he pressed his lips to mine. I didn't move—feeling lips so full and warm against mine took away my control, my ability to think, my ability to be my usual logical self.

I gave my body the say in what happened next.

My lips parted and a soft sigh escaped my body right as his tongue rushed into my mouth to touch my tongue. That one action had me melting and leaning against his chest.

His palms slid down my side and around to my back. He stopped their movement at my waist, but I needed to feel those hands on my ass. I wanted his strong to stroke, squeeze, grip.

I sighed and was about to grip his wrists to move his hands where I wanted them when Pasha screamed his military nickname through the house.

Gasping, I pushed away from him, but he didn't seem in any hurry to move. He still had his head tipped back, his eyes closed, and his lips moisten and lightly parted.

"Moros?" Pasha called. "I know you're here—your truck and bike are outside."

Khadri licked his lips.

"You owe me a kiss." He growled, softly.

"We just?—"

"When we have a real kiss, Shorty." He dipped his chin and opened his eyes. "You'll know. Now pass me a shirt from the closet."

Nodding, I scrambled and was handing him the shirt when Pasha barged in.

I opened my mouth to demand she fucking knock next time, but Khadri caught my arm.

My mood switched from anger to shame when our eyes met, and I realized that he belonged to someone else.

Nodding, I picked up the kit and the mess I'd made and left the room.

I knew if Pasha started in on me then about him getting shot, I would superman punch her in the tits.

"Shorty?" Khadri called.

Though I didn't want to stop, my pulsing body made me. Turning on my heels, I watched as he stepped out of the room to face me.

"Get some rest." He told me. "Today was a lot."

"I'm fine." I lied even as it was taking every bit of strength to keep my knees from buckling.

Leaving, I wandered slowly down the hall until I dumped the trash. I realized then my bag was still in the truck and I had his blood on me.

I went back to the room and knocked.

"Come in." Khadri called.

When I opened the door to ask him to borrow his keys, Pasha climbed from his lap after fixing back the bandage at his shoulder.

I blinked, straightened my spin and lifted my chin.

"I need to get my bag from the truck." I told him, proud my voice was as strong sounding as it needed to be. "Can I borrow your keys?"

Khadri nodded and rose to hand them to me.

Without another word, I kept my back straight, knowing he was watching after me until I'd descended the stairs. There, the power left my body and I all but crawled out the door to the truck. I leaned heavily against the vehicle.

I liked Khadri—the kind of like that would normally lead to a normal woman in a normal situation to flirt with him.

To shoot her shot.

And while I was shy and probably wouldn't flirt openly, I would try in my own way.

But not with him—not with this man.

After getting my bag from the truck, I sat on the front porch to call my work. When my boss answered, he was his usual asshole-self. But he didn't sugar-coat anything. He suggested I find a new job.

"What?" I demanded. "You can't fire me! I didn't do anything wrong."

"And I know that." Greg told me. "But we were barely staying open as is. I have no money for the repairs and the owner of the building is blaming me for the damage."

"Tell him it's one of your waitresses crazy ex."

"Was it one of my waitresses crazy ex?" Greg wanted to know.

"No." I sighed. "Sorry. I need this job."

"Sorry Ryanne. It is what it is." Greg paused. "I have to cut my losses or this will bankrupt me."

He hung up and I sat there and cried.

"You okay?" Pasha's voice was soft.

"Leave me alone." I told her, wiping my tears. "I don't have the petty in me to deal with you right. Khadri got hurt and I'm sorry. But he's a grown man and knew the risks. So just leave me alone."

"I didn't want?—"

"I don't care what you want!" I barked. "Okay? I don't want to be here anymore than you want me here so just keep your shit to yourself. I will stay in my room while you're here. That's the best I can do for now."

"Ryanne, I?—"

I was about to tell her to kiss my ass when Khadri appeared at the door to see what the yelling was about.

"You can call your girlfriend off. I get it." I told him, lifting my chin. "I get it."

"Shorty I?—"

"Don't call me that!"

Shoving by him, I jogged up the stairs even though my knees were now hurting from all the up and down.

I ensured the bedroom door was locked before I tried calling Dude, but my phone was now dead. That left me completely isolated because I hadn't stopped to grab the charger in my rush to get us out of my place.

To get us away from the hail of bullets.

In the bathroom, I stripped down to nothing, turned on the water and sat in the tub under the downpour, crying again.

I'd spent my entire life alone.

No family.

No acquaintances.

No friends.

As an adult, I spent my time trying to stay away from people.

Yet, now, I found myself in a position where some unknown force wanted me dead and I'd walked into being some guy's mistress with his woman in the same fucking house.

And it wasn't that she was bad looking—Pasha was perfect and she fit together with Khadri in a strange kind of way.

I couldn't even be mad at that.

He hadn't kissed me because he wanted to.

It had to have been the adrenaline crash that made him a little loopy.

Maybe he was in a daze and mistook me for her because his mind was so gone.

I cried harder.

Bowing my head, I rested my forehead on my arm now folded on my knees.