"Ah, there it is." Pleasure spread over his face in the form of a grin so wide his teeth glinted, his eyes sparkled. "Payment, is it? How much?"
"Thirty-five." Richard crossed his arms.
"Right." Leo winked at me and I gasped. Such a strange thing to do in this situation. Then I saw why, as he withdrew something from his inside jacket pocket.
A balled fist.
He drew his arm back, swung it round and punched Richard clean in the face.
It didn't make a sound.
But Richard falling backwards into a display of Bluetooth dongles, knocking them to the floor before stumbling to the ground himself, did.
Leo peered over him, flexing his fingers. "Piper, I think we're done here."
"You punched him."
"So I did." He put his arm round my shoulder, flexed the fingers on his other hand. "Shit, that's gonna hurt in a few hours."
"I mean, you punched him."
"Mmm. I know. And he stayed down. Wise man." He threw a glance over his shoulder as I opened the door and we stepped outside. "Oh, and Richard? Keep the change."
Twenty Three
Leo didn't say a word when he pulled up outside my block. He killed the engine and in so doing, stilled my beating heart. If he'd kept the engine running I would have taken that as a sign he was scooting off elsewhere. Back to his meeting? Another one? An office somewhere, another property he was interested in buying?
None of that was an option. He parked outside my apartment block and underscored his presence by undoing his seatbelt with one flick.
One hand on his knee and the other arm leaning against the driver door, he said, "Mission accomplished, then."
"Hmm." I thought for a moment, my seatbelt still done up as if I was planning on staying in this car while he got out. "I got my computer back and de-virused for free, and you got to punch someone."
"I know." He looked at me sideways and winked. "I love it when I get to act all manly."
I undid my seatbelt and opened the door before he could get out and do the gentlemanly 'let me help you' thing.
"Hey." He followed me up the steps to my block's entrance. "Hey, Piper."
"Yeah?" I stopped and frowned.
"You're..." He brushed a solitary finger over a strand of my hair even though I didn't think I was that disheveled so he must have been touching me for the sake of it. "Did you forget I was here?"
"No, no." Busying myself with rummaging in my handbag—or trying to—I looked away from him, and he lifted
my laptop bag out of my arms.
"Allow me."
Treating myself to a brief glance in his direction, I recovered my keys and let us into my block.
"Why do you have to live up so many flights of stairs, Piper?"
"It keeps me fit."
"It'd have to; there's no lift."
"We can't all afford snazzy loft apartments, Leo." Leave me alone; no, don't leave me alone. "Besides, you're strong and manly enough to cope with lugging a laptop bag up the stairs, aren't you?"
"None stronger, babe."
Neither of us said anything more for the remainder of the climb and when we reached my door, images of the last time he'd been here flashed through my mind.
I unlocked the door up against which he'd fucked me. Stepped onto the carpet I'd fallen to afterwards.
"Where do you want this?"
"I'll take it," I said, relieving him of my bag and heading straight to the living room, not looking at him, touching him, waiting to check if he followed.
"Aren't you going to have a look at it?" Leo's voice in the living room doorway made me jump.
"No." I'd put the laptop bag on the floor beside the settee and slid it back a few inches, out of sight between that and my end table. "I'll check it later. I really can't be bothered with it just now." I kicked off my shoes, threw my handbag and coat onto the armchair and flopped onto the settee, leaning on its arm, one hand shielding my eyes.
His weight disturbed the settee cushions and pulled me to one side like gravity would attract a satellite.
A hand on my knee. A thumb, caressing.
I took a deep breath and opened my eyes again, but stared straight ahead at my fireplace rather than to the side, at him.
"How d'y'feel now?" he asked in a low voice.
"God knows." I thought for a long moment. "Relieved. Tired. Wrung out. Creeped out—"
"Not by my presence I hope."
"No."
Silence descended, thick and oppressive and choking, like smog.
Leo inhaled sharply, moved again, this time facing me, one leg curled up underneath him, his arm—the nonpunching one—along the settee back. He said nothing, and took my hand in his, bruised knuckles rippling as he flexed his fingers and clasped mine.
His scrutiny was too damn much for me and I leapt to my feet, got halfway across my living room before I realized what I was doing.
"Where are you going?"
"I don't know. Nowhere. I just..." I even resented him asking me that. As if I couldn't even stand up, take a few steps without him making demands of me. Hands on hips, I faltered as I walked, and stopped, eyeing the door while still hyperaware of his presence behind me.
Then right behind me, a palm on the small of my back. "Piper. What's wrong? No, no, stupid question. It's obvious what's—"
"I've been smothered enough already today thank you," I snapped, the words coming from my mouth but not my brain. It was as if someone else spoke for me with my voice.
"I wasn't aware that asking someone a question constituted smothering them," he whispered against my ear. "Threatening to take them 'round back and give them a good seeing to? Now yeah, that I could say was smothering behavior."
"Exactly what I was referring to."
"Good. We're on the same page then. I might be hurt if I thought you were comparing my genuine concern with the behavior of a man slightly less gentlemanly than myself."
"Does that mean you believe me then?" I murmured, craving his validation and mentally kicking myself for this need.
"Why wouldn't I?" His voice had a kick to it, like a laugh he'd choked on.
"You knew him before you knew me."
"Do you want me to disbelieve you?" Leo asked, the laughter now more recognizable.
"I want you to..." I stepped away from him, to the side, looking over my shoulder at his lips, willing him to stop smiling, and he did.
"What?"
Go away. Leave me alone. Stay. Stop making me feel—
"Piper. It's understandable you'd be out of sorts, but I'm not the one who... well, you know."
"I know." Screwing my eyes shut, I turned my back on him again but he was there, always there. I didn't even have to look to know he was there. I felt him.
"Turn around."
Don't let him tell you what to do, Piper.
I turned around.
His hand went to my waist, resting on my hip bone and his thumb strained up, skirting an inch or two below my breast and I cursed the fabric separating his skin from mine.
"What did he say?"
"Who?"
"Richard." His name felt like a worm on my tongue.
"Oh." Leo scowled, his gaze following the progress of his hand as it slid up my waist, cupped my breast through my dress, moved higher. "Him. Nothing."
"I saw you speaking with him while I was picking up my laptop."
"He was just... being a douche."
"Yeah. I gathered."
"Oh, you know." His hand rested on my collarbone.
"No. I don't. Tell me."
A heavy sigh. "Piper."
"Leo."
"He denied it, of course. Said he'd assumed you were a casual fling to me, so he thought he'd make a pass, given the nature of certain files he'd seen on your computer..."
"Oh."
"Hmm." Leo inclined his head, crooked his finger and ran it along the inside of my neckline. His fingertip tickled my skin.
"And..." I wasn't sure if it was him touching me that made my heart beat faster or the thought of what I was about to say. "Did he say anything about what he'd found?"
A slow smirk twisted his lips. "Why? Are you worried I
might find out your deep, dark secrets?"
"No." Yes. I am worried you might find something out to make you think less of me and I hate, hate, hate that your opinion matters so much. "I have no deep, dark secrets. Just stuff on my computer that he looked at."
"Come on, Piper. Everyone has secrets."
Without thinking I shrugged his hand off me and his head flicked up. His eyes widened momentarily before two vertical lines appeared above the bridge of his nose. A hint of a frown, but nothing more than that. "What...?"
"I also have the right to privacy, and to know what people have said about me while my back was turned, so if he said anything about me, I want to know."
"Piper, he didn't say anything. Just a bunch of bullshit." Leo's hand reached for me but I dodged out of his way. "What the...?"
"Leo, just tell me what he said."
"Nothing! Nothing that made any sense. Just that he'd..."
"He'd what?"
"Thought you..."
"Thought I what? Was an easy target?"
"More or less." He shrugged.
"Christ!" I pushed Leo away with both hands on his chest and it must have been surprise that unbalanced him and made him stumble backwards because it sure as hell couldn't have been my brute strength against his. I'd lose every time on that front.
Every. Damn. Time.
"Hey." He neared me by one step but I kept him at arm's length. He could so easily have overpowered me but made no attempt to do so.
My fingers curled and his shirt bunched under my hands. Still he made no attempt to pull my hands off him or near me against my will. "God, this is..."
He cocked his head as if waited for me to finish, listening intently.
"I hate..." My tongue refused to finish the sentence. I hate that I had to ask for help. "It's not..." Fair. "I wish..." I didn't want you so much. "You shouldn't..." Be here because I asked for help. You should be here because you want to be.
"This..." Spoils it all.
"Piper." Something in his gentle tone of voice told me that he wanted me to lower my arms. But I didn't. Possibly couldn't. "Piper." He waited a few seconds before taking my hands and lifting them away himself. It was easier for me to let him than to cede any ground by moving myself. As he stepped forward, my arms bent and I ended up with my hands against his shoulders. His hands snaked around my waist but I couldn't look him in the eye. I didn't dare tilt my head back.
"It's not me you're angry at. I'm not the one who—"
"You were—" I interrupted him, then interrupted myself by choking on my own words.
"I was what?" His hand crept up my back, cupped the back of my neck, tightened, as if he was trying to make me lean back to look him in the eye. But I resisted, and he didn't force me. The tension between us remained, his hand a welcome pressure on my skin.
"You were... there," I heard myself say, and a metaphorical light came on. That was the problem.
"You asked me to be. You phoned me, remember?"
"I... I know. But... fuck." Again his shirt fabric bunched under my fingers and he inhaled sharply, though quietly. So quietly I wasn't even sure if I'd heard it.
"Why did you phone me?" His breath warmed my forehead as it had so many time before but this was the first time it had felt uncomfortable.
My entire body longed to get away from him because I was dangerously close to not being able to let him go. Better to split now than to get too used to the way he felt under my palms.
Oh. Too late.
"Piper? Why did you phone me?"
"Because..." Say something. Anything. Even if it makes him step back. Especially if it makes him step back, because then he won't be touching you and he won't be feeding your addiction. "You were the one who'd recommended that place."
"Is that all?"
"I needed my computer back and I didn't want to go back in there myself."
"Didn't you have anyone else you could have called?"
"Are you trying to tell me I shouldn't have phoned you?"
"Piper. I told you earlier I wouldn't have come if I didn't want to. You can't make me do anything I don't want to. I was there because I wanted to be."