War(8)

Common sense hadn’t left me completely, so I looked at him again as I drove, searching his eyes. I saw nothing, no malice, no excitement, nothing.

I nodded. “Okay. I’ll go there,” I said, knowing full well I had completely lost my mind but sure that my other options were limited.

“Do you know an indirect route?” he asked.

For some reason that question, one I hadn’t ever been asked before, brought me some measure of calm.

“I can go two more exits down and then circle back,” I said.

“Good, do that,” he said.

I did, and as I drove it occurred to me he was taking precautions for some reason, one that made my heart, which had calmed somewhat, speed again.

“Is someone following us?”

“Unlikely. But better safe than sorry,” he said.

“Yeah,” I said, again hating the way my voice wavered, the stupidity in it.

What else could I say? I had no idea if it was better safe than sorry, just as I had no idea how this would turn out. I did as he asked and drove to my home, hoping and praying this entire nightmare would soon be over.

I pulled up to my duplex slowly, and noted that the interior was dark. Either Tiff wasn’t home yet, or she and her boyfriend Charles had retired to bed.

I hoped she wasn’t back yet. I didn’t necessarily relish the thought of her busting in on us or trying to imagine how he would react if she did so, but even more, I didn’t want her anywhere near this, and if she stayed away, she wouldn’t be in danger.

“So your roommate is not home,” he said as he watched the duplex through assessing eyes.

I might have heard accusation in his words, but that could have been my own guilty conscience. It wasn’t like I had anything to feel guilty about, but I’d always been a bad liar. I hoped he would overlook that.

“Probably not. She went out tonight,” I said.

He turned to look at me, his gaze moving over me slowly in a way that made my heart speed faster, my breath come out faster. This look was different, still assessing, but not as if he was trying to figure out if I was going to fall apart, or even if he was sizing me up to see if I was being deceptive.

This look, it was almost hungry, was the look a man gave to a woman. It should have freaked me out, had me worried, running. I was none of those things, though. In this moment, his eyes on me filled me with something far too close to desire, and sent my sex clenching, my nipples beading tight.

I was officially nuts.

“And you’re not out tonight? Clubbing or whatever people do with friends?” he asked a moment later, the way he’d spoken that sentence being the first hint of something almost like awkwardness I’d seen in him, almost as if he had no real understanding of what “people do with friends.”

That little hint of awkwardness was oddly endearing, but when he spoke, his voice broke the spell.

Something for which I should have been grateful.

I wasn’t.

Not in the slightest.

“No. I had to work,” I said.

He watched me for a moment longer and then got out of the car without another word.

I lingered, my legs unwilling to move, my heart again pounding but not with fear.

Get it together, Milan.

My voice was loud in my head, but it did nothing to calm my body. The moment the door was wrenched open, I felt a rush of air enter the car. I kept my gaze centered on his chest, his dark suit jacket unwrinkled, his tie still neatly in place. It occurred to me I probably looked awful, and I reached up, stroked my fingers across the tight ponytail that was still miraculously in place. It was only after I did so that I remembered I wasn’t supposed to care how I looked.

“I promised, Milan. And I keep my promises,” he whispered, his voice almost tender.

After a deep breath, I moved my gaze up his broad chest, over his jaw, pausing briefly on his soft lips, until I finally met his eyes.

His expression was stoic but his eyes flashed with something like a promise. He was, I realized, trying to reassure me, had probably taken my pause as an expression of fear. That was one small silver lining that I could take from this. At least he hadn’t seen my reaction to him.

That was a benefit, one I would take advantage of. I was simply a means to an end, one that I didn’t doubt he would have any hesitation in destroying. I needed to get along, find a way out, and letting myself trust him, desire him, was beyond foolish.

Nonetheless, I couldn’t stop the feeling of comfort when I looked into his eyes, a warmth that was more than desire. As crazy as it was, my gut told me to trust him, at least for the moment, and I always listened to my gut.

Of course, the rational part of my brain tried to remind me, there was the question of what would happen if I didn’t. His eyes gave me comfort, but his body, this close to mine, didn’t only reignite the desire I had worked hard to squelch.