As if she could feel my gaze on her, Lucy turned her head and those dark eyes collided with my own. Her smile grew bigger, those beautiful nearly-black eyes filling with a warm welcome. I didn’t return her smile, unable to control the muscles in my face when I was so consumed with the green monster churning inside of me.
Her eyes lost some of their warmth, her smile dimming a few watts. Her gaze moved over me, taking in my clenched fists, tense shoulders, and tight face. “Hey,” she said when I reached her, her voice full of cautious concern. “What’s the matter?”
“How long have you been here?” I demanded, knowing I sounded like a dick but not giving a damn.
She shrugged. “Only a few minutes. You said you were busy so I didn’t want to bother you.”
“Not that damn busy.” Never so busy that I would just sit in my office when my girlfriend was out with some other guy. A guy I didn’t fucking know.
Lucy’s shoulders tensed at my tone and she shot the guy sitting quietly beside her a grim smile. “Will you excuse me a minute, Caleb?”
“Yeah, sure, Lu.” Blue eyes filled with concern and my need to punch that asshole doubled. What did he think I was going to do, beat her? “Will you be okay?”
She stood, her shoulders squared and determined, but she gave the guy a reassuring smile. “I can handle this. You hang out here with Marcus.” She nodded toward the other couch where Marcus was sitting, a glass of soda in hand as he watched me through emotionless eyes. “I’ll be back in a few minutes. If you want anything, just let Nate know. I always have an open tab here.”
“Lucy…we can go if you want. I don’t want to cause any trouble.”
I reached out and caught hold of Lucy’s wrist, tight enough to let her know that I wasn’t about to let her go anytime soon but not so tight that it would hurt her. Without a word to the two men sitting on the couches, I pulled her with me as I turned back toward the elevator.
My fingers were right over her pulse and I could feel how fast her heart was beating. I glanced at her out of the corner of my eye as the elevator began to descend. She was pissed. Good. Let her be pissed.
As soon as the doors opened, she jerked her arm out of my hold and stormed off the elevator. I took my time exiting, watching her closely as I stepped out. Her hands were on her hips, her head tipped back as she glared at the ceiling. Her chest lifted and lowered rapidly, attesting to her rising anger.
The elevator doors quietly closed and it was like the trigger to set her off. “What the hell was that about?” she demanded, nostrils flaring and mouth tightening.
“What the hell are you doing here with some other guy, Lucy?” I countered. “You said you were going out with friends, plural. Not some guy I’ve never even met.”
“Are you insane?” Her voice rose as she took a step closer. “You’re just going to jump to conclusions, automatically assume I’m out on a date or something, and rip into me like I’m the bad guy here?”
“You’re out with another guy, Lucy.”
“I’m out with a friend, you asshat. Caleb is Kin’s stepbrother. He and his twin sister are in town for a little while, to spend the holiday with Kin. She couldn’t go out with them tonight because stupid Georgia got her grounded. I offered to take the twins out, but Angie couldn’t make it.” She gave me a disgusted look and turned away. “I wasn’t out doing something to be ashamed of, damn it.”
Some of my possessive jealousy began to simmer down and I started to see things a little more clearly. As the red haze slowly faded, I realized that I’d just messed up. More like fucked up, by the look on her face. She was upset and I’d caused it.
Fucking hell.
“Lucy…” I took a few steps closer, reaching out to touch her shoulders, but she turned around and my hand dropped to my side at the look in her eyes. I swallowed hard. “Sweetness—”
“Don’t you trust me? Have I done anything to make you think I would ever cheat on you?”
I didn’t know how to answer that. I’d never thought about it, never considered the possibility that something like this would ever occur. My jealousy had only reared its head a few times when I’d seen other guys trying to flirt with her and that had been before we’d moved things from friends to an actual relationship.
Raking both hands through my hair, I turned away from her, trying to figure out the jumble of emotions rocking through my body now that the jealousy that had infected my head was starting to dissipate.
“Harris?” Her voice was softer now, her anger seeming to have evaporated and now all I could hear was hurt. “Do you trust me?”
“Yes,” I told her without turning around. “I trust you.” As the words left my mouth I realized that they were the truth.
“So why did you act like that?” I heard her moving a moment before her hands touched my back. Some of the tension eased from my shoulders and my head slumped. “Talk to me, Harris. I can’t understand what’s wrong if you don’t tell me.”
“Tiny told me you were here with some guy and I saw you on my security feed sitting with him. You were laughing and he was eating you alive with his eyes.” I blew out a frustrated breath and turned to face her. Capturing her hands with one of my own, I placed them on my chest and wrapped my other arm around her waist, pulling her against me. “I’ve never been jealous before you, Lucy. Never. No one has ever meant enough to me to produce that kind of emotion. It’s new and kind of terrifying and I lost it.”
She melted against me, making my body instantly react to the feel of her soft pressed to my hard. “I love you, Harris. For me that means you are it. I don’t want anyone else. I would never—not ever—cheat on you. Not by going on a date with another guy, or kissing him, and especially not by actually having sex with him.”
I lowered my head until my forehead was pressed against hers. “I know that,” I breathed. “Doesn’t stop me from turning into a rage monster thinking about some other asshole looking at what is mine.”
A soft laugh escaped her lips and the rest of my tension faded completely. Only she could do this to me—make me so mental that I couldn’t see straight one minute and then turn me back into a human with just a touch and a musical little laugh. The way she made me feel, the control she had over my emotions like that, should have terrified me. Oddly enough it didn’t, though.