“Do it and don’t argue. Stay put until I come get you.”
Avily looked like she wanted to balk, but miracle of miracles, she trudged to the vehicle and did as told. Confident she was safe, he cautiously nudged open the shop door and eyed the shadows ringing the small vestibule, on guard for suspicious movement.
Grabbing a pole that he assumed to be a light bulb changer, he prowled past the threshold, his attention riveted to the main hallway leading into the store. His boot heels making no sound on the tile, he inched closer to the wall, ensuring no sneak attack from behind. He reached the end of the hall. Other than the muted street noise and chatter of passing pedestrians, the main artery of the store was shrouded in eerie stillness.
His instincts warning him not to be lulled by the illusion of normalcy, he abandoned the hall and approached the first aisle, the makeshift weapon of the pole ready to bash a skull in if necessary. He cleared that section and rounded the next, working with steady precision until he’d swept the entire room and ascertained no one was skulking in a convenient hiding spot.
That left only Avi’s apartment. He retraced his steps to the doorway leading up to the loft. Unlike the alley entrance, the handle bore no signs of forced entry. Unswayed by that assessment, he picked the lock and crept up the stairs. Employing the same methodical surveillance he’d used downstairs, he listened at the top landing, his ears straining to detect the minute creak of a floorboard or slightest disturbance of air.
Seconds dragged into infinity.
Finally satisfied he wasn’t in imminent danger of being ambushed, he left the landing and checked the central living space and the kitchen before proceeding to the remaining rooms.
Nothing.
The tension didn’t immediately dissipate from him. There were too many unanswered questions lingering to give in to the luxury of relief. Starting with why her place had been broken into.
He jogged down the steps. Avi cracked open her door the moment he slipped past the exit. “Took you long enough.”
“Would you rather I hadn’t performed a proper sweep?”
“No, but I’ve been giving myself a minor stroke the last fifteen minutes, imagining the worst.” She swallowed, her coloring going a shade whiter. “You can tell it to me straight. Did they clear me out?”
“Far as I can tell, they didn’t steal anything.”
She blinked. “Want to run that by me again?”
“You’ll need to go over your inventory to double-check, but nothing’s been ransacked and the shelves are untouched.”
“I don’t believe it.”
Neither did he. Which might explain the buzzing of his senses despite no outward motivation why they should be. He held the steel door aloft, allowing Avily to precede him inside the store. While she investigated the status of her stock, he tailed her like a shadow, alert to any potential threat he might have overlooked.
She stepped back from the last display and gusted a relieved breath. “Everything’s accounted for. Thank gods. The would-be thieves must have gotten cold feet or were scared off. What moron would try knocking off a place in broad daylight anyway?”
One whose aim wasn’t to steal, but something more sinister. Maybe the culprit had hoped to take advantage of the absence of customers loitering around so they could harm Avi. Or there was always the possibility that this was an ominous calling card from the assholes who kidnapped him. A subtle message that they were watching.
And waiting to strike if he didn’t do their damn dirty work.
Chapter Fifteen
Avily had never been happier to close up shop in her life. Usually she loved the opportunity to mingle with customers, but as she’d predicted, she’d spent half the time fielding their wariness over Jerrick’s intimidating presence. The other half of the time she gritted her teeth at the blatant flirtation a handful of the braver ladies showered upon him. Really, it was revolting. Especially when a few of the hussies slipped him their numbers.
She lost no time calling him on the obnoxiousness of it the moment he followed her into the apartment.
He grunted, the bastard. “What did you want me to do, rip it up in their faces?”
You could have told them you were already committed to someone. Yeah, and that would have been a big, fat, hairy lie. Mr. I-don’t-believe-in-love tying himself to a relationship that lasted beyond a convenient roll in the sack? Not happening.
“Are you intending to call any of them?” She tried to convince herself that it didn’t matter if he did, but the awful tightness in her chest told a different story.
“No.”
A fraction of the heaviness lifted from her diaphragm. “Then you’re only giving them false hope.” Rather like her own delusional fantasy of torching through those steel bars caging his heart.
He made a frustrated sound. “I can’t win with you.”
Wrong. He’d won the most prized possession she owned. He just didn’t want it.
She shrugged from her light spring coat and hung it in the cupboard, along with his jacket. No clothes-sniffing this time around. Feeling guilty over her bitchiness, she ventured into the kitchen and cataloged the options in her cooler. “I’ll make Steak Silano for dinner. Least I can do after our botched lunch.”
An unmistakably happy moan floated from Jerrick. The dish had always been his favorite, hence Avily begging her mom all those years ago to teach her the steps in putting together the complex dish. Practice made perfect, and in considerably less time than it used to take her, she popped the succulent cut of meat topped with the creamy glaze and fresh vegetables into the oven. The key was a slow, even cook that gave ample time for the beef and savory ingredients to mingle in a tasty mélange of flavors.
Jerrick leaned his hip against the counter and took an appreciative whiff of the onion-and-herb-spiked air. “So much for that spare tire you warned me against.”
That bit of ridiculousness had been a deliberate goad on her part. If there was one thing he didn’t need to worry about, it was excess flab. Anywhere. Still, he’d handed her a prime opportunity to get her greedy mitts all over his naked flesh again. She was no dummy who’d let that pass her by. “Speaking of love handles, maybe you better try on your getup so we know it fits.”
The look he leveled on her verified he’d seen through her ruse, but he only awarded her a wry smirk and crossed to the chair where he’d left the leather pants the other day. He nabbed the garment and started to retreat to the bathroom.
She cleared her throat pointedly. “Aren’t you forgetting something?” She tossed the harness and leash, and he caught both items midair, his scowl firmly chiseled in place.
It was probably hideously wrong to be looking forward to this as much as she was.
While he changed, she made herself busy straightening up the space. She plumped the pillows on the sofa and arranged them to her liking. Fingers smoothing over the brocade fabric, she eyed the indentation in the middle cushion.
I want you to be my first lover, Jer. Make love to me.
Would she ever be able to look at this couch and not remember that day? Why the hell didn’t she get rid of this thing?
Probably for the same reason she couldn’t bring herself to part with her tattoo. Why move on from the past when she could continue torturing herself with it?
Grimacing at her utterly pathetic behavior, she slumped onto the cushion. Had Jerrick noticed the sofa was the same one he’d rejected her upon? Doubtful. Males likely weren’t sentimental about such things.
Smart of them.
She plucked at the couch seam, her dejection increasing. More than ever, her unrequited love for him mocked her. She held no prayer of him coming to his senses one day and loving her back. He didn’t have it in him. Love had become the enemy, and he would resist it at any cost.