“I already let you in,” I whispered my reminder and I saw a shadow pass through his eyes before he replied.

“Yeah, darlin’, you did but after you came, you looked at me like I was the only guy in the whole f**kin’ world and then you called me Jake.”

“I thought that was your name,” I defended and his hand at my neck and arm around me gave me a squeeze.

“I know that but when I’m inside you, I wanna hear you say my name. That was between us then, for me. And now that’s gone. I wanna clear the path of what might be between us for you. Can you get that?”

That was when my mouth suddenly formed the words, “Who’s Darla?”

The heavy warmth of his mood disappeared in an instant and the static came back.

“What the f**k?” he asked softly.

“Who’s Darla?” I repeated.

His eyes narrowed and his jaw turned to stone before he clipped out, “Who told you about Darla?”

I stared at him. Then I decided what I saw I did not like.

Then I whispered, “Right,” and started pushing again.

This didn’t go well for me mainly because he let me go with one arm only to lean us both to the side to put his beer on the table then he whipped me around so I was on my back in my couch and he was not only on top of me but also his h*ps were between mine.

Our last position wasn’t conducive to us having an intense chat about the future of our relationship in a way where he couldn’t boggle my mind with his hotness, sexiness and outspoken honesty but this one was way worse.

“I’ll ask again, Tess,” he growled. “Who told you about Darla? Was it Elvira?”

“Um…” I mumbled, his eyes narrowed so I rushed on. “She was at the shower with her girls and one of those girls was a lady called Gwen. Gwen told me.”

His neck bent back so his eyes could look over my head and he snarled, “Fuck. ”

“Brock –” I started and his eyes sliced back to me.

“Who Darla is, is not you,” he bit out.

“But –”

“No, Tess, she is not you. I told you earlier I liked my job for the four months it meant me bein’ with you. Suffice it to say, I did not at all like my job when the only play I had to make was bein’ with her.”

“You’re hot,” I said softly.

“What?” he clipped roughly.

“You’re hot,” I repeated. “I can see this. I can see them sending you in when they –”

“Unh-unh,” he shook his head, pressing his body into mine as the electricity snapped and sparked through the room. “I am not the DEA’s resident prostitute with a dick,” he growled.

“The play I made with Darla was my choice, a long job, a sacrifice I decided I had to make

‘cause the life I was livin’ bein’ under that cover I had to get out of. It was sucking me under.

It was suffocating me. That shit, those people I had to spend time with, no contact with clean air, decent living, good folk, it was dragging me down. I had to make a statue of liberty play and I made it. And the f**k of it was, I made that sacrifice and the whole thing got f**ked in a bad way, Tess, where I had to watch those morons take a good man down and almost take him out. You were not that. My assignment with you was light cover. Getting close. Nosing around. They investigated your finances, your bakery and they knew you were less likely a suspect involved in his operation and more likely a possible witness and knew he was jacked but the amount of communication and your name on his accounts, they had to be sure. I took it where it went because after about an hour with you I knew you were clean and I knew where I wanted to take it after the investigation was over. I came in late on this one because I’d just come off that last one. And when I took that job, you were the light of a warm, sunny day, Tess. Darla was the dead of a cold, dark f**kin’ night.” His face got close and his voice got low when he finished, “It felt good to feel the sun again.”

I stared into his glittering eyes.

Then my mouth whispered, “Your job is pretty intense, Slim.”

He stared into my eyes. Then the sparks disappeared, the warmth invaded and he rolled to his side, back to the back of the couch, taking me with him, his arms tight around me, his legs tangling with mine.

“Yeah, baby, it is. And it can f**k with your head. That’s why when I met a woman whose house always smells like there’s a cake in the oven, who holds tight and presses her tits to my back when she’s with me on my bike, who looks at me like I can make the rest of the world melt away and for her its only me, I know I wanna hold onto that woman.”

To those sensational, warm gushiness inducing words, I blurted, “It’s in my belly.”

I watched him do a slow blink before he asked, “What?”

“It’s tight, a poisonous snake curled up tight. It can get really small, so small, I forget it’s there. But when it uncurls, it swells and gets so big it fills me up, crawls up my throat, so deep up my throat, Brock, sometimes I think it’s going to choke me and, when it starts uncurling, I’m always terrified it’s gonna strike.”

One of his hands slid up into my hair and the skin around his eyes got soft before he whispered, “What he left you?”

“Yeah,” I whispered back.

I watched him lift his chin as his fingers sifted into my hair against my scalp and then he shoved my face in his throat.

And when he spoke again, his voice was thick, thick in a way I knew what that meant, thick in a way I knew what it meant to me and I pushed closer to his long, lean body as he asked, “You gonna work that shit out?”

“I…” His hand tensed on my head and my fingers curled into his tee before I whispered,

“Yeah.”

“You gonna let me help?”

I closed my eyes.

Then I repeated my whispered, “Yeah.”

His arms got tight, drawing me close and I held on.

“You scared, baby?” he asked.

I didn’t repeat my “yeah”, I just nodded.

His arms got tighter and his voice got thicker as I felt his neck bend and his lips say against my hair, “Don’t be. There’s a wild that’s f**ked and there’s a wild that’s just, plain wild. You just hooked yourself to a different kind of wild, Tess, and I swear, baby, swear, ”

his arms squeezed before he finished, “I’ll show you that’s a good, safe place to be.”

I sighed deep and I did this because I believed him.