Total pages in book: 25
Estimated words: 24355 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 122(@200wpm)___ 97(@250wpm)___ 81(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 24355 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 122(@200wpm)___ 97(@250wpm)___ 81(@300wpm)
I drum my fingers on my desk, trying to figure out what to do with the rest of my day. I try to focus on the business. Try to focus on what I have to do for the night. But every time I try to get my head straight, images of Tabitha pop into my mind. When I see her face and that fiery red hair, I feel my cock stiffening.
“Fuck it,” I say, my plan for the day finally coming into focus.
An hour later, I’m getting out of my car in the parking lot of Southern Coast College. Zeus opens the driver’s side door and begins to climb out as well.
“It’s all right. You stay in the car,” I tell him. “I shouldn’t be long.”
“You sure, boss?”
“Pretty sure nobody’s going to take a shot at me on the campus of a nursing school.”
He arches an eyebrow, a skeptical look on his face. But he nods and leans back against the Escalade, folding his thick arms over his chest. I never have to worry about Zeus following orders. He’s a good soldier. Turning away, I make my way through the crowd, searching all the faces for the one I want, but I don’t see her.
“You,” I say, stopping a couple. “Do you know Tabitha Wallace?”
Looking terrified, they shake their heads and quickly scamper away. I have to corner a dozen more equally scared-looking people and ask them where Tabitha is before I get an answer. After finding out she’s in a building on the other side of the small campus, I make my way over, drawing strange looks from everybody I pass. Granted, I know I don’t look like the rest of the student body, but the way they’re gawking at me, you’d think I was an alien with a second head or something. It’s irritating enough to make me want to smack somebody.
The doors open with a whoosh as I approach, hitting me with a blast of cool air. The crowd in the hallway parts like the Red Sea as I make my way toward the room I was directed to. It’s only then that I wonder if the punk I cornered gave me the right room number or if he just gave me some bullshit to get me to go away.
The class is letting out just as I arrive, and I see the familiar fiery red hair pulled back into a ponytail, bouncing in the sea of people. Tabitha walks out of the room, speaking intently to a blond walking beside her. She doesn’t notice me, so I step into her path. When she runs into me and turns her face up, I find myself staring into those sparkling green eyes that stir something deep inside me. Something raw. Something primal.
Tabitha’s eyes widen, and her face drains of color. She looks every bit as terrified as the people I cornered to ask about her. I offer her a smile.
“Hey,” I say.
4
TABITHA
When I find myself staring into Tyson’s icy-blue eyes, the scathing words sitting on the tip of my tongue for the idiot who’d gotten in my way wither and die on my lips. I feel my face immediately drain of color as my heart leaps into my throat. My first thought—fear, actually—is that he’s here to kill me for seeing too much the other night.
Izzy Worthy, my best friend, is standing beside me. She must feel me tense up because she grabs my hand and squeezes it, giving me a worried look. Always overprotective of me, Izzy takes a step forward, putting herself between me and the large man in the dark suit. Towering over the both of us, his blue eyes sparkle with amusement as the corner of his mouth curls upward.
“Tyson, what are you doing here?” I ask.
“I was hoping to have a word with you,” he replies.
My heart is thundering in my ears, my throat grows dry, and I swallow hard, trying to work some moisture into my mouth. “About what?”
He glances at Izzy, then cuts his eyes back to me. “Can we have a word in private?”
“Tabs, who is this guy?” Izzy whispers, as if he’s not standing right here and can’t hear.
It’s a fair question since he obviously doesn’t fit in with us. Dressed in a finely cut black, three-piece suit with a black shirt beneath the jacket and vest, blood red tie, and matching pocket square, he looks like the gangster I know him to be. Seriously, he looks like he just walked out of a central casting call for a mobster movie.
“I’m Tyson Harper,” he tells her. “I met Tabitha last night.”
She turns to me, her eyebrows raised and a playful smirk on her lips. Tyson is a beautiful man; there’s no denying it. But he’s also intimidating as hell. And his presence here, at my school, in front of my classroom, terrifies me. The man is dangerous. He’s brutal. And he doesn’t strike me as the type to just drop by for a little chit-chat. He’s here for a reason. I don’t know what that reason is, but imagining the possibility of what it could be has me weak in the knees.