Bitter hurt spread through me, souring my memory of our kiss. “Then you decided to give me the task of chasing her away. I’m glad to save you the inconvenience.”
He narrowed his eyes. “Why are ye upset?”
“I’m not.” I was.
“I don’t understand. I didn’t approach her tonight. I didn’t answer her call like the other time this happened. Are ye jealous?”
“No.” Also, yes.
“You’re attaching emotion to something that happened before I met ye.”
I mirrored his stance, folding my arms over the ache in my chest. “And you only kissed me to put her off.”
He’d seen her coming. He’d done the one thing he knew would stop me in my tracks. He could’ve just let her chase us out and told her no himself, but it was easier to have me do it. The ache inside me doubled down. To know that something which had meant so much to me in the moment had been a ploykilled.
Kane exhaled annoyance. “I kissed you because I wanted to. I asked you to handle her for two reasons. The more minor one was because she’s been persistent, and I’ve told her no withouther listening. I thought that her understanding I had someone else would finally work. I didn’t mean to use you. That wasn’t the intent.”
His ability to see how wrong he was had taken a trip to delulu land, to use Dixie’s favourite phrase.
Dixie. She was the reason I was here. Not for a flirtation with a man who messed with my feelings more than any other person on the planet.
Bringing up my phone, I tapped the next location, a small club just round the corner I’d had little hope for but needed to check, just to be thorough. And to give me some direction that wasn’t Kane. Ignoring him, I stomped on. He pursued me. Said my name. I kept going.
At the entryway, a narrow blue door in a nondescript building, the bouncer did the same check-in with Kane then waved us inside. But the place was clearly wrong from the start. Hip-hop blasted from the speakers, and a small crowd filled a sweaty room. No side rooms. No pretty blonde Dixie in sight. A bust, just like the last.
The third was the same. Bigger, but solely a place for dancing and drinking.
I’d struck out. I’d researched where to look and tried them all. If she’d been around, she’d hidden from me, and I had nowhere else to try. Nor had Mila or Convict come back with any clues. I’d failed.
Back in the street, I turned to trudge back to Kane’s car. My ignoring him must have annoyed him into silence because he’d barely said a word in ten minutes. But the moment we were around the corner and on an empty road, he caught my wrist and tugged me against him.
“I kissed you because I wanted to. I don’t kiss anyone.”
I whirled around. He didn’t let go, his gaze dropping to my mouth.
“I don’t care.”
“Aye, ye do.”
The heat from the clubs still clung to my skin, or maybe it was my too-fast heartbeat keeping me warm.
My chin wobbled. “I want to go home.”
“You want a lot more than that,” he muttered. Kane curved a hand to the back of my neck and marched me on. “And I’m going to give it to ye.”
Chapter 19
Dixie
From the staff exit of Heaven, I had Karla peek out into the street. “Sure he’s gone, hun?”
My almost-co-worker scanned the area then twisted back to face me. “Long gone. You’re safe.”
Cautiously, I stepped out of the door and peeked into the cold night. “It was just one guy, you said?”
“One big man, from Deadwater, and snapping out your name. I didn’t like the look of him. Was he a client gone wrong?” There was an odd intensity in her eyes.
Judgy-judgement, probably. Karla worked the tables and hadn’t made it as a dancer. She’d looked down on me when I’d shown up with experience and was immediately given a slot, even if I’d never made it to the stage. Tonight should’ve been my first walk, and I’d been a wobbly little jellyfish all day.
