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The hand fell into my lap. His body curled into me from behind, around my hips and his other arm wrapped around my waist.
“Make it stop,” he said as he rubbed his face against my hip. I was thankful for the shorts I had on because if he’d rubbed his face like that against my bare skin his beard would have hurt me. I didn’t need carpet burn from Dash’s facial hair. He was the only one of the guys who had a beard, and it was big and full, covering half of his face. It suited him.
The phone stopped ringing. And immediately started back up again.
I grumbled as I scooted away from Dash’s warmth, and climbed out of the comfort of my bed and his arms. I had no freaking clue what could be so important that someone would feel the need to call my phone over and over again. And, honestly, I wasn’t sure I wanted to know. I wanted to go back to bed and back to Dash.
Instead of doing what I wanted, I walked across the room to the dresser on bare feet. The wood floor was surprisingly warm; it always was. I kept expecting it to be cold on my feet when I got out of bed in the morning, but I was never disappointed to find it warm.
The screen on my phone was lit up, Quinton’s name on the screen. I frowned as I picked up the cell and unplugged it from the cord that had been charging it. I pressed my finger to the green button and swiped it across the screen before bringing it up to my ear. He was talking before I had the phone to my ear.
“Where the hell are you?” he growled.
Did I say he’d been talking? Well, I’d meant bitching.
“I’m home,” I grumbled sullenly. He woke me up just to ask where I was? Ridiculous. “Where else would I be? Where the heck areyou?”
Dash started to laugh quietly. They all got a kick out of me throwing attitude Quinton’s way. If he’d been less of a pain in everyone’s ass, they might have thought differently.
“Right now, I’m standing in front of my house watching that fuckwad football player drive off with that motherfucker Adrian.”
Oh boy.
With each word spoken, his voice got a little lower, until he ended in a scary whisper that told me just how angry he was.
I thought about my options and went with the easiest one.
“Okay,” I said cautiously. I felt like it was the only safe thing for metosay. Anything else and he would likely take it the wrong way. I didn’t like dealing with Quinton when he was angry, and, unfortunately, he was angry more often than not.
“Okay,” he repeated in a deep growl. “What the fuck do you mean, okay? No, never mind. I have no desire to hear whatever fucked-up shit that will come out of your crazy mouth if you answer that.”
Fucked-up shit that would come out of my mouth? My crazy mouth?
Please.
That did it. I needed coffee before dealing with his hostility.
I pulled the phone away from my ear and tapped the dark screen with my fingertip. The screen came to life and I pressed my finger firmly to the red circle, ending the call.
I didn’t feel bad about hanging up on Quinton. Sometimes, he needed it, and I was the only one who could give it to him without making him angry with me, and without having to fear him taking it out on me later.
Let him call one of the others and give them a hard time, my time putting up with it was up.
It wasn’t but ten seconds later when the phone started ringing once again. I sighed and, instead of turning my phone off and setting it on top of the dresser and walking away from it, I pressed my finger to the green circle and swiped. It was either talk to him now, or wait for ten minutes to talk to him when he showed up at the cottage. Which is exactly what he’d do so that he could give me a piece of his mind face-to-face. I’d like to avoid that particular delight if possible, something I might have screwed myself out of because I’d hung up on him; he might just show up anyway because he felt like it.
“Hello,” I said pleasantly into the phone.
This was going to be a disaster.
“Did you just hang up on me?” He growled. “Why the fuck would you do that?”
Sheesh. Normally, he was a whole lot brighter than this.
“Quinton,” I said patiently. “You called me, yelled at me, and demanded I tell you things and then proceeded to say not so pleasant things to me and about me. How can you honestly expect me to stick around for that? Of course I hung up on you.”
Perhaps I should have been a little less than honest with him? Oh, well. Too late now, the words were out, and like usual, I would have to deal with them.
“It’s Wednesday, Ariel.” He told me something I already knew. Then he told me something I had forgotten entirely all about. “You come over early on Wednesday, Friday and Sunday to meet with Adrian. The rest of the week, you do afternoons because of his schedule. So, forgive me that I was worried when you didn’t show up this morning, you’ve never even been late to these meetings before. What the hell was I supposed to think? You ran out of here yesterday like the devil was chasing you, and I’ve been worried ever since. That was a lot to deal with yesterday. Is that why you decided to no-show this morning? I wish you would have told me you weren’t coming. I looked like an asshole to Adrian.”
