Page 59 of Aftershock
Pressure builds in my head until my vision tinges red, my lungs burning.
Deep breath.
I’ll deal with it later.
“Maybe I will.” A wicked smirk tugs at her lips. “But not tonight. Actually, nothing can happen tonight since Hope and I are covering a few hours for the evening shift.”
“Absolutely not.” Protectiveness strains my muscles. “They’ll have to call in someone else. Or I’ll do it. Teach me what I need to know, and I’ll cover your shift.” Fuck Harold. Fuck my trials. Fuck my sleep too. “You’re going home at a decent hour.”
The whole time I’ve been talking, Lilith has stayed quiet. As if she’s been eating my speech up. Like she wants me, the man, not the doctor she remembers from back then, to say these things to her.
It should be infuriating how, with one long look, she reaches deep inside my soul.
This, too, feeds my obsession.
I want more.
“You don’t need to do that for me.” Delicate fingers pry my much larger ones off her neck.
“Yes, I do.” When I put my hand right back where it was, Lilith lets out a contented breath, like I passed her test. “I’m a fast learner. Teach. Me.”
“Alaric, seriously, it’s not the end of the world.” The edge in her tone sets off alarms in my head. “We’re leaving by eleven.”
A second ago, she gazed up at me like I hung the moon. Now she sounds like she wishes I’d back off?
What does she have to hide?
“I’ll be fine,” she adds.
So that’s what this is about. She isn’t trying to avoid me. She’s been handling everything on her own for so long, it seems, that she’s forgotten how to share the burden with anyone else.
“You’ve been on your feet for hours.” My thumb skims over her jawline, softer this time. I’m out of my mind with need, but I also want her to feel cherished, not forced. “Go home. Rest. I’ve got this.”
As the words land, she jerks her head back. Eyebrows flying up.
“I can take so much more than you give me credit for.”
“I didn’t mean for it to come out like that. I’m sorry.” I stay quiet until her expression softens. “I want to look after you, Lilith, not for any reason other than I care. And you’re going to let me.”
“Dictating what I can or cannot do and looking after me are two entirely different things.” She isn’t pushing mybuttons anymore. There’s defiance in her tone. A sliver of pain. “I love my job. I love my freedom. If I agreed to stay late, then I’m staying late.”
“Fine.” I’d argue, but she’s got a point. Even if it’s one that I don’t like. “At least tell me you have a car or you’re taking an Uber.”
“I won’t tell you a single thing other than that I live a few blocks away, so it’s not like anything will happen on my way home.” The conniving glimmer in her eyes, the one I’m starting to crave, is back. “And that we can exchange numbers, and I’ll text you once I get there. Deal?”
The fact that we’re neighbors gets me harder than a fucking rock for one full second.
Until she quirks an eyebrow once again, reminding me of her question.
No, no fucking deal.
Letting her and Hope wander out at night while I’m tucked away in my secure apartment isn’t going to work for me. At all. Which is why I’m going to stick around until eleven, then see to it that she gets home safe with my own two eyes.
“Deal,” I lie.
After she plugs her number into my phone, and I do the same with hers, I brush a kiss to her lips, promise to take her out this week, and turn to leave.
“Aren’t you forgetting something?” she calls out to me, even though there’s already a woman waiting in line.
