I should be asking him what the hell he’s doing, pointing out that I’m a grown ass woman who can put her own seatbelt on but as soon as his cologne wraps around me, every thought in my head goes on holiday and I’m left trying not to moan out loud at how good he smells.
As he leans back to put his own on, I can breathe again, I don’t know what it is about this man, but every time he invades my space my mind stops working.
Flicking on the indicator, Mr grumpy checks his mirrors and pulls out into the light traffic, heading back toward the house as I notice his hand is bandaged, it definitely wasn’t like that earlier.
‘You shouldn’t get into cars with people you don’t know’ he suddenly grumbles, and I turn my head quickly, wondering if someone else is in the car with us because he can’t actually be talking to me.
‘I do know that’ I reply, the reason why Caleb’s hand is bandaged melting away as I focus on his arrogant attitude, ‘I’m not a child.’
My stepbrother glances at me before quickly looking away, ‘you got in a car with that Noah kid, so obviously you don’t.’
‘He’s not a stranger’ I reply, a bite of defensiveness in my voice ‘he’s a friend from college and we went to a caf? for lunch.’
Caleb’s hands tighten on the steering wheel, ‘he could have taken you anywhere, you were lucky, you barely know him.’
I huff loudly, ‘I know my instincts and they said he was a good guy, plus I warned him that if he tried anything I would shatter his eardrums with my screams and cause so much pain to his man parts they’d never stand up straight again.’
Caleb’s eyebrows rise as he looks over at me, ‘man parts?’ he repeats.
I cross my arms over my chest, ‘yes, man parts.’
I watch my stepbrother’s eyes crinkle and if I wasn’t sure that it was impossible, I’d say that he was amused.
‘His dick’ he responds.
‘If that’s what you want to call it’ I mutter, fighting against the blush that’s crawling up my face. I may be nearly twenty, but I still don’t feel comfortable talking about certain things.
‘That’s what it’s called’ Caleb continues, ‘his dick’ he tilts his head, ‘why don’t you call it what it is?’
I shrug, ‘I don’t feel the need, you understood what I meant.’
His eyes winkle mischeviously as he pulls over to the side of the road, putting the truck in park and turning to face me.
‘Say it’ he orders softly.
‘What? No!’ I protest, and I can feel my face is now on fire, damn you fair skin.
‘Just say it, it’s just a word’ Caleb teases, ‘no? How about his cock, his penis, his big raging boner?’
‘I am not saying that, I do not need to talk about people’s . . men’s . . . downstairs regions’ I hiss, using my hands to cover my face in mortification.
He studies me for a second before suddenly throwing his head back and laughing loudly. I stare at him mesmerised as the closed off, argumentative man beside me suddenly turns into a playful boy. His entire face lights up, a glimpse of someone who likes to have fun peeking out at me.
My God, he’s beautiful, like adonis level beautiful. I don’t want him to stop laughing, I want to watch his face forever as he chuckles to himself.
‘Downstairs region’ he mutters, wiping at his eyes as he finally tamps down on his laughter, ‘never heard a dick called that before.’
‘Shut up’ I mutter, staring out of the window as he continues to chuckle beside me.
Reaching the house, I unclip my seatbelt before the car even stops, flinging open the door and running for the front door. Of course when I get there, I have to wait because I don’t actually have a key to unlock it.
That heady cologne hits me again as Caleb crowds me from behind, reaching around me to slide his key into the lock.
‘You really should wait for the vehicle to be in park before you take off your seatbelt’ he murmurs in my ear.
‘You were literally doing one mile an hour’ I mutter, using everything in me not to turn around and sniff him.
‘Well don’t do it again’ he breaths against my ear, ‘it’s dangerous and I need to keep you safe.’
Removing his key, he pushes gently on the door, swinging it open and I stumble inside, desperate to get away from the unreadable man behind me who seems to have done a one eighty on me since lunch.
With a garbled explanation about needing to work on my project, I scramble away from Caleb and head toward the stairs, literally running up them and down the corridor to my room.
Pushing inside, I slam the door shut and lean against it, the air leaving my lungs with a whoosh.
New Book: Back Home to Marry Off Myself
Loredana’s father left the family for his mistress, leaving them to fend for themselves abroad. When life was at its toughest, her father showed up with “good news” after 8 years of absence: To marry off Loredana to a paralyzed son of the wealthy Mendelsohn family.