So he stepped back and walked away. The direction he walked was toward the library.
“This isn’t finished,” Clinton warned his back.
“It never is,” Chace muttered, not knowing if Clinton could hear him and not giving a f**k if he could.
He watched the library coming closer as he thought of dancing with Faye after midnight to a fantastic f**king song while she smiled at him and let him hold her close. He’d sat in her truck, smelling her perfume, watching her expressive face, hearing her sweet voice using a variety of different tones that were as expressive as her face.
He’d bought her coffee. He’d watched a kid who had nothing grab five bags full of what he would consider gold that Faye Goodknight gave to him out of nothing but kindness.
He’d had a good morning, his first good morning in a really long time that his father and his bullshit had turned to shit.
And that was exactly what he felt as his long legs ate the distance from his truck to the library. Shit. He smelled it. He felt it. He tasted it in his mouth.
He had to get rid of it.
He knew only one way to do that. Only two times in f**king years he’d smelled nothing but sweet, felt it and, only once, tasted it.
Dancing with Faye and kissing her.
The library wasn’t open yet but he still wrapped his fingers around the handle of the front door and pulled.
It opened.
Thank f**k, she was in and hadn’t locked the doors.
He walked in, vaguely seeing the layout, the shelves, the books, smelling that smell that only libraries had but his focus was on scanning the space.
To the right, the long checkout desk.
From a door behind it at the back left, Faye came out.
“Hey,” she greeted in her sweet voice. “Did you see where he went?”
Chace didn’t reply, he stalked to her.
When he started moving, she dipped her ear to her shoulder, her head jutting slightly forward, her face going from curiosity to scrutiny.
“Are you okay?” she asked quietly.
Chace rounded the side of the counter.
Cute, tight skirt that skimmed her hips, cupped her ass and hit her knees. Her low-heeled, brown boots. A scoop-necked tee under a cardigan. Skin displayed above the neckline of the tee highlighting an unusual and attractive three-tiered necklace. Auburn hair falling in sheets over her shoulders and down her chest, a hank of it at the top, right of her forehead pulled to the side in a cute bobby pin. Makeup subtle and appealing.
She looked like a librarian who had good taste in clothes and a light but expert hand with makeup. Her own style, a style that did nothing to emphasize the obviously attractive features of her face or frame and because of that, they contradictorily accentuated them. It was a style that worked for her in a huge way.
And it had been working for Chace the same way for a long f**king time.
“Chace,” she said, still talking quietly, “did something –?”
She stopped talking abruptly when it came clear to her that he wasn’t going to stop coming at her.
She took a step back.
Too late.
He was on her, he rounded her waist with an arm and twisted them so he was moving her backwards toward the door she’d come out.
“Oh God,” she whispered, hands coming up to rest light on his chest, eyes wide and staring in his. “Is the boy okay?”