I crossed my arms under my breasts and glowered at him. “I’m not seven years old anymore, Zeus. And don’t tell me you haven’t noticed, because you have.”
His beautiful mouth twisted into a sneer as he landed a heavy palm on the table and leaned close. “Yeah, I fuckin’ noticed ’cause I’m a man with goddamn eyes and any man—monk, eunuch or married—is gonna get off on the sighta those tits, that ass, and a waist that spans one fuckin’ hand and not think about touchin’ ya. Difference is, I don’t wanna touch you. I don’t even wanna fuckin’ think about it.”
“Because you’re tempted?” I whispered, my hope like a dove struggling to take flight in my chest.
“Nah, ’cause I’m a man. The kinda man that needs a woman to satisfy him. Little girls, however stacked, don’t do it for me and, Lou? They never will so kill that hope in your eyes. I quit talkin’ to ya before because of these little girls dreams and I’ll do it again, you don’t obey my rules.”
Ouch.
I tried not to let the colossal amount of hurt radiating through my chest crack through my eyes and let the tears spill through but it was a monumental effort that left me strangely breathless.
“Got it,” I murmured.
The heartbreak of his words was that he spoke the truth. The man sitting across from me was all man, from the top of his wild mass of gold dipped brown waves to the tips of his heavy motorcycle boots and the ends of his deeply calloused fingers. He smoked, drank, marauded and fucked like he was on Death Row, like every single moment counted more than the next.
Who was I to claim a man like that?
I closed my eyes as I took a deep breath to settle the ruckus of insecurity that surged through my mind.
I was Louise Lafayette and that obedient, sad excuse for a woman didn’t deserve a man like Zeus Garro.
But, I thought with sudden verve, Loulou Fox could give him a run for his money.
So, I opened my eyes and knew they burned on his skin as I said, “Fine, no touching. But you never said you couldn’t touch me, and I’m telling you now, Z, I’m going to do everything in my power to make these tits, this ass and this tiny waist as tempting to you as possible.”
He stared at me for a long minute, inscrutable and arbitrating like the God of Olympus on his throne casting judgment on a mortal. And then, to my utter surprise and delight, he threw back his great mane of hair exposing his corded brown throat in the process, and laughed.
The sound was just as rich and warm as I remembered from my childhood and I let it wash over me as I stared at his throat and thought I’d never known how sexy an Adam’s apple could be.
“Finished?” I asked snottily when he finally wiped the tears from his eyes with the back of a hand.
“Don’t figure I’ll ever finish bein’ surprised havin’ you back in my life,” he said through his grin. “Can’t believe little Loulou just threw down with me.”
“You bet your ass, I did,” I said with a defiant chin tilt. “I’m not a kid anymore, Zeus Garro. And with or without you, this is who I am and I’m in this world to stay.”
“Then it’ll fuckin’ well be with me,” he growled, his smile so quickly replaced with a scowl that I lost balance and leaned toward him. “Hear this, little girl, you got what you wanted, yer guardian monster is back but this time, he’s teachin’ ya how to keep the monsters at bay yourself so when the time comes that you no longer need me, you’ll be good.”
I rolled my lips under my teeth and held out my hand to secure his promise with a shake. His eyes sparked with humor as his huge, rough hand engulfed my own and then his lips stretched into an arrogant grin when the warm contact made me shiver but I didn’t say anything.
I was too busy thinking, Game on, Zeus.
Zeus.
To say my life was a fucking mess would have been an understatement of epic fucking proportions.
I was elbow deep in blood, debt and drugs, none of them my own and all of them fucking poison. Just ’cause they weren’t mine personally didn’t mean they weren’t my problem.
The Fallen MC had a problem, it meant I had a problem. And right now, we had a big fuckin’ problem.
The Nightstalkers were back.
Cut off the head of the beast and three more grow back, right?
’Cause it seemed that no matter, I’d sliced up the bastard in charge less than a year ago, the fuckin’ MC was back and still lookin’ to take over my operation.
I’d bled, sweat and fuckin’ killed for The Fallen, for the success of each of my brothers and there was no way in heaven or hell I’d hand over shit to those fuckers.