Sudden alarm replaced the look of languid pleasure and her body went rigid when just moments earlier, as soon as he’d begun massaging her feet, she’d melted bonelessly against the back of the sofa. She bolted upright, her feet dropping from his hands to the floor with a thud.
He cursed, his already fraying patience threatening to completely unravel along with his anger.
“What the hell is wrong now?” he demanded, his narrowed gaze aimed at her.
If he thought the not-so-subtle reprimand would make her back down, he was wrong. She stared up at him with wide eyes that were laced with worry and he was seized by the need to allay any fear she had. Goddamn it, he didn’t want her to be afraid with him, but she wasn’t exactly making it very easy for him.
“My girlfriends,” she stammered out. “Oh my God. They’re probably out of their minds with worry. They may have even already called the police! I was already late getting off work and then I was dragged into a car by your henchman and brought here. What time is it, anyway?”
Drake sighed and managed to rein in his simmering temper. Barely. He didn’t give a rat’s ass what her roommates thought, but he did care that Evangeline was in obvious distress, and he did care that the police could already be involved. If questioned, Evangeline would no doubt have any cop convinced that Drakehadabducted her and was even now holding her against her will.
Something he planned to rectify immediately. She would stay. There was no doubt about that. But it would certainly not be against her will. He was never going to get to that point, however, because of the incessant interruptions. He not only despised interruptions and inconveniences, he simply didn’t tolerate either. So why the hell was he suddenly doing just that when it came to one infuriating, exasperating, stubborn woman?
Because you want her as you’ve never wanted another woman.
There was that. Even though the admission didn’t sit well with him at all. Evangeline was a complication he didn’t need. But damn if he didn’t want her. Complications, frustration, inconveniences and all. He almost shook his head. Hell of a thing to find himself in this predicament over an unwilling woman. His men—those closest to him, men he called brothers in every sense of the word—would laugh themselves silly if they even had a hint of the turmoil one small, fragile, infuriating female was causing him.
“Can’t you text them?” he asked mildly, even as he registered that she was frantically digging for her cell in her purse.
Her gaze lifted and she bit into her lip. “Yeah, I’m going to text them right now. I should have texted them the second your goon made me get into the car with him, but I wasn’t exactly thinking straight at the moment. And to be honest, if I tell them where I am and why, me texting them isn’t going to do any good. They’ll definitely call the police and haul ass down here themselves.”
As she spoke, she was typing away on a very small, hopelessly outdated cell phone, murmuring each of the recipients’ names as she added them to the group text.
Drake shrugged. “So tell them you’re somewhere else. You don’t owe them an explanation, nor do you answer to them for your actions.”
She huffed impatiently. “Look, Drake. They know all about what happened here last night. They also know I am not the type of person to be ‘somewhere else’ at almost five o’clock in the morning after working a long shift and being dead on my feet. I’m not a party girl nor do I have men lining up to take me out on dates, so no matter what I tell them, they’re going to smell a rat, and they’re smart. They’ll put two and two together, and here will be the very first place they’ll look for me. Whether I text them or not. Whether I tell them I’m perfectly okay and not to worry. Because that’s what friends do. They have each other’s backs and they worry about each other, and they’re especially protective of me because they know I’m a naïve twit who’s incapable of recognizing a predator when I see one.”
She glanced down at her phone, worry furrowing her brow.
“They haven’t responded. I should call Steph. They’re probably freaking out.”
Drake sighed, not even attempting to hide his irritation and displeasure as she called and evidently didn’t reach this supposedly worried-out-of-her-mind friend, because Evangeline rattled off a message saying she wouldn’t be home and that she was sorry for not contacting them sooner.
Her girlfriends seemed like gigantic pains in the ass, and she’d probably be much better off without them, because it sounded a hell of a lot like they smothered her, judged her, kept her in line and expected her to gain their permission to so much as take a piss.
He mentally winced because he was every bit as controlling, but his method of control and dominance was not even close to what her girlfriends apparently considered their way of managing her life, or rather micromanaging her life. He would always have her best interests at heart. He was almost certain he couldn’t say the same about her girls.
Damn it all. If all Evangeline had said was true, and he had no reasonnot to believe her, then she was right. A text wasn’t going to head off a potentially ugly confrontation and the cops showing up at his club and him having to answer to kidnapping and coercion charges. Since Evangeline hadn’t received a response, and her phone call had gone unanswered, he was going to have to throw one of his men under the bus and have him take care of the matter personally.
“Maddox,” he snapped, knowing his man would hear at his station outside Drake’s door, the exit on the opposite end of the elevator that not many knew of, and judging by Evangeline’s sudden look of wariness and her quick glance at the elevator as if expecting him to appear from it, she hadn’t noticed the other door in the far corner. She likely thought he was a paranoid, psychotic bastard, and, well, she’d have at least part of it right. He hadn’t survived in his world this long without a healthy degree of paranoia and common sense not to offer his trust freely.
Maddox entered in an instant, his expression wary as he sent a scowl in Evangeline’s direction.
“Go assure Evangeline’s roommates that she is perfectly all right, but she won’t be coming home tonight, or any other night for that matter. Inform them that she’s moving in with me and will be in contact with them in the next day or two and will explain everything to them then.”
“What?” Evangeline’s shriek made Maddox wince. She didn’t look frightened as one might expect. No, she looked outraged and indignant.
Satisfied she wasn’t about to become hysterical with fear, Drake ignored her reaction, instead picking her feet back up and resuming his ministrations, which forced her to recline back onto the couch. Because while she might not dissolve into hysteria, she might well punch him right in the face, so distraction was necessary immediately and she’d definitely enjoyed the foot rub he’d already given her.
Maddox clearly had no liking for the task Drake had assigned him. It was evident in his disgruntled expression.
“What the hell did I do to deserve to be put on difficult andrecalcitrant women duty?” Maddox muttered. “Surely you can come up with more creative ways of punishing me, Drake. Defuse a bomb? Stop an assassination attempt? Be a substitute day-care worker for a week?”
Evangeline sent Maddox a saccharine-sweet smile at his acid sarcasm.
“I certainly didn’t ask to be dragged from my workplace at four in the morning to face a man who is clearly out of his mind or has mistaken me for someone else entirely. And if I hadn’t been dragged here, I would be home, and therefore my roommates wouldn’t be out oftheirminds with worry and you wouldn’t have to deal with difficult, recalcitrant women. Though I’d pay money to see you in a day care with mini spawns of Satan nagging you and pulling you in forty different directions.”
Her smile was mockingly sweet, a definite smirk lurking on her lips, but her words were tart with a distinct edge that amused Drake. Evidently Maddox was as well.
