Page 35 of Break Me Not

But this time I didn't push and followed her out of my now-destroyed apartment instead.

“Did you eat?” she asked as we got into the elevator.

I tried not to make it obvious that I was putting space between us, but the elevator was so small that I was practically pushed against the metal wall.

“Um, we had breakfast, but it's been a few hours. But I'm not hungry. It's okay. We can just go to your office first.”

The elevator door closed, and she was looking at me. Heat continued to rise to my cheeks. The space felt like it was closing in. I was all too aware that with just a simple movement, we would be touching.

God, what the fuck is wrong with me? Why is she affecting me so much?

“What?” I asked as she continued to look at me.

Jax let out a chuckle and reached over me to press the button for the parking garage. I couldn't help but inhale the scent of her cologne.

“Your mind somewhere else today?” She said it in an almost flirtatious tone.

“Just tired and… overwhelmed,” I answered honestly.

Her face changed to one of understanding.

“Let's stop and get you something then. Anything you want. My treat.”

“Anything?”

“You name it. It's the least I can do.”

My stomach churned, but I couldn't ignore the fact that I was truly hungry.

And if she was offering, I might as well take her up on it.

Jax

“No. Absolutely not.”

Her bite of pizza was still in her mouth, red sauce smudging it, when she spoke the words. She looked positively homely as she held up her second slice.

I loved every moment of it. Us being so close. The normalcy of it.

If I put everything else on my mind aside, I could pretend this was just the two of us out on a date. But I was quickly brought back to reality by how disagreeable she was being.

Disagreeable was putting it mildly. She was vehemently against my idea.

“We ran out of safe houses,” I explained. No matter how much I wanted her by my side, this wasn't something I would lie about. We had doubled our clients in the last few months, and while a lot of the teams ran on autopilot, there were complications that involved getting safe houses. “And, let's be honest, you're not going to buy a house within the next few days.”

She gave me a look. I wanted so badly to reach over and brush her hair behind her ear. I felt like this was the first time I was seeing her.

We had gotten really close at the club, but now I was able to indulge myself in taking her in in the daylight.

“But your house? Are you forgetting everything—” She stopped herself, looking around before she dropped her voice into a whisper. “That's a bad idea, and we both know it.”

It was a god-awful idea. It would be torture for me to have her so close and not be able to do anything about it. Unless she allowed it to happen. Which I knew she wanted, and that was why she was rejecting this so harshly.

If she were any other client, I wouldn't have offered. So even if my own bias and wants were coming to play here, I would allow myself this selfishness.

I tried to justify it by telling myself that it would truly help her, but the evil voice in the back of my head kept reminding me how nice it would be to have her right next door.

I’d given her a couple of days to process everything. I would've given her more if her apartment hadn’t been broken into. But her ex forced my hand, and now we had no time to waste. We had to act.