But still, he did not pull away and I took advantage of it, forgetting,again, that we were not in a place where I could lose myself in the warmth seeping into my palms where they touched his shoulders. The way his neck arched as he angled his head to give me a better view.
The scent that dizzied me.
“We should leave.” I reluctantly let him go, trusting the wound was not that serious. “To somewhere dry.”
“Only place I’m going is to fucked-up town and, trust me, that place isn’t dry.”
I’d been around enough English people to discern that he wanted to lose himself. To leave this night behind with whatever vice came his way.
Drink.
Drugs.
Sex.
Whichever it was, he could not do it in the rain where he stood, and it did not take much more looking at him wet and bloodied to give in to the reckless urge I’d felt yesterday, tuning Jake out before he could talk me down with logic and sense.
Ranger and I had not travelled in the vehicles with the other men. We’d left our bikes together—his Harley in the same ditch as the Ducati I rode in England. It made sense that we slipped away from the port and tugged them free of the undergrowthtogether.
Less so what came out of my mouth as he tossed a long leg over his V-Rod. “Follow me, friend. Your idea of fun is starting to grow on me.”
The flat I called home was a loft-style apartment a hundred miles from the port. I expected Ranger to ditch me, but he rode behind me the whole way until we reached a different city. Then he surged ahead, leading me to a place he’d supposedly never been before, rumbling to a stop mere yards from my building.
He laughed at whatever he saw in my face. “This is my manor, Vik. You think I don’t know where all the bad men lay their heads?”
“We are that obvious?”
“To me? Yeah. I grew up here, on the shithole estateover therebefore my nanna took me south.” He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “These towers were always for the crooks.”
“I do not live in the towers. My home is in the conversion behind them.”
“Eh. Close enough. My great-grandad made shoes in that building.”
We left our bikes in the car park across the street. The city was well lit and already starting to wake, the night giving way to grey skies and more rain.
Ranger pulled his hood up, concealing his bloodied face. Before we stepped onto the street, he tugged mine up too. “You ain’t looking too clever either.”
What did that mean? I spoke many languages with varying fluency, but English was by far the most vexing. Full of nonsense and nuance.
I waited for him to elaborate.
He did not. He trailed me through the rain to the entrance to my building. To the lift that took us to the fourth floor and my front door.
I typed the code into the concealed combination lock.
Ranger watched, propped against the wall. “Too posh for a key?”
“I have a key. Just not with me.”
“Let me explain how locks work, luv.”
The door clicked open. My lips curled in a smirk, but the pressing need to check my home for death traps and assassins swallowed the joke, along with the reality that the true threat might’ve been the man at my side.
Unlikely. He’s had all week to kill you.
And try as I might, I couldn’t think of a reason why he would want to.
I ushered him forward. “Wait here.”
