Staring at him, sleepy and confused, I suddenly understood that mask. It slotted into place when he was hiding something important from me.

“Which would mean, of course,” I kept blurting, “that you would never darken my door.”

The mask fell away instantly and he grinned, huge, his dimples popping out and dang, it killed me, but I had to admit I really missed those dimples. Then he twisted his torso and I was on my back in the couch, his upper half on top of me, my h*ps in his hips, my legs dangling over the back.

His fingers trailed my hairline and tucked my hair behind my ear as he went on. “What’s next?”

I felt my eyes get squinty. “Why are you asking me this?”

“What’s next, Gwen?”

“I’m still sleepy,” I dodged.

His face came closer and his thumb stroked my jaw when he whispered his demand, “Baby, what’s next?”

God!

Okay, he wanted to play this game, whatever. I’d play.

“Meredith being my real mom not my stepmom.”

He nodded and his thumb swept my lower lip. “What’s next?”

“You want to clue me in, Hawk?” I requested.

“What’s next?”

Apparently, he didn’t.

“There isn’t anything next,” I declared.

“Bullshit, Sweet Pea, a woman who wants a pair of seven hundred dollar shoes, she’s gotta have a next.”

“A diamond bracelet from Tiffany’s,” I replied then went back on it. “No! Wait. Leo to get Cam an engagement ring then a diamond bracelet from Tiffany’s.”

His head dipped and his mouth touched mine before he moved back and murmured, “All right, baby, that’ll do for now.”

What’ll do? And for now?

No. No. I didn’t want to know.

Time to move on.

“Since you’re here and don’t appear to intend to leave anytime soon, I might as well ask you something,” I announced and got another grin. “Tack says that things have cooled with Ginger. Does your intel confirm that I’m safe?”

“Ginger’s gone to ground,” Hawk repeated Tack’s words. “Darla, Skeet and Fresh were facing kidnapping charges and luckily they all signed confessions so they won’t breathe free for awhile. This is good because it’s good. This is also good because their incarceration is an added deterrent to anyone who might think of f**kin’ with you. Lee entered the game which is further inducement for someone to avoid f**kin’ with you. But, no, you’re not safe.”

Dammit!

“So I take it that means I can’t go to the grocery store.”

“You can go to the grocery store but you’ll do it with one of my boys at your back.”

My body froze under his and my heart slid into my throat.

Then I forced out, “No.”

His hand at my neck moved so his thumb could lightly stroke my throat.

“Brett’s recovering, babe,” he whispered. “It’ll take time but it’ll be a full recovery.”

“No more of your boys at my back.”

“Gwen.”

“No, Hawk,” I denied, made a decision and then proclaimed, “I’m buying a gun.”

He burst out laughing at my words, no hesitation, like they were beyond hilarious and I glared at him. “I’m not joking.”

He controlled his laughter and stated, “Babe, you want a gun, I’ll give you one but you won’t be let loose on the unsuspecting population of Denver until I train you how to use it and you get comfortable with it, so no gun.”

“I don’t need your permission to buy a gun, Hawk.”

“Yeah you do, Gwen, seein’ as you’re livin’ in Badass World now.”

“Well, I’m taking a vacation from Badass World and visiting Zip’s Gun Emporium,” I shot back.

He smiled at me, dimples and all. Then he changed the subject.

“We’re goin’ out tonight.”

Oh no we were not.

“No we’re not. It’s cosmos at Cam’s tonight.”

“Then I’ll take you there and bring you home.”

That’s when I made another decision.

“No, I’m spending the night so I can get as drunk as I want.”

“Babe, warned you about that shit.”

Something about that pissed me off. Likely it was the reminder of how the us we came to be used to be. Something he seemed totally okay with resuming and something I was really not okay with.

In other words, that was when my mouth ran away from me.

“Yes, you did, but you did that before you destroyed me. See, Scott crushed me but you destroyed me. It was just a week, I know that so here’s something to freak you out. You got it wrong, in only a week I was already tied to you. I was already in deep. It was only a week but it happened, you didn’t see it and you went in for the kill. So I’m getting from you that you’ve had a chance to rethink things. But for me, you not reading how precious it was, what I gave you, and even for self-preservation’s sake walking all over that is a red flag, Hawk. And that red flag says to me it could happen again and I’ve had enough in my life, I don’t need any more of that shit.”

“I’m not your f**kwad ex, babe, my shit’s not about bangin’ any woman I can to prove I’m a man,” he returned and I noticed he looked just about as pissed as me.

“I’m aware of that, Hawk, that doesn’t change the fact you walked all over me.”

“I didn’t, Gwen, I explained that shit to you then and again last night. And, newsflash, Sweet Pea, outside my family, you’re the only one in Denver who knows anything about it.”

Wow. Interesting.

So interesting, I gave a little but I didn’t give in.

“Okay, I understand where you’re coming from but can you at least take a second to understand where I’m coming from?”

And it would appear, from a response that gutted me, that I was so deep in my own efforts at self-preservation that I wasn’t paying enough attention and I vastly underestimated just how pissed off Cabe “Hawk” Delgado was.

“I know where you’re comin’ from and what I see is that you haven’t dropped that hand, Gwen, and you never did. I came clean and you’re usin’ some seriously bad shit against me to fend me off. He taught you curl up tight and keep everything out. You threw it in my face that I called you on what it would mean, you don’t take a risk on me. Now, you’re blinded to the fact that you’re doin’ the same f**kin’ thing I was but I’m strugglin’ to get passed it and move on. But you, babe, not you. You’re hell bent on holdin’ on. My wife and daughter were murdered, Gwen, and I found myself, eight years later, in the same f**kin’ mess with a woman who had a sibling that put her in extreme danger. I took that risk and in a week, I was so tied to you, I was in so deep, I faced that shit again, was confronted with the possibility of that kind of loss, I couldn’t deal.”