I said no more because I was flying through the air.
I landed on the bed near the edge, and by the time I pulled myself up Raiden was yanking on a pair of cargo pants.
Okay, that did not go well.
“Raid—”
“Goin’, you be gone when I get back.”
My breath froze in my throat.
I swallowed to clear it, got up to my knees and sallied forth a lot more cautiously. “Okay, that didn’t work, honey. Maybe—”
He viciously yanked a tee down his chest then bent toward me so fast, he was a blur.
Hand in the mattress, other hand pointing an inch from my face, he growled, “Do not think you know shit. You do not know shit.”
Motionless with fear, I forced my lips around the word, “Raiden—”
“I’m goin’ and you be gone when I get back.”
It took a lot but I lifted my hand, curled it around his wrist and started, “Sweet—”
Savagely, he yanked his wrist free and I went flying into both hands catching myself on the bed. I pushed myself up just in time to see him, boots in one hand, stalking to the door.
I started to scramble off the bed, calling. “Raiden! Please. I screwed up, honey. Please, let’s talk.”
Before I got to the door, he’d slammed it behind him.
Which meant before I could get it open, he was already yanking open the door of his Jeep.
And this meant, before I got to the bottom of the stairs, he was reversing then he was gone.
* * * * *
Four hours later…
I did not go into town to sort my shipments.
No. I’d walked too close to the fire and got singed by the flames. I needed to do what I could to try to bank that fire and retreat.
So I stayed at Raiden’s house. I cleaned his coffeepot. I did his dishes. With what I had to work with, I made minimal sense of the mess on his kitchen-ish countertop. I folded the clothes in his dresser so the drawers shut. I found a scary-looking but functional washer and dryer in a small room in the back corner of the bottom level and did three loads of laundry, including his sheets, which meant I cleared most of the floor, hung his clothes and made his bed.
Once I’d cleaned the coffeepot (my first priority), I’d made coffee.
I’d also opened the fridge. The wave of scent that assailed me was so strong I was certain my hair wafted back with it and the visions that assaulted my eyes didn’t bear thinking about, so I erased my memory of them and shut the door as fast as I could.
Therefore, I’d eaten nothing.
I wasn’t hungry, but I figured I needed to keep my strength up for the battle that lay ahead.
But after what I encountered in the fridge, caffeine was just going to have to do.
When I heard the Jeep return, my nerves, already frayed, unraveled completely. I was so rattled it was a wonder I wasn’t a trembling mess, incapable of movement.
But this was important.
People were counting on me, and two of those people included Raiden and me.
So I held the good times close, like Raiden Miller telling me he was going to retire at forty and he expected me to be around when that happened, pulled myself together and faced the door, not having any idea that I was about to get scorched.
The door opened and a lick of white-hot flame surged through instantly when Raiden’s eyes fell on me.
“I told you to be gone,” he growled.
I beat back the blisters and told him, “We need to talk.”
“You need to be gone,” he returned.
“I need to apologize. That was—”
He leaned toward me.
“Bitch, get the f**k outta my sight!” he roared and all my skin boiled away.
I braced against the pain. “Raiden, please—”
“Hanna, trust me, you stand there two more seconds, I’ll make you gone, and babe, you do not want me to do that.”
He’d do that. He would. He’d been physical with me before when he had a point to make. And his face told me he was not making threats.
Thus I didn’t wait two seconds.
Not even one.
I ran to the door, even though he was still in it, and my heart splintered when he got right out of my way.
He didn’t call after me. He didn’t even come out to the landing at the top of the stairs. I knew because, stupidly, when I was in my Z, I looked up.
The door was closed.
I hit the button. My baby purred, I reversed and tested her speed and maneuverability on the way home.
She did not fail me.
I did this crying.
Because a Boudreaux didn’t cry unless she was in a place she could do it.
And my baby was that place for me.
* * * * *
Eleven fifteen that night…
I was driving home from my warehouse in town. The afternoon slid by without me able to take my mind off Raiden, so I piled my SUV with finished afghans and went into town, thinking that work would keep my thoughts occupied, so I’d done it for hours.
This, incidentally, was an unsuccessful endeavor, but at least all my shipments were ready for the post.
I cleared the woods around my house and my heart started thumping when my headlights fell on Raiden’s Jeep parked in front of it.
As I drove down the side drive, I saw him illuminated by the porch light, standing on the porch, leaning against the post he’d leaned against when, just days before, he said beautiful things to me.
I looked away, rounded the house and hit the garage door opener.
I parked my SUV next to my Z and shut down the ignition. I hurried out, hit the garage door button and hustled out the side door of the garage and across the yard toward the house.
I saw Raiden’s shadowed frame rounding the house.
I stopped myself from running, but hurried up the back steps, keys in hand. I now had two locks on the backdoor (there were two on the front door too; Raiden put them in as he said he would on the day he said he would) and I had the key ready that luckily unlocked all of the new locks on my house, so no fiddling with switching keys.
Just unlock and in, and maybe, if I was lucky, I’d get in and keep him out.
The outside light lighting my way, I yanked open the screen door and got both locks unlocked, but not before I heard Raiden’s boots on the steps behind me.
I didn’t look back. I pushed in and let the screen door fall behind me.
Except it didn’t shut for two beats.
He was in.
Since any further efforts to keep him out would be futile, I left the interior door where it was, tossed the keys on my kitchen table and moved through the kitchen like he wasn’t there.
I didn’t make it even halfway.
Two arms closed around me from behind and my back slammed into Raiden’s front.