He didn’t say another single word. His eyes bulging wildly, he turned and fled down the hall as fast as his legs would carry him. He didn’t even bother waiting for the elevator. He hit the stairwell and she heard the distant sound of pounding feet.
“Good riddance,” Hayley murmured.
She glanced down at the check again, half afraid the check was nonnegotiable. But no, everything seemed to be in order. Which meant...Oh God, she had to talk to Silas! She had just assumed he was likely off with his woman, Evangeline, the past few days. But he hadn’t been! He’d been hunting down the insurance salesman forher.
She hugged herself and chanced a look down the hall toward the door of Silas’s apartment. Maybe if she had been wrong about where he had been the last few days, then perhaps there were other things she was wrong about as well. Like his presumed relationship with another woman. At any rate, he deserved her appreciation and gratitude. Especially after the way she’d blown him off earlier.
She hurried into her apartment long enough to put the check in a safe, secure location, so she didn’t lose it. First thing in the morning, she’d make a trip to the bank to deposit it and then pray that it didn’t bounce or that payment hadn’t been stopped on it.
Then, drawing in a deep, steadying breath, she left her apartment and walked more slowly down to Silas’s door. When she reached it, she stood there a long moment, trying to work up the nerve to knock.
***
Silas paced the floors of his living room, agitated and swearing as he made up his mind and then changed it for the hundredth time since Maddox had, in a nutshell, told him what a huge, fucking hypocrite he was being. The sad thing was that Maddox was not wrong. Silas was all Maddox had accused him of and so much more.
What was he supposed to do with a woman like Hayley? She was simply too beautiful, too passionate, too... perfect... for someone like him. How long would it take her to realize what a terrible mistake she had made by allowing him into her life, and how much longer after that until she ran?
For that matter, who was to say she’d ever agree to the kind of relationship he required? He stopped pacing momentarily and let out a groan. Required? It made him seem cold and heartless, and again, hewasn’t wrong. It went beyond a requirement. It was a necessity. Like eating and breathing for everyone else. Control wasn’t something he enjoyed or even craved. He had to have it in order to survive each day.
But nothing he said, no rationale he could offer himself for allowing Hayley to think what she liked so she’d move on and forget about him, could erase the image of Hayley feeling hurt, rejected, unworthy by and of him! Unworthy. He couldn’t wrap his brain around it. No amount of applying logic to the situation could make him forget Maddox’s, Jax’s and Thane’s well-aimed arrows into his heart. Or what used to be his heart.
How could Hayley ever think he didn’t want her? Didn’t desire her with his every breath? How could she in a million years ever consider herself unworthy ofhim?
“Fuck this,” Silas bit out.
He started toward the door because there was no fucking way he would ever allow Hayley to feel unworthy of goddamn anyone. He had no idea what to do about the matter of him and Hayley or if she could ever accept him for what he was, but he couldn’t worry about that now. He would cross that bridge when he got there.
He was but a few feet from his door when the doorbell sounded, eliciting an immediate snarl of rage from Silas. Now of all the fucking times on earth?Now?
Ready to take apart whatever idiot had decided to intrude at the exact moment he finally made a decision in regard to Hayley, he threw open the door and let his most chilling glare erupt.
Hayley stood in his doorway in a robe and... God, was there anything on underneath that really thin robe? Her eyes rounded in trepidation as she took in Silas’s obvious foul mood and took a defensive step back.
“Princess?” he managed to choke out.
“I obviously came at a bad time,” she said hastily, turning even as she spoke, prepared to flee.
“No! No,” he said in a calmer voice.
His pulse was beating so hard and fast he was dizzy and felt lightheaded. He, who had never fainted in his entire goddamn life no matter how badly he had been beaten or how hard he prayed for unconsciousness to overtake him, was now about to do one epic face-plant right on the floor at Hayley’s feet.
“Please,” he asked softly. “I thought it was someone else at the door. What are you doing over here? Are you okay?”
He was sweating, another first for him. At the rate he was going, he’d soon be out of a job. What the hell kind of enforcer, the one guy in Drake’s organization you did not want to cross, would it make him if he started suddenly hitting the floor and sweating like a damn pig?
“I’m fine,” she said, a hint of a smile curving her beautiful, full lips.
He reached behind her to close the door. At first he opted to set the locks later, needing, wanting, his entire focus to be on Hayley. But his skin prickled the instant he turned away without performing his ritual. Even his hands were unsteady and undisciplined.
“Go ahead and lock them, Silas,” Hayley said in a sweet voice full of understanding. “I can wait.”
He closed his eyes and then slammed his lips shut to prevent his audible groan as he turned back to the door. Unworthy. Of him. He wanted to kick his own ass for ever treating her as if she were unworthy of him. And then he needed to figure out a way to convince themboththat he was actually worthy ofher.
He was so flustered that he lost count midway through and had to start from the top all over again. By the time he finished, he had managed to adequately calm his fried nerves enough to face Hayley.
He turned, immediately seeking her out, and to his astonishment, she hurled herself at him. He had no choice but to catch her or they’d both end up on the floor.
“What’s this about?” he asked in bewilderment.
