It’s hopeless. I’m hopeless, and now I’ve crossed a line with my boss. One I can’t retreat back over and pretend like nothing happened. I really like my job, and I’m sad that I have to walk away from it now.
“Please,” he moans, holding me tighter when I break our connection and take a step back.
He doesn’t lean in closer, doesn’t turn me and press me to the wall, taking exactly what he needs in an attempt to persuade me to his will. He doesn’t do anything but plead with his eyes when I wipe at my lips with the back of my hands.
“Owen,” I say softly. I can’t even look him in the eye, and the warm atmosphere turns chilly in an instant.Chapter 16Briar
The open sign is off in the clinic by the time I arrive, and Molly’s car is the only one left in the lot by the time I park across the street.
The man inside of me, the one I’ve always wanted to be but wasn’t destined to become wants her to find love, to make things work with the straight-laced vet. The devil in me, the one that strips her of every scrap of clothing each and every damn time I lay eyes on her, wants to make sure she’s safe, then burn the fucking clinic to the ground. The constant war inside of me is exhausting, draining me of the willpower I’ve collected over the last couple of months.
A flicker of movement draws my eyes to the second floor. They narrow immediately when I see the douche holding up a lighter. I’m close enough to see his lips moving as he scowls at the lighter. Fucker can’t light a damn cand—
The growl from my throat at the realization of what he’s doing rumbles in the empty cab of my truck. My blood heats, thickening in my veins when Molly steps up closer to him. Her mouth is teasing, eyes bright with mischief as she steps closer to him and places her hand over his mouth.
“Please don’t,” the devil in me hisses as she inches even closer.
My eyes dart from the window to the glove box. With quick movements, I hit the latch and pull out the glock, tucking it into the waistband of my jeans just in time to turn and see her pressing her lips to his.
Red.
It’s all I can see.
It’s the color of the only emotion I can manage right now.
The color of his blood when I shoot him between the eyes for touching my fucking girl.
I’m out of the truck and rushing to the front door of the clinic in seconds flat. Just before hitting the front steps, a quick decision carries me around to the back. He has to have another entrance, and even in my anger, I know kicking in the front door of the clinic while it’s still daylight outside is a very bad idea.
Images flash in my head as I stride around the building. Her coy smile. The glint in her eyes as she steps closer.
I stop in my tracks.
She closed the distance between the two of them.
She reached up and kissed him.
The knot in my throat is impossible to swallow.
She’s doing exactly what I urged her to do, exactly what I know in my heart she should do, the one single thing that will kill me if it comes to fruition.
I’m turning and back in my truck before I realize I’ve even moved. The key turns in the ignition, firing the Chevy to life. The gear shift is moved to drive, and it’s as if I’m having an out of body experience because it’s not my hands on the steering wheel or my foot on the gas pedal as I drive away from her. It can’t possibly be. I’d never leave her. I’d never drive away knowing she’s going to seduce him, give him what she’d wanted to give to me, what I turned down in the hallway last week.
Somehow through muscle memory and pure dumb fucking luck, I end up back at the clubhouse. Things don’t seem real until I’m sinking into one of the couches with a drink in my hand and a numbness in my throat that tells me it isn’t my first.
“Hitting it kinda early aren’t you?” TJ’s voice draws my attention, and I look over to find him with his eyes on my hand.
The bottle in my hand seems more appealing than the two fingers worth of whiskey in the other. I throw back the contents of the glass before dropping it heavily on the table in front of me.
“I saw Molly at the vet’s office today.” TJ is looking for an ass beating at the rate he’s going.
Ignoring him, I raise the bottle to my lips, drinking until I can’t breathe.
“She seems to like him, I mean likes working there.”