other smaller issues had been leading up to this, and she was finished. She’d left Alpin outside, after she made a pass over the entire yard, to make sure that bitch hadn’t put anything poison down for him.
Now he sat out there, enjoying a doggy ice cream in a cup. And she stood over her broken table.
The destruction was crude but effective. She didn’t have proof other than her gut that it was Gemma, and she needed to make sure the locks were changed on her house. There were too many incidents since she’d shown up. It wasn’t just locks she needed, but also cameras.
Stepping over the broken leg, she picked her cell phone up off the counter and scrolled through her contacts until she found the number she required.
“Joe’s Locks and More. How can I help you?”
“Charlene? It’s Skylar. Is Moses out on a run today, or would he have time to swing by? I need a new set of locks.”
Skylar kissed his cheek and waved as he drove away an hour later, a piece of pie in his belly and a firm date for a lunch on his phone, to appease the wife. Turning her head, she slowed her return inside as the garage door to her neighbor’s house rose.
Parker Jax, stood there, rock-hard body exposed inch by tantalizing inch as the door lifted.
Just wasn’t fucking fair.
He looked at her and sent her a grin that wasn’t good for a damn thing other than wetting her panties and making her long to throw them at him. This morning he’d taken Alpin out and let her sleep in. She hadn’t slept well, tossing and turning because of nightmares about Reggie and Brennen.
He’d asked her what was wrong, but she’d put him off—she wasn’t ready to let him into that part of her life. Physical was fine, but to the place where she was the most bare, most raw? No, she wasn’t ready.
Not yet. Maybe not ever.
He waved at her and strode toward her. Locking her knees and bolting down her lady bits, she waited for him to near. Lord knows if I go to meet him partway, I’ll end up running and jumping on him, which won’t be good for me. At least not for my image. It may be very good for me.
The closer he got, the warmer she got. Suddenly living in the Arctic wasn’t such a bad idea; she could deal with the cold. Anything to bring her core temperature down.
Pausing before her, he raked his gaze over her, kicking her internal temperature to the stratosphere. Feet shoulder-width apart, he crossed his arms and canted his head to the left.
“Still mad at me?”
Even though they’d had a row about the baby momma again today, she was learning how apparently being mad had nothing to do with wanting to fuck him. “Does it matter?” Dammit, she wanted to be pissed off and hurt at his actions. There was a little part of her that did a shimmy when he bestowed that look in her direction. The one that could have nuns waving their panties in a bid to get his attention. And it was all for her.
“Of course it does.” He reached out and smoothed a large hand down the side of her face.
She literally had to force herself to remain still to keep from swaying into his touch and doing what she could to establish more of that against her cheek.
“What do you want?” There, she had a bite to her words. He would learn she wasn’t such a pushover.
The door to his place opened, and Gemma sashayed out onto the front step. The woman sneered in her direction, and it took all her strength not to react. She wasn’t going to go around like she was still on the schoolyard.
“Came to make sure you’re up for our date tonight. Just you and me.”
His fingers were winding around sections of her hair, and it took her a moment to realize somehow, he’d gotten it out of the slapdash ponytail she’d tossed it into before Moses arrived. He shifted his large body closer to her, cupping her cheeks in his calloused hands. “Say yes, baby. Let me take you out. We’re supposed to be so in love we hate being apart from each other.”
Problem was, the line between make-believe and truth had gotten so fuzzy, she wasn’t even sure it existed any longer.
Gemma stepped back inside and slammed the door behind her. Parker never once turned to