My brows pull together instantly. “Excuse me?”
“Turn around,” he repeats, like it is nothing, like it is a normal thing to say to someone you just met.
I let out a sharp breath and cross my arms. “I didn’t come here to be ordered around.”
He steps closer.
Now I do have to tilt my head back.
“Then you came to the wrong place,” he says quietly.
Something in my chest tightens, but I hold his gaze. I don’t move. I don’t give him that.
“Why?” I challenge. “So you can check for weapons or something?”
“Because I want to see if you were followed.”
That lands harder than I expect.
I feel it before I can stop it, the slight shift in my posture, the tension that tightens just a fraction too much.
“Happy?” I mutter, even as I turn.
I hear him move behind me, feel it, the awareness of him circling, looking, assessing. It should make me uncomfortable.
It does.
But not in the way I expect.
“Anyone see you leave?” he asks.
“No.”
“Anyone know you came here?”
I hesitate.
Just for a second.
That is all it takes.
He is closer now. I can feel the heat of him at my back, close enough that if I lean even slightly, I will hit him.
“Answer the question, Maddie.”
My breath catches before I can stop it. “No.”
He doesn’t say anything right away, and somehow that is worse.
When I turn back to face him, he is right there again, closer than before, the air between us thick and charged in a way that makes it hard to think clearly.
“You’re being tracked,” he says.
I let out a short, disbelieving breath. “You don’t know that.”
“I do.”
“Based on what?” I snap.
