3. Amanda

Chapter 3

Amanda

I don’t let my guard down. Or I guess I didn’t until Leo and if you were to ask me what makes me trust this man, I don’t know that I could point to something tangible. I just do. It’s a gut feeling.

When he starts to leave, I put a hand on his arm. “Wait. Don’t go. Stay with me tonight.”

Leo’s eyes darken. “I can’t sleep here.”

I drop my hand. “I’m sorry.” It occurs to me he may have known how to buy clothes like the ones he gave me because he has a girlfriend. Someone he holds. Someone he kisses. Someone I envy.

“Don’t be. I can’t stay because I can tell you’re wrecked emotionally and I’m not the kind of man who uses a vulnerable woman.”

“Nights are difficult for me. I don’t sleep nights. When the sun comes up, then I do. I had cameras inside my last place, but now I can’t afford expenses above food and shelter. Anyway…” I take a breath to stop my flow of words until I gather my thoughts because I know I’m babbling.

Then I explain, “All I meant in asking you to stay is so that I’m not alone.” It’s not that I wanted him to stick around for anything except companionship through the dark. It’s not that I’m wildly attracted to him.

He lifts a brow, his expression calling out the words— the lies —I’m silently using to console myself in the face of his rejection.

“You know what? Forget I asked. You can go on home to your girlfriend.”

He stares at me, his dark eyes holding steady on mine.

“I don’t have a girlfriend.”

My heart dances.

“I’ll keep watch in the hallway outside the apartment because there’s a reason I can’t sleep in here. I can’t stay without wanting to be deep inside you.”

Heat rushes through me, coating my cheeks and I put a hand against my face to cool my skin. I don’t know how to answer him. He was right in saying I’m wrecked, and he was right thinking I’m feeling vulnerable. But it wouldn’t be taking advantage of me not with how I’m feeling about him.

“You can rest well tonight, honey. Nothing will get past me. I mean it.” He puts a hand on my head and stoops down until we’re at eye level. “I’m good at what I do.”

Leo reminds me of a boy I knew long ago. The one left behind when I was yanked away kicking and screaming, begging them to let me find him to tell him goodbye.

“Okay,” I say through a throat gone raw. “Then I’ll make you breakfast tomorrow.”

He smiles as he lowers his hand, and I smother a gasp. The sexy curve of his lips. How potent.

“Can you cook?”

I shake my head. “No, but I can pour cereal in a bowl like a master chef.”

“I’ll look forward to it.” He motions toward the bedroom door. “Go on and sleep.”

“I will after I shower.” I think about showering, then I think about being naked with him in the shower and get wet from a surge of longing.

He glances at my lips, then turns away and strides across the floor. “I’ll be right outside.”

“Do you need anything? From me?”

His shoulders stiffen and he stops. “Do you want me to answer you honestly?”

The air between us crackles. Do I? Do I want to know if it’s me he needs? This perfect stranger with the hard body? “I don’t know,” I say. I’m afraid of wanting someone. Afraid I’ll be happy and then it’ll get snatched away.

“If you can’t say for sure…” His hands clench into fists. “Then it’s a no.”

He tugs on the door handle, then steps out and shuts it behind him.

In the aftermath of his presence, I sag against the side of the sofa I got for a song at the thrift store until I pull myself together and get my stuff to carry into the bathroom.

Ever since someone broke in, I’ve cut my shower time down and I use the water on the low setting so I’ll be able to hear over the sound. Knowing someone I can trust is watching out for me makes it easier to relax.

The warm, soft flow of water from the showerhead trickles across my breasts and over my nipples that ache for the touch of a man I barely know. My hand slips across my stomach and below to the curls between my legs.

My body craves release. I part myself and tip my face up and spot a wolf spider on the ceiling. Then I’m slipping in the shower, trying to find a handhold among the soap and shampoo bottles. I shriek when the spider drops.

Leo

Amanda’s scream makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up. I spin and kick the center of the door. It splinters and gives way.

I bound through the bedroom and into the bathroom, bracing myself, ready to destroy the danger.

The shower door is open, and she’s flattened herself against one of the shower walls, her breathtaking body glistening beneath the droplets of water.

“A spider was on the ceiling. I noticed it when I was touching myself and?—”

She stops and ducks her head in embarrassment as she uses her hands to cover her beautiful body.

There’s so much I want to say to that but if I want to remain in control of myself and my thirst for her, I can’t go there.

Instead, I tear my gaze away from the nipple poking between her fingers to ask, “Is it gone?”

“Yeah, I think it went down the drain.”

I turn my back to her and pull a towel from the rack. Reaching behind me, I hold it out. “Dry off. I broke the front door so we’re leaving.”

“You don’t have to do that. I can stay up tonight and then get it fixed tomorrow. So don’t trouble yourself to?—”

I face her, thankful she has the towel now covering that dream body. “We’re leaving.” I give her the stony face I used to give clients who didn’t realize that the first part of staying safe is getting to a secure location.

She steps from the shower, and I watch a line of water caress a path along the soft skin of her shoulders. It runs below the towel, traveling to a destination I want sprawled out before me warm and willing.

Swallowing hard, I shift my stance so my cock isn’t prominently showing.

“Okay,” she concedes, “but I don’t want to be a burden.”

No one wants a kid like you around. You’re a burden. As the words staff from the Home used flash through my thoughts, I frown. “Why would you coming with me be a burden?” I ask.

She chews her lip. “I mean we’re strangers yet here you are taking care of me.”

I can’t tell her that though I once protected others as a job, I feel like I was born to protect her. And maybe because Amanda reminds me of her, in some way I’m trying to find penance for the guilt I feel for failing to protect a broken angel. I’d promised I’d stay by her side and couldn’t.

“Pack what you need,” I instruct. “I’ll arrange for your place to be secured.” I step out of the bathroom to make some calls to my brother, Flint, and then to Rio Fairway.

He once did time to protect the woman he loves and like me, he’s been through some bad shit. He’s a cowboy who can be counted on to have my back in the middle of a tricky situation.

I don’t know exactly what Amanda is dealing with, but whatever it is, judging by the fear she exhibits, it’s bad.

By the time Amanda finished gathering her stuff, twenty minutes passed and two of my brothers are at the door.

Wilder rubs his chin when he sees the damage, but like Flint, he doesn’t ask questions. They get to work using the boards they brought to prevent access to her apartment.

Amanda exits as Wilder hammers in a nail, and she quickly sidesteps, moving closer to me while watching my brother’s every move.

“He won’t hurt you.” I take her hand in mine and ignoring Flint’s raised brows, say, “She’ll be staying at the ranch with us for a while.”

Amanda pulls against my hold, but I don’t let go.

“Leo, I can’t impose, and really, once the door is fixed?—”

“Save your breath,” Wilder interrupts. “Arguing with Leo is like trying to get a fence post to agree with you.”

Flint grunts and nods his agreement, then because he’s always thinking of what needs to get done, claps my shoulder and adds, “First thing tomorrow fix the side of the barn. Marshall’s horse kicked through the stall because River’s damn crazy rooster spooked him.”

River has a habit of rescuing injured or unwanted animals. He’s got a knack for doctoring them back to health and then they stick to him, following him around like he’s their daddy.

I grab the handle of Amanda’s suitcase with my free hand. “We’ll see you back at home.”

Except for a pitiful streetlamp, the apartment parking lot is nearly pitch black. I make a note to get someone on that.

When I unlock the truck door, she passes within a breath of me and starts to climb in. I will not look at how well her firm ass fills out her jeans. I will not pay attention to the low cut of her shirt.

She struggles to heft herself up and worried that she’s going to stumble backward and fall, I quickly move to help her.

Instead of my hand going around her waist as I’d intended, when she steps down, I’m almost cupping her tit. My thumb is just below her nipple.

She doesn’t move away like I thought she would. She stills, breathing low and fast.

I want to slide my hand up. I want to take that nipple between my thumb and index finger. I want to feel her.

“Leo?”

“Hmm?”

“Where am I going to sleep tonight?”