to you. And if he doesn't talk, you can't figure out where he is. And if you don't know where he is, and he doesn't talk, you have no idea what's happening. You don't know if he's looking at you with disgust or disdain. You don't know if he's angry or if he's laughing at you. Hell, you don't even know if he’s still in the fucking room."
I paused only long enough to draw a breath. There was a dark shape in front of me that I could only assume was Gideon. "You can't see any attacks coming so you can't even run. You can't laugh because you can't tell if the other person thinks something is funny too. I'm twenty-seven years old, Gideon. I'm twenty-seven and it feels like my life is over. I know that doesn't make sense to you—"
I snapped my mouth shut when Gideon suddenly grabbed me again. I was shocked when he pushed me back several steps until my back hit the wall behind me. I tried to protect my face with my arms, but he grabbed my wrists and pinned them to the wall. I was completely at his mercy and it terrified me.
"Your life is not over, do you hear me?" Gideon practically yelled in my face. "And I sure as shit wasn't mocking you or trying to make you feel off balance. Did it ever occur to you that I don't know how the hell to respond to you? I don't talk, Lex. To anyone. From the moment I found you this morning, all I wanted to do was get you out of here so I could go back to my nice, quiet life!"
His declaration actually stung. But I shoved the emotion away and said, "Then just let me go, damn it!"
He went silent again, which I hated with a passion. I wanted to see his eyes so I could know what he was feeling. I struggled to free myself from his hold, but he just tightened his grip and barked, "Stop it."
The command was firm and unyielding, but strangely enough, I wasn't afraid of it. The fact that I could waffle between being frightened of him and feeling safe around him made absolutely no sense. But this was yet another one of those moments where I felt oddly safe. Like the closer I was to him, the more I could read him even when he didn't speak. In some ways, it was almost comforting. My anger began to fade the longer we stood there like that. His fingers weren’t touching my skin, but they might as well have been. My body began to react to his proximity and I suddenly remembered that I hadn't bothered to put on the sweats he'd given me because I'd only intended to search out the bathroom, not have this kind of confrontation with him.
With my blood quickly heading to the lower part of my body, I swallowed hard and said, "Let me go." It wasn't actually an order like his had been. No, there was too much desperation in my voice for that. I felt my dick begin to harden inside the snug boxer briefs I was wearing. If Gideon felt me getting an erection around him, it would be game over. "Gideon, please, you have to let me go," I choked out.
The response that followed left me giddy and horrified at the same time.
"I can't."
Chapter Six
Gideon
I didn't even know how it happened. I'd gone from watching Lex's expression soften when I’d talked about Neil Mitchum's penchant for wanting to give people rides around town without the benefit of a vehicle to do it with to witnessing the outburst that had followed. And now here we were with me holding him against the wall pretty much against his will, and no matter how many times I told my fingers to release him, they wouldn't follow through on the order.
I’d spent the better part of the afternoon working to make it so Lex could go home to the cabin he was renting. I'd made sure the generator was still going so the place would start heating up and then I'd located Lex’s insulin pump controller so I could get it charging. Then I’d gone searching the area around the generator for his phone. By the time I’d found it, the power had kicked back in and I'd been able to get the generator turned off and reset for the next time it would be needed.
I'd also