Page 68 of Sexting the Boss
He reaches for my wrist.
It happens fast enough that my brain lags. Suddenly his fingers are wrapped around me, tight and familiar and wrong in a way that makes my breath stutter.
“Don’t touch me,” I say.
“Lower your voice,” he snaps. “You don’t want to make a scene.”
I pull back, but he tightens his grip. Panic spikes, sharp and immediate, and I hate how quickly my body remembers.
Then Ethan’s voice cuts through it.
“Get your hand off her.”
The room changes.
I turn and see Ethan a few steps away, posture relaxed but eyes locked on the man holding me. The relief hits so hard it scares me, because I didn’t ask him to be here, and now I don’t know what this costs.
The man scoffs. “This doesn’t concern you.”
Ethan doesn’t look at him. “It does.”
The grip on my wrist tightens. “She’s busy.”
Ethan moves in close and peels his fingers off me one by one, slow and controlled, like he’s dismantling something he understands too well. I feel the pressure leave my skin and realize my hand is shaking.
The deli goes quiet.
The man squares up, puffed and angry, like this is a performance he knows. “Back off. This is between me and her.”
Ethan stands between us without touching me, and that small choice matters more than he knows.
“No,” he says. “It isn’t.”
The man lunges.
It’s chaos for half a second. A shove. A crash against the counter. Someone yells. I grab Ethan’s arm.
“Stop,” I say. “Please.”
He stops immediately.
That almost undoes me.
The man backs away, swearing, pointing, promising things I don’t listen to, then he’s gone, swallowed by the noise and movement like he was never here.
My wrist aches. My chest feels tight. Everything feels too exposed.
Ethan turns to me. “Are you okay.”
“I didn’t ask you to do that,” I say, and my voice shakes despite my effort.
“He grabbed you.”
“I was handling it.”
“He doesn’t get to touch you.”
“You don’t get to decide that for me,” I snap, because the fear has nowhere else to go.
