Chapter Three
“Give him back,” Lilith demanded, holding out a hand, knowing she didn’t have a leg to stand on but putting on her tough girl act nonetheless. Pretending she was invincible and had no fucks to give had gotten her out of a lot of scrapes. She didn’t see why that had to change now, especially with this sweater-vest wearing butthead with a golf club up his ass.
Except the man holding Flaps, studying her favorite stuffie like it was something he could buy at one of his fancy country club pro shops, didn’t seem cowed by her. Flaps wasnotfor sale, and this fucking guy, no matter how barrel-chested and husky he was, needed to get his manicured hands off of her bat or she was going to claw his eyes out.
“Him?” he asked, tipping his head and still dangling Flaps in the air.
Lilith’s chest got tight and she felt her rage turning into tears, but no way was she crying. She wanted to storm over to Lance or Chance or Vance—whatever the fuck his bourgeois ass was named—but she didn’t dare.
Rich white guys thought they owned everything, and sometimes that included her. She hadn’t said no to Chester her creeper boss to say yes to some yacht-sailing, loafer-sporting Ivy Leaguer. Although saying yes didn’t seem to matter all that much to some of those guys either.
If she was smart, she would storm out while the storming was good, haul ass out of Mountain View, and find another seldom-used summer place to crash while she figured her shit out. But while Lilith knew she was smart, she wasn’t thinking with her head at the moment. She was thinking with her heart, and her heart couldn’t bear the thought of abandoning Flaps.
“Yes,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest again, the straps of all her heavy bags digging into her shoulders.
It wasn’t fun hauling all her earthly possessions around like a packhorse, but it was better than getting on her knees for her smarmy ex-boss.
“Give me my bat and I’ll leave. I swear I didn’t break anything or steal anything. So, just, hand it over and I’ll go.”
But he didn’t. Just stood there, keeping Flaps hostage. She might’ve committed a B&E, but he was the one who was being a dickhead.
The jerk cocked his head to the other side like he was a golden retriever or some other dog you’d see in a Ralph Lauren commercial. She hated him.
Dogs were fine, and she would understand if one of them decided to play keepaway with Flaps even if she didn’t like her beloved bat getting slimed. This guy didn’t have that excuse; he was just an aging khaki-clad dudebro. He was definitely older than her but it was hard to judge by exactly how much because while his body was that middle-age sturdy brand of thick she found uncomfortably hot, his face was boyish and his light hair hid any greys he might have.
“Give him back,” she ground out again. To her abject horror, her voice cracked when she added, “Please.”
She shouldn’t have to ask nicely and she wasn’t going to beg, but something about her sorry state had an instant effect on…Vance. Yeah, that was his name.
His shoulders dropped and the assessment that had crinkled the corners of his eyes vanished. He looked almost…sorry.
“Hey,” he said, taking a few steps toward her, holding out Flaps. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you. I was going to give him back, I just meant to use him as a bargaining chip so you’d answer my questions.”
“That’s fucked up,” she muttered as she snatched Flaps away from him and cradled the stuffie to her chest.
* * *
This woman was surprise after surprise. He felt another surge of tenderness for her as she hugged the bat and looked at it like it was a human baby instead of a sort of creepy and worn toy.
Vance knew better than to be an asshole about stuffies—more than he’d already been, anyway. He was acquainted his fair share of littles and many of them were extremely attached to their favorite stuffed animals. The plushes weren’t toys to them so much as friends, and guilt roiled his stomach as he realized what he’d done.Dick move, Yardley.Hudson would have his head for that.
Vance stared at the woman for the couple of seconds she seemed to forget herself before everything about her went from sweetly soft to demon hunter sharp and she turned on her booted heel toward the door.
Where the fuck was she going to go? If she had somewhere else to be, why wasn’t she, you know,thereinstead of squatting in his place?
He couldn’t stomach the idea of her heading out into the cold dark night, especially not in that lack-of-clothing. That combination wasn’t asking for trouble because that wasn’t a thing, but there were definitely some sick fuck nuggets who would feel like it was.
“Don’t you dare walk out of this house,” he bit out, smothering the “little girl” that wanted to chase the admonishment.
He wasn’t at Hive, for fuck’s sake, and more importantly, he didn’t have that kind of relationship with this woman. Or any kind of relationship for that matter, beyond her having trespassed on his property.
It wouldn’t have surprised him if she just kept walking, slammed the door on her way out. But she didn’t. Maybe he was more right than he knew—perhaps the daddy in him had connected to the little in her while their walkabout everyday selves were still floundering? Whatever it was, the woman stopped in her tracks and slowly spun around.
Well, shit. If he’d thought he cracked her hard candy shell and found the squishy, pliable little girl center, he was wrong. Dead wrong. Like maybe literally dead because she looked like she was about to grab a machete or a wooden stake or a sawed off shotgun with silver bullets out of one of her many bags.
“What did you just say to me?” she demanded in a lethally quiet voice.
Vance held up his hands because while he probably had a foot and seventy pounds on her not to mention that she was weighed down with a bunch of personal effects, she was fucking terrifying.