Page 4 of Reese’s Protection

His smile curved his thin pink lips. They looked fragile and kissable on his angular face. I shook my head at myself, but he must’ve taken the gesture as a warning, since that asshole was all over him earlier, and stumbled a step back from the table.

“You’re fine,” I said, holding out a hand to stop his backward progress.

He laughed, a high, nervous sound that drove a knife through my heart.

All right, if we needed to address the elephant in the room before he could calm down, we would. “You’re a loyal friend to Layton. You’ve gotten him out of a few jams at school.”

Reese blew out a long breath and nodded. “That’s why he let me stay with him when I was stuck with . . . .” His dark eyebrows danced upward. He’d shouted at the club, but his voice tended toward a calm, low cadence. I loved it. He hadn’t spoken much to me in the past. I’d been on the edge of his existence, stepping in from time to time when he and Layton got into problems that were too much for them to handle. I loved the way it felt to help him and have him smile at me, and I wanted more of it.

“Cool. Why were you hanging out with that trash at Sinful?”

He huffed, a tiny indignant sound that had the corner of my mouth kicking up into a smile.

“As if I had a choice!” He flopped his hands at his sides, my jacket swaying around his slender frame. “Jeremy followed me there. He wants me back.” His eyelids fluttered as he rolled his eyes.

“Why didn’t you do anything? You’re a grown man.” I walked over to my workbench and leaned against it. As the silence dragged out between us, I gripped the edge tightly. “Take a swing? Make a ruckus?”

Finally, Reese hung his head and crossed his arms, but he was still wearing my jacket, cute despite the irritation etched in his features.

“He’s stronger than me.” It seemed to cost him a lot to admit that fact, since his scowl took over his face.

“Buy a gun. A bat. Anything to knock him around. A fucking paddle for a kayak would do the job.”

His mouth fell open. “You want me to shoot him?”

“Or hit him. Hard. Better him than you. If he’s going to be a problem, have a solution. Life’s pretty easy that way.”

He laughed and spun in a circle as if he was looking for help, then glared at me. “You’re victim blaming.”

“No.”

His bottom lip popped. “You’re telling me this is my fault!”

“No, I’m telling you, from where I’m sitting, he’s an unstable fuckhead, and you should definitely shoot him if you need to do it.” I shrugged. “Better than you getting hurt.”

He puffed out his cheeks and stared at me wide eyed. The air leaked from him and his shoulders slumped. “Layton never told me you were this crazy.”

“I’m willing to bet Layton hasn’t told you a lot of things.” Our fucked-up shared childhood flashed through my mind. Dad loomed, a monster. Maybe that was why Layton had been so willing to bring Reese into his home. I’d wondered what was going on there. “No one will save you. Get a gun. Learn to use it. Hell.” I opened the top drawer of my workbench and lifted out the Glock I kept in there for home defense. I set it down beside a hammer. “You can have mine if you want.”

He shook his head. “I can’t.”

“No one will save you,” I growled.

“You did.” He pointed at me, but my jacket flopped around and had him huffing again.

“I’m a dumbass,” I muttered. “Not everyone will get between him and you.”

His nose wrinkled and he turned his back on me, pacing over to the coffee table again. The only useful thing my father ever did was teach me his craft, and I loved carving wood.

Reese slid his palm across the smooth surface, and it made me shiver to watch him. My hands had been there. I’d worked that wood over, and now he was enjoying it, caressing it. My dick pushed against my boxers in a distracting way.

“Did you do this?” he asked.

“Yep.” I walked to him with my hands shoved into the pockets of my jeans.

“Wow.”

The silence dragged out, and when he made no move to speak, I sighed. “I’m serious. How will you protect yourself?”