Tattooed Troublemaker - Elise Faber Page 0,21

I had in months.

Trouble.

This woman was so much trouble.

Nine

Charlie

I’d never considered myself much of a visual person until I laid eyes on the gloriousness that was Garret.

Perfect twin handfuls of pecs, dusted with exactly the right amount of hair.

Flat stomach, narrow waist, strong arms covered with gorgeous ink.

Forget being attracted to assholes, he was my new addiction.

My mouth had gone dry, heat had enveloped me from head to toe, and my thighs had clenched together.

Then he’d grinned and given me shit.

And my brain had gotten involved.

I did like fighting with him. It was both entertaining and a challenge and . . . I wanted to do it more.

Even though he was kind of a dick.

Which wasn’t exactly fair, I wasn’t exactly being Miss Susie Sunshine with him either. As much as he’d blown hot and cold and had given me a hard time, I’d done the same back.

Partly because he hadn’t started off on the right foot that first night, but also because he’d apologized and moved on.

In the past, I might have forgiven him and moved on too, probably would have ended up as close of friends with him as I had with Tig and Delia. The difference in this case was . . . I didn’t want to fuck Tig and/or Delia. There wasn’t an undercurrent of sexual tension. I wasn’t physically drawn to them or imagining stroking my hands—or my tongue—down their naked chests.

That added another layer of complication and vulnerability, and after spending my formative years the way I had, I knew I couldn’t afford to be vulnerable. I couldn’t allow someone to get close so easily, not someone I instinctively understood had the ability to hurt me.

I couldn’t open my heart or body up to something like that.

Nope.

Couldn’t do it.

Though, I guess that didn’t mean I couldn’t still appreciate the view or the bickering or ignore the fact that I felt almost like a different person when Garret was around.

Not wounded or broken or abandoned.

I was confident, fiery, tough.

And . . . I liked that, loved that I could be that form of myself, even as I didn’t like all the other difficulties that came with opening myself up to the world.

“Well, I don’t have to open myself up to the world,” I muttered. “I don’t even have to open myself up to him.” I could ignore him, keep my head down, and do my fucking job. But—

I sighed and turned back to the pipes, forcing my focus to return to my work. What was the fun in that? I lived my life in this tiny little bubble. I had my company, my apartment. I had Tig and Delia for however much I let them in—and thus far, that was no more than a couple of times a month. I had Dave, though I was fully aware I kept him at a distance because I didn’t want to emotionally drain him when he had kids living with him who needed him more. I had . . .

That was the problem, wasn’t it?

I’d been so focused on getting the company going, on having a stable income, on not relying on anyone else that I didn’t have anything aside from myself.

I was alone.

And for the first time in my life, I was beginning to wonder if being alone was really what I wanted.

Maybe, deep down, what I really wanted wasn’t actually to be alone.

Maybe I was yearning to belong, to be part of something that had meaning and fulfilled me, and . . . wasn’t simply a job, an income, or empty money.

But I wasn’t convinced I had it in me to let go enough to find out.

Even if I’d never felt more alive than when I was engaged in the contentious back and forth with Garret, even when I’d barely been able to get him out of my mind, even if his body was the sexiest thing I’d ever seen, and crossing swords with his sharp mind was the most fun I’d had in years.

Even if.

The risk was too great.

I inhaled deeply, taking in the rich smell of my coffee in my hands, the slight moisture in the air from the beginnings of a humid summer morning, the scents of engines and motor oil.

It was seven A.M.

The perfect start for the workday. The sun was shining, but it wasn’t overwhelmingly hot, and the roads weren’t slammed with cars, nor the sidewalks crammed with pedestrians staring at their phones and generally getting in everyone’s way.

Quiet, sort of,