Ironhand (Riders Of Tyr #5 - MC Romance)

16. Dinner

Ironhand

After I changed her bandages, I simply stormed off to the shed in the back and got to work. I need to get my hands busy before they do something stupid. Something sinfully stupid. By Tyr, this has been a looooong day. 

I go into the workshop and get ready for work. I have been working on this totem pole ever since I got the place. It's a lost art but my grandfather was the one still practicing it. I may be away from home, but this is my land and I want the Spirits near. After I am done with that, I am making a wooden statue of Tyr. 

There is not much sunlight left but I simply don't want to go back to the house. Chiara has managed to drive me away from the bar the first night we met and now she is driving me away from my home. And driving me nuts in the process. 

To my defense, being around her is not good for my concentration. Part of me wishes she just took off, escaped me and left the country. Tor wouldn't let me hear the end of it, the brothers would talk behind my back but that would be the extent of it. She knows nothing, I can tell as much and she is not a threat. To others. To me, she is the gravest danger I have ever faced.

When it's too dark to even pretend I am doing decent work, I head back to the cabin, hoping she is in her room, sleeping, plotting my death, eating her nails anything but being around me. How good were the days she was handcuffed to the bed and looked at me with hate! 

But as luck has it, I am not getting my wish. The minute I walk in, the smell of a spicy tomato sauce hits me. I walk to the kitchen and Chiara is there, her right leg in the air so she won't put weight on it, her back to me and her head over a pot.

I try to keep it clean, be grateful that she is cooking for me, though I might be the one killing her for all she knows. But I am a weak, pathetic man and my look travels south. Don't do that, do not look at her. Don't! It's hopeless. 

Chiara is still in my briefs that are so big for her, she has gathered them up her waist and tied a knot to keep them in place. The result? They are barely covering her ass and let her long legs show. It takes me several minutes to take them all in. Her long hair is falling in free curls down her round shoulders and from this angle I can see the side of her elegant face. 

I should just focus on her damn face instead of taking the same road down just to end up ogling her legs one more fucking time like a starved teenager that looks at a woman for the first fucking time! And don't even try to stop my depraved mind from fantasizing those legs wrapped around my waist while I-

"Penne all' arrabbiata," she says.

I snap back up to her face like a kid caught with both hands in the cookie jar. She is looking at me over her shoulder with a wicked side smile. Busted! I know what her look means but that doesn't mean I am just going to roll and die. So I turn my face and my body into stone and pretended I am bothered. Which I am though for a whole different reason.

"You like it?" She turns her whole body to me.

Are we talking about the penne or that freaking hot body of hers?

"Never tried it," I growl and look over her shoulder.

"Are you sure? It seems you fell into the pot when you were a baby."

I frown and gnarl behind tight teeth to remind her who she is talking to. Afraid, that's what I need her to be. Afraid of me. 

"See?" Chiara chuckles. "You know, arrabbiata means angry. Which should have been your Native American name. Angry Cougar."

I freaking try to keep my eyes off her but once more I admit defeat. She provokes me, insults and flirts with me all at the same time. But when she drives her fingers through her wavy hair, I know it's the latter that prevails. I narrow my eyes and I leave the kitchen. This is a damn dangerous game we are both playing and I already feel I am fighting for the losing side.

I go straight to my room and take a quick – icy cold – shower. I am not going to hide away but I have to cool down this raging need I feel suddenly. She may have survived the encounter with one cougar, but I doubt I will be that willing to back off if she keeps playing that game, flaunting her body to me, looking at me like that. Taking one deep breath, invoking the Great Spirit to my aid, I go back out.

The kitchen is empty but I hear her shuffling outside. When I step out, I tighten my jaw. First of all, she has set the table I have out here, candles and shit and I am not a candlelight-dinner type of guy. Second of all, she is leaning over the table and her sweet, round, perfect ass is in the air and in my fucking face. For the love of Tyr...

"Woman!" I warn her.

She is startled and jumps up and for a fleeting second I get my hopes up that we will go back to being the captor and the captive and that she would look at me with those big eyes filled with dread. However, both Tyr and Kisemanito have abandoned me tonight. 

Chiara's face softens in a smile and her eyes travel up and down on my body before settling on my eyes. The animal in me stirs and awakens. It demands dominance over that female that offers herself so willingly. 

It takes everything I got not to go over, tear my briefs off her and fuck her bent over the table, howling into the crescent moon. My look must have conveyed my thoughts cause her eyes go heavy and she bites her lower lip down. Careful! I warn both her and myself and head to the table with a cold look on my face. I hope it's cold anyway.

"I just felt like eating out," Chiara says and arranges the plates.

In the middle, there is a big tray with penne and that sweet, spicy sauce. She has a few candles lit and hasn't turned the outside light on, making the place look...nice. To anyone watching, we would look like a cute couple in a romantic getaway instead of a captor and a victim. This is getting more fucked-up by the minute.

"I would normally serve in plates but I am pretty sure a big guy like you will eat the whole thing anyway so I looked around and found this tray. You sure don't have a lot of things here. How long-?"

"Sit!" I order.

"I think you mean "Thank you, Chiara, for going in all that trouble", don't you?"

"How about "Sit the fuck down cause your ankle is getting worse"?"

Her jaw drops and so is the fake-friendly look on her face. There you go, I see the real Chiara underneath not that seductive bitch I met back in the bar. Her shoulders relax, her moves became curt out of sheer anger and she sits down on a chair. I grab the small stool I am working on and I place it before her under the table.

"Put your goddamn leg up!"

"Are you always this tentative with the people you are going to kill?"

"Do you always make pasta for your killers?"

She tries to hold back her smile but her eyes betray her. I like her eyes like this, green now under the candlelight, shining with humor, relaxed. For those brief seconds, she is her true, real self. And she is fucking beautiful.

"OK, let's assume that neither wants to kill the other and eat," she exhales.

"Tonight," I take my seat across her.

"What?"

"Let's assume that neither wants to kill the other tonight."

"Right. Truce for the night. You did fight a cougar to save me after all," she raises a glass of water.

I stare at her icily.

"You don't toast with people?"

"Not with my prey," I try to push her back using fear.

"Are you chasing me, Mr. Girard?" she provokes me once more with a smirk on her lips.

"Chasing you?" my voice is dead serious. "I've already caught you."