Page 43 of Heaven Help Me

I flop back in my seat. “Well, shit.”

“Guess this dick just can’t be contained,” he drawls, putting his pants back on and looking like we didn’t just have sex in the car. Damn men and their ability to look put together instantly.

I whack him on the arm. “This isn’t funny.”

He sobers quickly. “I know. I’m clean, if that eases your mind at all.”

I rub my forehead, already regretting it. “I am too.” Hell, I haven’t been with someone in several years at this point. Too difficult to find no-strings-attached dalliances. Another idea hits me, this one stopping me cold.

“I’m not on birth control right now. My hormones have been all over the place, and I wanted off of them so I could figure out what was going on.”

I have Deuce’s attention now. “Okay,” he says calmly. “We can go to the pharmacy tomorrow and get some things. How long have you been having hormone issues?”

This is really not the time to have this discussion. No woman wants to discuss her failing ovaries right after she fucked a guy in his car. “A couple years now. It’s not a big deal.”

Deuce leans into my space, concern written across his face. I have the urge to reach up and smooth back that lock of hair. I sit on my hand instead.

“Maybe your anxiety is due to your hormones. That’s common, you know.”

I frown. I didn’t know that, but also, how would Deuce know that? He’s probably just spitting out bullshit, trying to mansplain my own body to me. It’s coming from a good place, but I’m not here to discuss my gynecological situation.

He sits back and gives me room, glancing out at the gray sedan that’s still parked outside the hotel. “I have a nurse practitioner friend. She can get us hooked up with some stuff tomorrow. I’ll take care of it, I promise.”

I want to say something snarky, maybe ask if this nurse practitioner friend is also one of “his girls,” but I don’t. It’s none of my business and if it helps me get a morning-after pill to prevent a situation I’m not ready for, then I’m all for it.

“Let’s just continue our stakeout in silence, okay?”

Deuce nods, which I see out of the corner of my eye. I fold my arms over my chest and try not to think about what we just did. It was fantastic and just what I need.

But I also regret it.

Because it will complicate things.

“I kind of like knowing I’m leaking out of you right now,” Deuce says on a low growl that makes goose bumps break out along my skin.

“You’re filthy!” I gasp, but I can’t deny it’s exactly the kind of thing I like in a man. “And I kind of like it,” I admit.

He bursts out laughing, and I join in. The tension eases immediately and I realize that he meant what he said earlier.

We’re friends.

And it’s really fucking nice.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Deuce

At some point in the middle of the night, we shifted to the back seat of my car, both of us complaining about sore backs and stiff necks from sitting in the front seats for too long. Not sure that change accomplished anything. As the first light of day streams through the windows, I blink awake to a shooting pain in my neck, and I’m pretty sure I don’t have a left arm anymore. Can’t feel it at all.

Awareness returns quickly and I realize I’m sweating already though it can’t be much after dawn. Valentina is lying on top of me, her hair acting like a blanket across my face. She’s using my chest as her pillow and her leg is hitched over my hips. As much as I like having her snuggling with me, a thing she’d never do if she was awake, I’m pretty sure one of us is supposed to be watching for the owner of the gray sedan.

Using my right hand, I push her hair out of my face, a few strands caught in my mouth. Jesus. How do women live with a mop of hair on their heads their whole lives?

Ah. There’s my left arm. It’s jammed between the seatback and Valentina’s body. It’s gonna hurt like a son’bitch when circulation returns to it.

“Valentina,” I croak. She was supposed to take the early morning shift. Or was that me? Shit.

She doesn’t even stir. I wrench my left arm out and try to poke her in the ribs with it, but I can’t move my fingers. Best I can manage is to drop the useless appendage on her ass. That wakes her up in a hurry. She pushes off my chest and raises her head like a king cobra ready to strike. Her knee also comes up on reflex and jabs me right in the balls, a move I would have anticipated if I’d been fully awake.