Chapter 4
Grant
I never bothered to turn on any lights. The semidarkness of the fading sun suited me. Instead, I just sat on my couch, nursing that second glass of whiskey.
Time passed, though I wasn’t really paying attention. Pain could do that to you—rip away any sense of self or time.
At some point, I heard the door to Cori’s house open, and I saw her through my darkened windows as she put out her trash. She was so casually beautiful; I couldn’t stop the thoughts I shouldn’t be having.
The boyfriend was there—I’d seen his truck out front.
He’d never given me any reason to dislike him the way that I did. It was a gut-level thing. Joel and I were never going to get along, and I chalked up my dislike to plain old jealousy.
I was a big enough man to admit that I was, in fact, jealous.
She looked over at my house, and worry crossed her expression. Why? What was there in my direction that caused her to worry? That was the last thing I wanted her to feel when she looked at me.
It only lasted for a second, and then she went back inside.
A long, slow sip of my whiskey, and I laid my head back on the couch. The drink was helping. But so was just…not moving. Hopefully this and a full night’s sleep would relieve the pressure and tomorrow would be better.
I closed my eyes, and a noise brought them open again, along with my instincts singing to life. Something was wrong, but I hadn’t been listening closely enough to identify what it was.
There. Raised voices coming from next door. Or just one raised voice. Male.
My body went entirely still.
Cori might be off-limits to me because of her relationship, but I was still her neighbor. And I wasn’t the kind of neighbor that would just let something like this happen without making sure she was okay.
Heaving myself off the couch, I ignored the pain and went to the window. Nothing looked wrong, but I still heard him yelling. It didn’t take more than a minute for him to come storming out, looking as if he’d just run a marathon.
The look on his face made me tense. That wasn’t just a man upset about something; that was pure rage. It was an expression I’d only seen on the faces of men about to lose it entirely.
What the hell happened in there? There was nothing I could imagine Cori doing that warranted the aura of hatred and near violence pouring off that man. He was carrying a bunch of things. What looked like clothes and a toothbrush.
My eyebrows rose. Were they breaking up? If that was what was happening, then I shouldn’t be intruding on their privacy. But I didn’t trust Joel. And Cori’s safety was more important to me than her privacy.
“You’re a pervert. I can’t believe that you would ever ask me for that,” Joel bellowed. He went back inside, and I heard Cori’s voice, though I couldn’t make out what she said.
“Yeah,” Joel yelled. “You’re disgusting. That stuff is unnatural.”
Cori came out on the porch. She was flushed too, but even from here, I could see she was miserable. Joel carried a couple of books to his truck and tossed them through the cab window. Never pegged him for much of a reader.
“If someone enjoys it, who are we to judge as long as it happens between two consenting adults?”
Wait, what?
“I don’t think about that sort of thing because I’m not some perverted freak,” he said, voice echoing off both our houses.
Cori wrapped her arms around herself. “Jesus, Joel. It’s not like I asked you to cut me up or beat me. This is not completely out of the norm.”
Hmm. Evidently Cori had wanted to get a little adventurous, and ol’ Joel had said no. Although, calling this temper tantrum “saying no” was kind of an understatement.
And hell, this man was an even bigger idiot than I’d originally thought.
My mind was now racing with the possibilities of what she’d asked him for and finding plenty of interesting options. She could ask me for each and every one of them, and none would make me react like Joel.
I’d dabbled in that world a little bit. Not nearly as much as some of my friends, but I wasn’t ashamed to like it. And Cori shouldn’t be either. The fact that this man was telling her what she wanted was shameful burned me up inside, no matter what it was.
“You’re disgusting,” Joel said, walking up the stairs toward her. “Perverted, and I cannot believe that I was ever with someone like you.”
The way Cori shrank into herself was something I would never forget. Her eyes were fixed on the ground, and her voice was steady, though her tone was miserable. “Just leave.”
“I’ll leave when I’m good and ready, after you forcing me to listen to your perverted fantasies.” He pulled open the screen door and went inside, letting it slam behind him.
Cori swiped at her face, brushing away tears that I couldn’t see at this distance in the deepening evening.
“You know what?” Joel said, coming back out of the house with a bunch of random shit in his hands. It looked like a picture and a stuffed animal. A couple smaller things.
Fuck,those were gifts he’d given her. What an asshole.
“You’ll be lucky if I don’t tell your whole fucking family the kinky shit you’re into. Wonder what they’d do if they knew their daughter was a freak? Even more than not following in the family business, that their precious little girl wants to—” He cut himself off as if he was too disgusted to even say it.
Cori was fully crying now. Even I could see that. But she straightened her back. “You’ve made your point, Joel. Now, leave. Get the hell out.”
Brave girl.
Joel’s face contorted into anger, and as soon as he took a step toward her, I was moving. Pushing open the front door to my house and making sure I wasn’t limping in the slightest. It only took me a few seconds to make my way into the light.
He froze when he saw me appear.
I crossed my arms. “I think the lady asked you to leave.”
“What are you going to do about it, cowboy?”
Joel and I had met a couple of times, but I’d seen more of him than he had of me. Because my training had made sure I was aware of potential threats. Even before tonight, my subconscious had labeled him as one.
I knew by the way he held himself that he was more of a bully than a trained fighter. He was all talk.
I casually walked down my steps, holding my breath against the pain. “Not a cowboy,” I said. “Just a good neighbor. One who will use his SEAL training to make sure you leave. Because the minute she asked you to and you didn’t, you became a trespasser.”
“Well, aren’t you a Boy Scout,” Joel said with a sneer. “This is none of your business.”
I leveled a stare at him. “Your fight isn’t my business, but if you think I’m going to let you intimidate or hurt a woman while I’m around, you’d best rethink that strategy.”
He snorted in disgust. “Fuck you.” Then he looked back at Cori. “And I’ll definitely never fuck you again.”
I didn’t look to see her reaction. I wanted to know if she was okay, but I sure as hell wasn’t taking my eyes off an opponent while he could still do damage. Joel was still angry. It was written in every line of his body. But he got the message, and he pulled out of the driveway, burning rubber as he took off.
I stayed there for long seconds, making sure he wasn’t going to come back, before I looked over at Cori. She was still frozen on the porch, eyes locked on me. Her arms were wrapped around her middle as if they were the only thing holding her together.
Shit.
My concern for her physical well-being had been so prominent, I hadn’t thought about whether Cori would be embarrassed to have a witness to an intensely personal argument. Of course she would be. That asshole had just spilled one of her most vulnerable secrets, and I’d shoved myself right in the middle of it.
“Cori—”
She shook her head and turned, fleeing back into the house, door closing behind her with a brutal finality.
Guess we wouldn’t be talking about any of this tonight.
I limped back into the house and went straight up to my bedroom, leaving the remnants of my unfinished whiskey behind.