How Much I Feel - Marie Force Page 0,6
police station.
I tell myself to shake him off, to tell him off, to let him know I’m perfectly capable of walking without his assistance. But the minute I step out of the frigidly air-conditioned station into the warm sunshine, I begin to tremble again as the reality of my time in jail sinks in.
“You’re fine.”
I latch on to his soothing tone despite my resolve to keep my distance from the temptation he represents. As he runs a comforting hand over my back, I tell myself it’s of no consequence to me that he immediately tuned in to my distress and said just what I needed to hear.
“It’s over. No big deal.”
“Sure. No big deal. And when my mother calls tonight to see how my first day went, should I mention my stint in jail?”
“You might want to leave that part out. You could tell her you went joyriding in a Porsche on company time. That’s exciting.”
I scowl up at him and find him looking down at me with a warm, friendly expression and the potent grin that makes me want to climb all over him. Our eyes meet and hold as a zing of awareness passes between us like an electrical current, confirming he feels it, too. Doubly fabulous and all the more reason to keep my distance.
Over my body’s strenuous objections, I move away from him. “I can walk on my own.”
“Suit yourself.”
“Thank you, I will.”
“Someday you’ll laugh about all this, you know.”
“I highly doubt it. Giordinos don’t get arrested. They don’t get handcuffed and fingerprinted and photographed. They don’t get searched and tossed in a cell.”
“They searched you?”
I can’t bear to relive the humiliation of it. “Yes.”
“Strip-searched?”
“Just about. They made me remove my outer garments to ensure I wasn’t concealing any weapons.” Single most humiliating moment of my life.
“Huh.”
“What does that mean? Huh?”
“I’m getting a visual of you in sensible white cotton underwear, and it’s rather . . . appealing.”
I whirl on him, prepared to punch him or at least smack the smug grin off his face, but his grin isn’t smug. It’s not smug at all. It’s rather tortured, and when I venture a glance below the belt of his black dress pants, smug isn’t at all the word that comes to mind. Impressive is more like it. Very, very impressive and very, very aroused. Over the thought of me in my underwear. Oh God.
“I do not wear sensible white cotton underwear,” I spit at him, furious at myself for letting my eyes venture down there. For reasons I’ll ponder later when I’m far, far away from him, it’s important he know that my underwear is neither white nor cotton.
“All the more interesting.” He runs a finger over my cheek, the caress sending a torrent of heat and light and energy to every corner of my body.
Stunned and totally unnerved by my reaction to him, I take a step back. “I don’t know what kind of game you think you’re playing—”
He drops his hand. “No game. The last thing I need right now is any kind of romantic entanglements.”
“Good. We have that in common. So don’t touch me again.”
“I apologize.”
We walk the two blocks in uneasy silence that he breaks right before we reach the gates to the impound lot. “What was that about back there? Why did he tear up your ticket?”
“I . . . um . . . I used to know someone with the department.” The most important someone in my life, someone I loved and lost in the worst way imaginable. A shudder of agony goes through me, transporting me right back to the darkest days of my life. Grief is funny that way. It can come at you out of nowhere, smacking you in the face with memories so painful they can still take your breath away five years later.
“Are you all right?”
I nod, because that’s all I can do.
Inside, we learn they want six hundred bucks for the car. Before I can process that number, Jason hands over a black American Express card.
“I’ll pay you back.”
Somehow.
I should’ve called an Uber for Betty. My carefully calculated budget has no room for even incremental payments on a six-hundred-dollar debt. I’ll have to pick up some extra shifts at the restaurant to settle my debt with him as soon as possible. So much for thinking my waitressing career was over now that I have a big new job.
“Don’t worry about it. I need to get back to the hospital, so can we please expedite