A Brutal Tenderness (8 page)

I watch Clearwater speak with Jewell, fully embracing his role
as Brad. The thunder of his expression tells me she did tell
someone.

Why Dec?
I know he likes her. If Jewell wasn’t the subject, maybe
there’d be more. I contemplate this, and as if on eerie cue, his
dark eyes raise and meet mine.

I see the subtle signal there and react automatically. “I’ll
take it from here, Gunner,” I say, using his alias with ease. Dec
and I have done this dance before.

Clearwater’s in his role, his eyes narrowing on me, and I
return the heat. Not even having to reach too deep to behave
as though I’d rather not see her around Dec. I don’t. However, I
like it more than when Maverick is around. Dec’s the lesser of
the two evils.

“You know Castile?” Dec asks Jewell, her face saying she
does. That same face begs me not to say that we’re more than
acquaintances. I almost laugh out loud at that. Her face is so
full of expression I wonder if she realizes everyone can see
down to her toenails.

I study Jewell in her flush of nervousness and can still taste
her skin on my tongue. I want to taste more of her. Like a true
addict, you can never have enough. Even when you know it’s
doing you in, you beg for more.

Dec lays it on thick, dropping the speech I know he’s
normally capable of and shrouds himself easily in the persona
of Brad. “Jess here says she knows you, dude, but acts like she
doesn’t want to, if you dig my meaning.”

I smirk as we do the dance, and Jewell mistakes our intimate
understanding as the potential for violence.
See? She does somehow know who I am . . .
Jewell puts a hand on Dec’s arm, and his expression softens
when he looks at her. A frown settles on my face. Yeah,
Clearwater would dig her if it wasn’t for the assignment.
And me.
“It’s okay, Brad. He helped. Okay?”
Boy, did I. I get turned on remembering Jewell pressed
against that wall.
Her large eyes plead with me not to mention our interlude,
and I don’t, even though I feel like peeing in corners to mark
my territory. “He won’t let anything happen to me,” Jewell says
in a loaded comment as her eyes meet mine.
I glance at her, then to Clearwater.
Clearwater lets it go and says, “Treat her right, Castile.”
“I’ll treat her how she wants to be treated.” I lock eyes with
Jewell in silent challenge and listen to her sharp intake of
breath. A light flush infuses the skin of her face, and I know it
turns her on when I say what I’ll do. What I know she wants
without her asking. Then I add softly and with promise, “Won’t
I?”
I’m not asking for a response, I’m demanding one.
The flush deepens on her fair complexion. “Yes,” she answers
softly.
Clearwater just shakes his head and gives a small wave to
Jewell as he walks off, leaving her with me.
Jewell looks at me. Fear and anticipation are mixed on her
flushed face, her expressive eyes tracking me.
Like a lamb that spies a wolf.

I know she’ll follow. Something inside me begs for her
obedience, that she submit her trust to me. I don’t analyze that.
Jewell’s been hiding, and I selfishly want her to sacrifice the safe
anonymity of the last two years for the heat that’s between us.

My strides take me to the main hall, where the doors swing
wildly as students pour in and out, an intersection of human
flesh. I hit the door with the flat of my palm, narrowly missing
a geek type by a fraction of an inch.

I hate myself for wanting her, for jeopardizing the
assignment. I’m pretty sure what I have in mind is what
Marshal O’Rourke was thinking about when he gave the green
light for engagement.

Jewell is slowing, not following me like I want, and I prowl
back to her as the students move around us like a choked river
of bodies, their gear and purses, backpacks, and the rest jostling
us like debris in the water.

I can tell Jewell is working up to tell me something big
when I reach her.
“I can’t date you,” she says, the words like a small volcano
erupting.
This is so perfect I almost fuck it up, the opening I’m
looking for right there for the taking.
“Who said I want that?” I ask, scorn in my voice.
Jewell’s thrown off by that, and I smile.
Gotcha.
She assumes I’m sniffing around her like a stud dog after a
bitch.
I am. But I’m not going to make it easy.
“What?” she asks, bewildered. My stance is completely
different from her expectation. “Did I misunderstand
something?”
No, she didn’t, actually. That’s the problem. Jewell
understands me too well.
The crowd thins as we stare at each other, so close we can
touch. Keeping the distance is painful, like fighting a magnet.
I step into that electric current between us, and Jewell
actually makes a sound of relief when she exhales. It’s
everything I can do not to sweep her against me right then.
I hang on by a thread. It’s gotta be her. All Jewel. I ask softly,
“What about just fucking?”
She flinches as if I hit her. I stand my ground as my palms
tremble in an effort to be this close to a woman I want this
badly.
But might not have.
Jewell shakes her head, and small wisps of hair softly curl
around the delicate line of her jawbone. “I can’t believe you
just said that here.” And she begins to walk away to her class. I
follow her.
I can see the flushed skin at her nape. When Jewell reaches
her physics class, she turns, and we’re no longer sharing the hall
with anyone.
Jewell should be in class, but she’s intrigued by my offer of
no-strings sex. It keeps her in my protection and will feed the
fire that burns endlessly. For her.
And, apparently, no one else. I would give my left nut to
want another woman  .  .  . any other woman; it’d be simpler.
Sometimes choices of chemistry are misunderstood. Or never
understood. I’ve let that reactive and instinctual nature of mine
take over. It’s in charge now, and soon it will be in charge of
Jewell.
I turn her to face me, and the ache abates when I finally
have my hands on her. Where they’ve wanted to be since that
first audition.
“Cas,” she says softly, drawing out my name.
The blush deepens on her face as Jewell contemplates what
just fucking with me means. Maybe there’s some primal alarm
ringing, giving her a warning to flee while she still can.
I begin to smile as she looks me square in the eye.
I move even nearer, our chests almost touching, and Jewell
has to crane her neck to look at me. “I see ‘yes,’” I say to her
softly, begging permission with my voice, my eyes, a mirror of
my own need reflected in her gaze.
If she agrees, Jewell is mine. I don’t know if I can ever give
her up if she does.
“Yes,” she says with soft resolution. That one word springs
my cock like a strummed guitar string.
“Yes what, Jess?” I ask in a voice that’s barely more than a
whisper. My hands are planted on either side of her head, her
body pressed against the corridor wall.
Jewell closes her eyes, and when she opens them, I know
she’s made up her mind. “To fucking,” she says in a voice mixed
with anger and anticipation.
I know exactly how she feels. My smile becomes a grin,
my heartbeat racing to catch up with hers. I have a hard time
containing my excitement—and trepidation. I’ve taken a big
risk, moving the relationship farther than I’ve been directed,
farther than I knew I wanted it. Make no mistake, I want it.
I bend down until my lips hover above her own. “Yes . . . to
fucking,” I repeat, and I close my palms around her shoulders,
cupping them as I jerk her into the shadow of my body. I slam
my lips on hers, wrapping one hand in that knot of silk at the
back of her head, my other holding her against me with a palm
at the small of her back. My tongue breaches the barrier of her
lips and we pant as we go at each other, starved . . . our tongues
mingling, teasing, tasting.
The school melts away. My job.
A relevant plan of any kind.
All I feel is Jewell’s heat. Her hot skin against mine,
bleeding through our clothes, and it’s wiped my mind clean.
A great white wall of noise floods my senses in a succulent
buzz. It pushes the blood through my ears in a dull roar of pure
sensation as I sip at her lips, my palm moving with restless but
deliberate abandon at the arch of her spine.
I let her go suddenly, backing away, saving myself like a
desperately thrown Hail Mary. I try to regain my composure,
tossing on the handy asshole persona. I can’t let her see how
she’s affected me.
Jewell’s lips are swollen from my kisses, bruised from the
demands of my mouth. It’s still not enough, it’ll never be, and
I give a soft moan to camouflage my next word. “Tasty,” I say
with a hint of triumph, a smile curling my lips, when the reality
is that I feel anything but the winner. On the contrary, I feel
like I’m losing. Losing to her  .  .  . to what Jewell is, what we
are together. The entire dysfunctionally hot mix of chemistry
happening like an unstoppable collision.
But her next words are the equivalent of a cold shower. “I’m
dating Mitch,” she qualifies. I know a little of my anger seeps
out, and I clamp down on my expression.
She’s mine. Jewell just doesn’t know it yet.
Hell, I didn’t know until now.
I speak before thinking. “I don’t share,” I warn as I approach
her again, my eyes never leaving her face. Those deep eyes are
definitely the windows to her soul. I don’t look away from
anything. I want her and I want to know what she’s thinking.
Goddammit, I want to know what she feels.
She gives a soft little snort of disbelief as her eyes lock with
mine, then her gaze slides to my mouth. The one that had
commanded her to kiss me. To respond. She’s quiet for so long
I realize it might not be a sure thing. I can’t force her to be with
me; I can’t force her to not be with Maverick. The thought of it
hollows me out, an empty spot in the center of me filled with
nothing.
Vacant.
“Fine,” she says automatically.
Relief pours into where nothingness was before. I push my
advantage of shock and demands to a new level. “Don’t fuck
him,” I order. It’s really for his protection. Because I know with
a murderous certainty I’ll kill him if he touches her. I know
because it makes my body physically react to think of it.
And that’s just in theory.
I don’t look away. Instead I let Jewell see how serious I am.
How my life hangs in the chasm of her indecision, her will, not
mine
Jewell casts her eyes down. Finally they rise to meet mine. “I
don’t want him to know.”
Good Christ, she was still going to date the douche?
No. I have no right to dictate terms, but I don’t let that stop
me. “Don’t worry, Jess. My cock’s for the taking; your pussy is
not. I want you, Jess”—my eyes search hers—“and I can tell you
want me.” I state it as fact. “It’s just sex; that’s all this will be.”
Jewell is seeing the real me. The raw thing I keep hidden
from everyone. I never give anyone the upper hand, but here I
am, letting Jess know that she holds a certain power over me. I
feel something for her, something that goes beyond chemistry.
It makes me vulnerable . . . it’s dangerous, compromising, and
simply impossible to stop.
I wait as Jewell thinks about her choices, but in the end,
neither of us has a choice. We know it.
We’re just stalling.
Jewell gives in. She offers me the smallest nod of
acquiescence. “Okay,” she says in a shaky voice of uncertain
conviction.
It is done.
We’ll just fuck.
But of course, things are never that simple. And we both
know it.

I frown, feeling the middle of my brow fold in irritation,
giving Clearwater a look. “Y’know, I think we need a
background on that pal.”

“Budget,” Dec says in answer, polishing off the rest of his
hot dog in one bite. He washes it down with a slug of OJ, then
elaborates. “O’Rourke will have a shit fit if you ask for anything
deep.” Dec meets my eyes significantly. “Remember we almost
lost the go for this? If it hadn’t been so high profile  .  .  .” He
shrugs.

But this is getting serious. It doesn’t matter that Jewell
makes me have constant sex on the brain. Nobody is more
important than the next. But she is.

We know Thad’s back. Amanda Miller’s murder tells us so.
He’s closing in on Jewell, making her skittish. She’s clearly
already paranoid. Making a second name change isn’t our
first clue to her state of mind. Thad is using the death of an
acquaintance to subliminally unnerve Jewell. He doesn’t have
to manifest in the flesh, when torturing her imagination is
infinitely more powerful.
Clearwater snaps his fingers in front of my face.
“What?”
“Hey, man, you’re zoning, big time.”
“Yeah, I’m so in my head with all this bullshit.” I scrub my
skull in irritation, my fingertips rippling over all the embedded
scars in my scalp.
“Better get out of it.” His eyes meet mine, glittering like
black marbles in the ambient light that seeps in through from
outside, the inherent grayness of Seattle filtering real sunshine
like a sieve. “And stop asking for background on every guy who
looks at her.”
I peg him with my eyes. “He’s not just looking at her,
though, is he, Dec?”
He gives the smallest shake of his head with a smirk.
Goddammit.
Dec shrugs. “I couldn’t see them after their ‘car time,’” he
says, dropping his fingers from air quotes.
Shit.
I want to drive that eight-ball gearshift up Maverick’s ass.
Yeah, I went there. I didn’t have to use my expensive tools to
get into that car, a coat hanger did the trick. All the old cars
fold to that.
Dec holds up his hand offensively. “I don’t think she did
him in the car or something, Cas.” He gives me serious eyes.
“Not that it matters who she bangs or where.”
Fuck.
“It matters,” I say, my voice ominous. We’re not going
there.
“You’re going to lose your job.”
I tap my temple. “Smarter, not harder.”
Clearwater’s smirk goes wide as he caps his juice bottle.
“Your dick’s the only thing that’s gonna be hard, and we all
know that head doesn’t think, pal.”
I give him a level stare.
“Time to spar?” Dec asks with a grin, now that he’s got me
worked into a lather.
I feel a slow grin spread over my face. “I thought you’d never
ask.”
“Just don’t kill me, Cas.”
I don’t comment, stripping off my outer gear as I head to
the ring, the familiar press of the mats underneath my feet
making the adrenaline kick in to fight mode.
Clearwater is ready as we square off.
I am too.
However, nothing can prepare me for my future, and life
doesn’t hand out clues. It keeps you in the dark and feeds you
shit.
Like a mushroom.