“Um…” The loud voices carried over her as bodies moved by her in a blur. Sure, it was easy to jump to conclusions about why he’d left. Deep in her heart, a little flutter wanted to believe that Maddox had decided for himself that the rules of the game needed to change. That maybe they could see where this relationship would take them. “Do you know why he left?” she asked.
“I can’t say for sure,” Greyson said, then took a swig of his beer before turning to face her more fully and giving her a knowing look. “But I would think that seeing you in the arms of another man might have had something to do with it.”
She blinked. “Why?”
Grey arched an eyebrow at her. “Why would seeing you with another guy bother him?”
“Yes, exactly. Why?” she repeated firmly, holding her ground, wanting answers from someone who was clearly close to Maddox.
Grey took another sip of beer, watching her closely before he put his glass down on the bar and answered her. “To be honest, if I know one thing about Maddox, it’s that he doesn’t share well. Tonight, he had to share you with others in a way he hasn’t since you two reconnected.”
That didn’t make any sense. “I thought he didn’t date. How can you know that about him?”
“I wasn’t born yesterday,” Grey said, giving her a grin. “Maddox may not date, but I’ve had personal experience in my life with jealous boyfriends, and if the flare of nostrils wasn’t an indicator that he couldn’t stand seeing you with that guy, I don’t know what is.”
She gave him a look and folded her arms. “But he’s not my boyfriend, so your theory doesn’t add up.”
Grey leaned forward, staring at her as if willing her to see something she couldn’t see yet. “Maybe that’s the problem.” He grabbed his beer and tilted the tip of the glass toward her. “Maybe he should be.”
* * *
The pub’s door shut behind him with a bang, and the night was darker than it’d been in a while, mostly due to the cloud cover from the rainy day. Maddox moved toward his car waiting for him in the parking lot. The air felt moist from the obvious rainfall that had happened while he was in the pub, and he wouldn’t have minded some drops of rain to fall on him to cool him off. Since that didn’t happen, he planned to go on a drive to clear his goddamn head.
Pull it together, Hunt.
For fuck’s sake, he’d come all too close to removing that guy’s hands off Joss in front of a pub full of cops. An epic fucking disaster, considering he’d get suspended in a heartbeat, and her reputation was on the line. He couldn’t forget that little detail in all this. No matter what lay between them, their jobs were an issue that remained.
He tilted his head up to the sky and drew in the moist air, trying to get a handle on things. On one hand, he wanted to end this with Joss and put him out of his goddamn misery. Things between them were becoming complicated. Too complicated. At first, his hunger for her had him overlooking how professionally risky she was. Now, she was making him emotional. And that could only lead to him getting suspended, or worse.
On the other hand, the thought of letting her go and never touching her again gutted him. There was no way he could walk away now. His plan to shed his need for her had failed. He’d become a full-out junkie, and he knew something between them had to change, or he was going to fuck up in a tremendous way.
He lowered his head, sure the air was thicker and far harder to draw in, when he closed in on his car. Tight and tense, he rolled his shoulders, stretching out the muscles where the stress simmered. He reached into his pocket, taking out his car keys, and right as he pressed the button on his key fob to open the doors, a soft voice broke the silence.
“Why are you leaving?”
He planted his feet hard on the ground while he returned his keys to his pocket. Overwhelmed by the hot emotions swirling inside him, he pressed his hands against his car and shut his eyes, letting the coolness of the metal shed some of the heat from within. He didn’t want to face her now. He didn’t trust himself with her, not when she’d want answers.
Answers that he wasn’t prepared to give her.
“Maddox.”
Her soft voice brushed across him again, weaving its way through him to where no woman had ever touched before. She stood right behind him, but he didn’t have to look to see that, he could feel her there. And it fucked with his goddamn head. He wanted her. All of her. Every fucking inch of her until she couldn’t give him any more.
Everything was wrong, and yet it was also so very right.