Dark Horse

by Jessica Gadziala

Contract muscle.

  Or maybe, judging by the car, driver.

  Whatever it was, it was definitely below-board.

  Enzo, the almost unfairly gorgeous man with the laugh that turned her belly liquid... was absolutely some sort of criminal.

  But when she ran his name at the office - something that was maybe a bit inappropriate, but her curiosity needed to be sated - she had found no criminal record on him. Not even something petty like a drunk and disorderly. Not even a parking ticket.

  What kind of career criminal walked away from that life without a record?

  A good one, her mind suggested.

  Though, he definitely hadn't gotten out unscathed.

  There was a scar down the side of his face. And it was fresh, just barely healed.

  Was that why he decided to turn his life around, take a new path? Had things gotten too messy? Did he need to save his skin, leave it all behind, move to a new city, get a legit job?

  All these thoughts were floating around her head in the oppressive silence of that car as they both just stared at a construction site.

  Eventually, she felt so full up of unsaid things, that her mouth ran away with her, and broke the silence.

  She had no right to be annoyed when he asked about her father. Really, it made sense. They were both curious about the other's pasts. And even though her past wasn't anywhere near as scandalous as a criminal background, it didn't mean it was something she wanted to rehash. Especially if it gave him fuel to feed the fire, if it gave him something to hold over her head, use against her.

  If he figured out that she left her last job because she was continually underestimated, and ruthlessly sexually harassed, then what was stopping him from implementing those things in the new office to make it miserable for her there as well?

  Xander, maybe.

  He didn't seem to underestimate her.

  And, you know, the fact that Enzo did genuinely seem like a decent person.

  But depending on how hungry he was, how desperate he was to beat out the competition, maybe he was willing to stoop that low.

  Uncomfortable, knowing that if he asked more about her past, she was going to get defensive and start tossing around her ideas about his past - information she wanted to play close to her vest in case he went low, she could go lower - she hopped out of the car, bent on clearing her head with a walk. Which was, well, not like her. Aside from kicking ass in martial arts classes when her schedule allowed, she pretty much avoided any form of exercise like the plague.

  She was not a pacer.

  She didn't 'walk to save the cab fare.'

  She didn't wake up early to get a run in before work.

  Nope. Not her.

  The only exercise she enjoyed was the sort that afforded her the opportunity to whoop some ass in the process.

  That was just how badly she needed to get away to clear her head.

  That was exactly her intention too as she stepped out onto the sidewalk, but then froze when she noticed a shadow moving across the street. Her brain brushed it off at first, figuring it was some unsecured plastic tarp floating around.

  But then it moved.

  And her heart dropped down to her belly.

  She didn't stop to think.

  She didn't even remember to tell Enzo.

  She acted on pure instinct.

  All she could think was she had the chance to prove herself, she could show not only Xander that she was capable, but in a way, show her entire old office too. She wasn't too weak, too slow, too girly to take down a bad guy.

  She had taken down her motherfucking sensei - who was a brick shithouse of a man - when she was all of fourteen.

  She could handle herself.

  She just needed the chance to show everyone else that.

  That was literally the only thing on her mind as she threw herself between stacks of rebar and copper piping, something zinging in her brain at seeing them, but she quickly replaced those thoughts with adrenaline as she saw the shadow shift again, seeming to move inside the half-built first floor.

  Completely disregarding all the literal danger signs, she tore in through a side window, following the shuffle of other feet. Slow. Unconcerned.

  They had to have heard her footsteps, coming fast, but they didn't seem all that concerned with the fact.

  Espen's heart became a frantic pounding behind her ribcage as she ripped down a sheet of semi-transparent plastic where she thought she saw a figure, finding only a discarded construction hat stuck on top of a pile of steel.

  "Damn it," she hissed under her breath, turning, and ramming into something - someone - hard.

  Instinctually, she brought her hand up to strike, only to find her wrist snagged in a strong, unyielding grip.

  Very, very few people could anticipate her movements. She might have been small, but she was quick. No one usually even saw the strike coming.

  But her dainty wrist was enclosed, completely enveloped, in a medium-skinned, scar-covered hand.

  She didn't have to look to know.

  Of course it was him.

  But her head tilted up to find him standing over her, evenly breathing even though hers was labored, body calm where hers was coiled.

  "What are you..." she started to hiss.

  "He took off already, honey," he said, releasing her wrist when she remembered to yank it.

  "What? How? I was right behind him!" she insisted, feeling her pride take another hit it truly didn't need.

  "You reached to move the plastic away, he took off the other direction."

  Determined not to show any signs of embarrassment, any disappointment, any weakness at all, she dropped a guard down over her face. "Why didn't you go after him?" she accused.

  "He was halfway down the fucking street by the time I got to the door, Espen. He would have been gone down a side street before I hit the main drag. It was pointless. Did you get a look at him?"

  Espen sighed, shaking her head. "Just a general 'hoodie, jeans, tall, thin' kinda look. It's so dark here."

  "Alright, well, he won't be coming back tonight, that's for sure," Enzo said, shrugging it off. Meanwhile, she was just a tumultuous mess of emotions inside, pissed that she had possibly fucked up a great lead.

  What if he never came back?

  What if that were the only chance they would get to catch the guy?

  "Come on. Let me drive you home," Enzo said, cutting into her insecure internal ramblings.

  "It's fine. I can take the subwa..."

  "Honey," he said, his voice a little cutting, like he had reached the end of his rope with her, something unusual enough to make her turn and give him her full attention. "I fucking get it, okay?" he said, shaking his head.

  "Get what?" she asked, maybe liking the rougher around the edges side he was showing her right then.

  "You can take care of yourself. You don't need no man. You are a badass bitch. I get it," he said, ducking his head a little. "So you can knock it the fuck off already. I offered to give you a ride home, not shackle you to a kitchen stove, and demand you cook me dinner."

  A surprised, choking laugh burst out of her, making his light green eyes dance in response. "You just called me a bitch, and I'm not even mad," she admitted, forgetting that she didn't want to let on that any part of her liked any part of him, knowing the possible ramifications of an admission such as that.

  "Because 'badass' preceded it," he agreed with the slightest of up-turned lips. "Look, Espen," he said, tone level, reasonable. "I have sisters, okay? I get your whole... thing. And I even get why it's necessary. But I need you to get me, okay? I have nothing but fucking respect for women. I was raised by a whole shitload of amazing and strong ones. But I have two little sisters out in a world full of shitheads. I know this because I used to associate with a bunch of shitheads. So I don't like seeing a woman, even a capable fucking woman, walking the streets in bad areas at night. Call that backward or Neanderthalish if you need to, but that is just how I am."
<
br />   She shouldn't have liked that speech as much as she did.

  And maybe it was a testament to how badly things had gotten at her previous job that she was so affected by it, but the words almost felt heavy, like they landed with impact.

  She found herself wanting to know more about the strong women. It was plural, so it was more than just his mother. Were there aunts? Grandmothers? Friends of the family?

  And these sisters of his. She knew they were younger, but by how much? What were they like? With a big brother as protective as him, that was hard to tell. Maybe they rebelled and became wild. Maybe they nestled in the cocoon of his protection and were soft and sweet. It was impossible to tell. Despite her better judgment, though, she wanted to know.

  "What?" he asked when, well, she must have been standing there like a damn idiot for too long, thinking about his family.

  "How much older are you than them?" she found herself asking, figuring it was the safest - and least creepy - of all her questions.

  "Just a couple years," he said, shrugging. "Kenz would fucking flay me if she knew I was walking around calling her my 'little' sister still."

  So Kenz, whoever she was, was more of a wild child.

  "And the other one?" she asked, falling into step with him as he led them both back out of the building, making her aware for the first time how rickety the ground was, how much glass, how many nails were all laying around. She could have lost her footing at any time, fallen, and been impaled by God-knew how many different items.

  She would never have lived that down.

  She needed to be more careful.

  "The other one would likely say, well, nothing. Reese is quiet."

  So he had them both - the wild child, and the one in the cocoon.

  Interesting.

  As they walked through the land around the half-built building, carefully navigating their footsteps so they didn't step down on anything dangerous, she found herself wondering about him as a brother. He was protective, sure. He admitted that. But did he sit and listen to them babble about hair products? Did he scare off their boyfriends? Was he the type to hold them while they cried, or run as fast from the room as possible?

  "Espen," Enzo said a couple minutes later after they had gotten into the car, so lost in her own thoughts, she didn't realize how long they had been sitting there doing nothing.

  "Yeah?"

  "Unless you're sleeping at my place tonight, I'm gonna need an address."

  His place?

  She'd be lying if she said there wasn't at the very least a swell of anticipation at that idea.

  But she quickly pushed that aside and rattled off her address, knowing that any lengthy pause following a comment such as that would be read into. Correctly. And that, well, that would not be good.

  She lived in a better area of town than where Xander's office was, but not anywhere near as nice as where her father lived, where he would prefer she lived as well. See, he was progressive in most ways, but when it came to providing for her, despite the fact that she was a grown ass woman, he still wanted to take care of her. And, well, she just had way too much pride for that. She moved out of her dorms, and into an apartment that fit her somewhat modest salary at her desk job.

  Quite frankly, she wasn't sure she could afford to stay there in the long run working for Rhodes, but that was a small sacrifice. She was never the kind of person who got overly attached to a house anyway.

  "What are you doing?" she asked as he cut the engine and reached for his door as she stepped out. The sun was starting to snake across the sky, making her wonder what time it was. It must have been that point in the night where it stopped being late, and started to be early.

  "Walking you up," he said casually, like it was the most normal thing in the world.

  Aside from men she brought home to sleep with, literally no one had ever offered to walk her to her door before. While she was steadfastly determined to stand on her own two feet, to be a strong, independent woman, she had to admit... Enzo's insistence on old school manners was way more appealing than it should have been.

  "Are you for real?" she found herself asking, shaking her head at him.

  "This is where my mother would have said something about 'what were you raised in a barn' kinda thing that basic manners faze you."

  "I grew up in the city," she offered, waving a hand out to where a cabbie was wailing on his horn, and some jackass in a Lexus was screaming obscenities back at him.

  "Code, honey," he said as they stood outside the front door awkwardly.

  Jesus.

  What was wrong with her?

  "Right," she said, punching it in, shaking her head again when there was a buzz, and Enzo held open the door for her.

  They headed toward the elevator to take it up to the top floor. She had a thing about wanting to be high. Why? She had no idea. Logistically, it was the most unsafe place to be in a building. You had all those damn flights to take down in an emergency. But she liked being 'away from it all.' She liked not having footsteps above her. She liked that, with this particular building, she was able to sneak up onto the roof, and look down at the city when she was stressed out.

  "Quiet," Enzo commented as they moved down the hall on her floor that she only shared with three other apartments.

  "Yeah, for the city, this is pretty peaceful."

  "I got a couple a floor above me who fuck like an asteroid is about to hit the earth."

  He said it so casually, like it was the most normal comment in the world. But to Espen, who was losing a battle with her sex drive that was hyper aware of his close proximity, his overwhelming masculineness, his deep voice, his overall just deeply sensualness, yeah, it was a problem.

  So him making comments about fucking, yeah, she felt a heavy pressure land on her lower stomach, unable to name it anything other than desire.

  "That must be, ah, distracting," she offered, digging her key out of her pocket, and stabbing it into the bottom lock.

  "Distracting is an... interesting way to put it," he said as she undid the last lock, and pushed the door open.

  "What way would you put it?" she asked, turning on the light, then turning back to face him.

  Which was, well, a big mistake.

  Because he was close - too close - and he was way too good looking.

  On top of all of that, his eyes seemed molten suddenly.

  "I call it... stimulating," he said, head moving down slightly, getting even closer to her.

  Stimulating?

  Oh, she realized, a pre-orgasm tightening accompanying that new knowledge.

  Now she was the stimulated one.

  Shit.

  Okay.

  Deep breaths.

  And she needed to...

  Oh, lord.

  He was coming closer.

  If she wasn't mistaken - and she rarely was - there was something predatory in his gait, in his gaze.

  "What are you doing?" she asked, knowing even as she turned to keep her eyes on him, a move that made her back hit the wall, that things were about to go a way that she both equally did and didn't want them to go.

  She wanted to be able to claim that she could fight it, that she was strong enough to push him away, but she just wasn't sure if that was an assertion she could make. Let alone stick to.

  One of his arms raised, the whole forearm moving to rest on the wall beside her head. The other side was open. She could slide out. She wasn't actually trapped. But somehow, she still felt trapped. Just not against her will. She was trapped by the way his body curled into her space, the way his head ducked down to keep almost unnerving eye-contact, the way she could feel his body heat, could smell his body wash, could feel the brush of his leg on hers.

  "I'm doing something we both wanted from the fucking second we spotted each other on the street outside Xander's," he declared as his other hand raised, moving up to brush the sensitive skin of her neck as it slid behind to wrap around the back of it. Then he used that to yank
her forward as his lips crashed down on hers.

  It wasn't fireworks or anything cheesy like that.

  No, this was something hotter, something smoldering.

  There was not even a thought to stopping it, to pulling away.

  In fact, it was barely after their lips met that she was pushing off the wall, pressing her body into his. His arm dropped from the wall, sliding across her lower back, and holding her tight as his tongue moved out to claim hers.

  A shiver coursed through her body as his arm released her back so he could slam her back against the wall, hand at the back of her neck preventing her whacking that in the process. His free hand slid down her thigh, moving inward at the knee, then yanking it up to the side of his hip, opening her core to him.

  There was no stopping the ragged moan that escaped her as he pressed his hips forward, and his hard cock pressed against right where she needed him most.

  A low, sexy rumble moved through his chest, reverberating into her own, as he pulled back, then ground against her again.

  Then there was something else.

  Something against the crease of her thigh, something that was in Enzo's front pocket.

  A buzzing.

  His cell.

  And, well, it was vibrating very close to where she was longing for the sensation, dragging a throaty whimper out of her, but a low, rolling chuckle from Enzo as he released her lips.

  "When we hit the sheets, remind me to bring some toys," he said, voice even deeper than usual, but not as smooth, a bit rough in his own desire even as he smirked at her, his hand sliding down to snag his phone in his pocket.

  Unattended-to need still sparking through her system, the only thing that was clear right then was that he said when.

  When we hit the sheets.

  Not if.

  When.

  Like the decision was made, like he was done fighting it.

  Granted, neither had put up that epic a fight, seeing as it had only been a few days, but it felt like a battle. She felt weakened from it.

  "Yo," he said into the phone, watching her with those light eyes of his intensely for a second before something on the other end of the line made his entire face go serious in a blink. "Gina. Gina, calm down. I don't understand what... what about Basking Ridge? Wait. Alright. Kenzi? What the fuck do you mean Cassie was fucking kidnapped! Whoa, fucking shit. Raped? Gina, I need you to take a breath, and tell me that again. Motherfucker!"