With a snort, she rolled her eyes. “Because I work with the overly protective big brother type? I don’t know.”
“Because Pick’s told them to,” I corrected. “You can’t tell me you haven’t noticed anything unusual these past few months since working at Forbidden. Prank phone calls. Problems with your car?”
She paused as if something had recently happened to her car. But then she scowled. “My car’s a piece of shit. It never works right. And everyone gets hang-ups now and again. I assure you, nothing has struck my radar as threatening.” She lifted her eyebrows. “And that includes you.”
I watched her, worry growing inside me. Turning her nose up in denial might be worse than if she’d just been blissfully unaware. Now she might purposely put herself into a sketchy situation just to prove no one was after her.
“Don’t do anything stupid,” I said. “Just keep it safe.”
Narrowing her eyes, she met my warning with a rebellious glare. “Well, aren’t you just the pot calling the kettle black.”
“Excuse me?”
“You stood there not thirty seconds ago and ranted to me about staying away from you so I could be safe, but now you’re turning it around and trying to tell me you moved in with me for safety’s sake. So I’m confused. Which is it? Are you the threat? Or really my bodyguard?”
“Both,” I said before meaning to blurt that out. I’d planned on keeping all other dangers away while trying to stay away from her myself in the process. Mumbling, I looked down. “I didn’t think we’d have quite this much contact with each other if we became roommates.”
I realized how stupid I sounded as soon as the words left my mouth.
She cracked off a harsh laugh. “I hate to break it to you, honey, but you’re bound to have the occasional contact with the person you live with.”
I shot her a petulant glare. “I didn’t think we’d...talk this much.”
Her shoulders deflated as pain filled her features. I bit the inside of my lip until I tasted blood, not meaning to hurt her…again.
But she pulled herself together, straightened her spine, and murmured, “Oh. I see.” Turning away from me, she left the room.
The hollow ache that filled my chest told me I’d fucked up. Bad.
“What…the fuck?” The back door to City’s car flew open.
What felt like a dozen hands reached in and grabbed me. They dragged me out before I could find my footing, and I would’ve gone down if they hadn’t kept yanking me along until I was well away from the car. Once they released me, I landed on my ass.
“Who the hell are you, and what’re you doing with my sister?”
In nothing but my boxer shorts, I looked up at City’s brothers and frowned in confusion. There were three guys looming over me. She only had two brothers.
“It’s that Parker fucker who was hanging around our backyard the day of the cotillion,” Max answered the other brother’s demand.
“He’s what?” Garrett boomed. “A Parker touched my little sister?” He grasped me by the hair and dragged me to my feet before punching me in the face.
It hurt like hell, might’ve even broken my nose, but I didn’t really blame him. If I’d caught one of them with my sister, I would’ve wanted to do the same thing.
Behind us, City screamed, “No! Leave him alone.”
My eyes watered and my entire face screamed in pain. But as I held my nose, feeling blood fill my palm I called, “It’s okay,” so she wouldn’t freak out too much.
“Oh, it’s not going to be okay for you at all, asshole,” Garrett assured me as he cracked his knuckles. “Tad, hold him still for me.”
As his friend grabbed me, he swung at me again. City screamed and tried to dive forward. I ducked my face to the side, but Garrett still grazed my jaw.
“No. I’m sorry. This is all my fault. Please don’t hurt him.”
“Felicity, shut up.” Max tried to stuff her back into the backseat. “Put your clothes on. We’ll take care of this.”
“I will not. You have no idea what’s going on.”
“Oh, I think the used condom lying right there makes it clear what just happened.”