“Well, she—I—”

“Save it. Get your shit and get out. You’re fired.”

Dash didn’t wait around for a response. He took me by the hand, disregarding the baffled looks and whispers as he led me out of the suite and to the elevators. Not once during the ride up did he speak, but he didn’t have to. He was pissed and ready to take it out on me.

My theory proved right once we made it to his floor.

“What are you trying to do to me?” He growled as he all but flung me from the elevator and into his office suite. If there was a door, I was pretty sure it would be slamming right now, but I was forced to settle with the powerful thud of his footsteps as he charged me.

“I could ask you the same. You didn’t need to fire him.”

“I think his hand on your ass meant I did.”

“It doesn’t matter because you sent me down there in the first place.”

“An error I overlooked because of your childish behavior about my relationship with Celesha. For fuck sake, you had no reason to believe I ever fucked her.”

“You had no right to be this upset over a stupid ass grab.”

“No one touches what’s mine.”

“I’m not yours!”

He tipped his head and regarded me with narrowed yes. “You say that as if you have a choice.”

“I do. I always did and I made it. I left, remember?”

“You ran. Big difference.”

“Whatever the difference, I got far away from you and your overbearing ability to be a complete ass!”

“Stop shouting.”

“You first.” I should have heeded the threat, but I was done taking orders. I only ever wanted to be my own person and only two people had ever succeeded in stealing my right. He shed his suit jacket while keeping me trapped in his gaze. The part of me that longed to submit knew what it meant, but I held my ground figuratively and literally.

“Stand down.”

“No.”

“Where was all this bravery when I asked you to be with me? It was so easy for you to be a coward but hard to love me?”

“It was easy to leave because you were nothing to me. You meant nothing because you never could. I thought of you so little I could have forgotten you.” I choked on the last, but it was too late for regrets.

His silence was deafening. Or maybe it was the pounding of my blackened heart. The one that he sought to rip apart so callously.

So wrapped up with the battle between my angry heart and my conscience was I that I never noticed him closing the distance until he was standing in front of me. The amber flecks of his eyes disappeared to the silent anger raging in their depths.

When his hand rose, I flinched but didn’t miss the question in his eyes as his finger swept his lip thoughtfully.

I desperately needed to know what he was thinking just as my conscience had won me over. “Dash, I didn’t—”

“Shh, Angel.” His voice was deceptively calm. His finger left his lips and fingered the button on my dress. The first slipped through followed by a second and third before I could muster a sentence.

“What are you doing?” I held my now gaping dress together with trembling fingers.

“Undressing you.”

“Yes, but why?”

“Because I like this part of our arguments.”

“Then you haven’t been listening.” His small smile followed by his lips moving against mine was his only reaction, and whether it was an answer or a distraction, it worked. My lips moved with his seeking more of his taste, and I suspected he did the same judging by the hungry urgency.

“I heard everything,” he whispered when he finally came up for air. I could see the unmoving purpose in his expressive eyes.

“Celesha,” I reminded.

“She won’t be disturbing us.” I was lifted in his arms and carried through a door I’d never noticed before. Inside was a small bedroom that still managed to appear luxurious. The large bed with its dark sheets dominated the room, and for the first time since returning, I admitted fear.

“I don’t—”

“Shhh,” he repeated as he forced my fingers away and unzipped my dress. “I don’t care.”

His hands pushed the dress from my shoulders first and then tugged the tight material down my trembling legs until it drifted to the floor with finality.

It wasn’t until the dress was gone that I remembered I never got my panties back. I looked down my body hoping I was wrong. How could I possibly forget my panties?