Falling for Trouble by Jenika Snow

drank
himself unconscious. He surely must look like some kind of alcoholic to her.
Hell, to everyone. Truth was he hadn’t gotten drunk since that morning fourteen
days ago. He’d told her he was going to do right by her, and dammit, he was
trying.
    Everything
he did was a start. If she didn’t want that kind of relationship with him, then
he would take whatever she would give. Having a life without Kid in it was not
something he wanted to face. He supposed that was why he hadn’t admitted his
feelings to her yet. That rejection he might face from revealing such things
also hung in the air like a black cloud. He would take each day one at a time,
and then, when he felt the time was right, he would lay it all out for her. He
would bare his fucking soul to her and pray like hell she didn’t walk away.
    He
looked away from Red and stared at Hunter’s closed office door. What in the
hell was going on in there? Oh, he had seen the way Hunter looked at her when
Sophia wasn’t looking. There was clear interest on her boss’s face, a fact that
had him on edge. Abe had seen it for the last four years, but the guy never
made a move on her. It was clear Abe’s silent threats and death glares hadn’t
penetrated Hunter’s thick fucking skull. It wasn’t lost on him that running off
potential boyfriends for Sophia was a really shitty thing. Why should he be
able to be with someone, yet she wasn’t? Telling himself that Sophia never
showed any interest in her boss and therefore Abe was just looking out for her
was a lame excuse. He didn’t want her with anyone because she was his. He had
come to that conclusion, gripped it with the claws of his soul, and held on
tight.
    Something
inside of him had snapped and molded into a picture-perfect image of what he
could have…Sophia. Maybe all the years of coping with his pain had gotten old,
or maybe it had been waking up that morning and really seeing her in his
kitchen, tending to him, that he knew it was now time for a change? Whatever it
was wrapped around his mind and refused to let go. Just the image of her messy
hair falling around her face, of her expressive green eyes, pulled at his heart
and had his stomach clenching. It had taken him far too long to come to the
realization that he was in love with Sophia and wanted her to know it finally.
    Of
course, all of his musing could be for nothing, but he would never know unless
he tried. The first step in the right direction was straightening out his shit.
She might not know it, but Sophia Kidd was his, and he would prove that to her
until he drew his last breath.
    ****
    Hunter’s
office wasn’t what one would call an average bar office. It looked more like a
small apartment tastefully decorated with hints of masculinity. The walls were
a deep tan and green with dark brown leather furniture tastefully positioned,
and an old, worn-in thick wooden desk taking up a good portion of the room.
There was a door off to the side that she knew led into a small bedroom. He
took his business seriously, even if that meant spending the night to get
everything done.
    When
Sophia was seated in the chair in front of his desk, they stared at each other.
The air around Hunter seemed different, charged almost.
    “How
are you doing, Soph?” He leaned back in his seat and placed his hands behind
his head. His shirt stretched over his wide chest and she looked away, feeling
embarrassed for looking at him with anything other them professionalism.
    “Good.”
She cleared her throat. “I’ve been pretty good.” Shifting in her seat, she
suddenly felt so strange alone with Hunter. She turned her attention back to
him and saw that he watched her intently.
    “That’s
good, Soph.” He leaned forward to rest his forearms on the desk. “I was
wondering if maybe you’d like to go out with me sometime.”
    For
a solid minute, all she could do was stare at him and blink. He probably
thought she was a crackpot, just staring at him, her mouth opening and