Page 120 of Resist

“He’s the reason she couldn’t go out with you that first time.”

I stare at her, blink, and try to process what she’s saying and what she’s not saying. “What do you mean?”

“Read between the lines, Lockhart. I’ve already said more than I should.”

“The prick likes to rough up women?” I ask the question knowing full well she’s not going to answer.

But the idea eats at me. The way he carries himself as if he can do no wrong. The way Vaughn was skittish that first night I saw her at Apropos. The fact that any man thinks it’s okay to touch a woman other than to make her feel good.

And it eats at me some more as Vaughn flips through the channels. “He’s met you face-to-face, hasn’t he? That’s why you spilled the drinks that night. You were afraid he was going to recognize you.”

Her body stills, but she nods ever so subtly. “Someone had to confront him over the bruises he left. Someone had to make him pay for her downtime. Someone had to tell him that’s not how you treat a lady.”

“And that someone was you, I take it?” I ask, already knowing the answer, but using the question as a means to calm the anger brimming just beneath the surface. Because as much as I love the fact that Vaughn will go toe to toe with the prick and put him in his place, I also hate knowing that she puts herself in situations that could easily escalate out of control.

“I was in my Vee wig and uniform.”

“Vaughn.” Her name is a warning. An I don’t like this. “I don’t care what you were in. He’s—”

“I have to defend my girls, Ryker.”

“And who’s going to defend you?”

“I have enough dirt on each of my clients. That’s all I need to stop most of them in their tracks.”

Those words should give me pause. They should make me wonder what—other than Roxanne—she has on me.

But all I can think about is her alone with Carter and the thoughts I’m more than certain were running through his head and itching his fingertips to reach out and take. Of the offhand comments he’s made here and there over the years about what he likes to do to his “side” women to get off.

“Stopping most of them isn’t good enough, Vaughn. It only takes one of them to hurt you, and fuck if Carter Preston isn’t low on the scale of moral compass.”

“I’m more than aware.”

“If you don’t give him what he wants, he’ll have no problem going after you to get it.”

“Been there. Done that.”

“What the hell are you—”

“Don’t. Just don’t, okay?”

And there’s something in her voice that tells me I’m overstepping. That a few nights of sex doesn’t mean I have the right to tell her what to do. And fuck if she isn’t right, but at the same time, I care about her. “I don’t like this one bit.”

She shifts so that for the first time since this conversation began, she meets my eyes. “Just like I don’t have to love the fact you knew where I lived without ever asking me my address.”

She’s got me there.

“Vaughn—”

“Stalker,” she says with just enough of a smile and roll of her eyes to add some levity to this conversation, and hell if I’m not willing to play along.

“Thank you. I appreciate the compliment,” I tease.

“Seriously, though. You used your PI?”

“Just as you’ve used yours on me.”

“You didn’t answer the question, Lockhart,” she huffs.