“I’m going to give you a number of a car service I have an account with, you’ll use them. I do not want you wandering around late at night on your own.”
He had to be out of his mind to think she’d agree to that rule. She wasn’t about to let him take over her life.
“Please, Tara,” he said. “I was terrified last night. I don’t want to feel like that again.”
Well, shit.
“Fine,” she agreed reluctantly. “But only at night.”
He nodded. “All right, I can compromise. You may take the bus during the day.”
“Gee, thanks
,” she said dryly.
“Why didn’t you call me last night once you were safe? I nearly went out of my mind wondering what had happened to you.”
She glanced over at him in surprise. His hands were clenched around the steering wheel so tightly the skin over his knuckles had grown white. She felt guilty at how worried he’d been. He was right, she should have called him. If it had been her on the other end of the phone she’d have been frantic.
“I’m sorry, Alex. You’re right, I should have realized how worried you’d be.”
He nodded. She glanced up as they came to a stop and noticed they were in a parking garage.
“This is my office building,” Alex explained. “Do you drive?”
“No.” She’d never had anyone to teach her. Her father certainly hadn’t been interested.
“I’ll call my car service. They’ll take you wherever you want to go. Anywhere except back to that jerk. Come on, you can wait in my office.”
***
Tara looked around her apartment in dismay. Sure, the place had always been a wreck, but it had never looked like this. Alex’s car service had dropped her off fifteen minutes ago. After grabbing a paper, she’d made her way up to her apartment to find the door ajar. Inside, the apartment was a complete wreck. The cushions on her couch were slashed; the drawers in the kitchen had all been pulled out and emptied.
The alarm was blaring, giving her a headache. She quickly moved to the keypad and put in her code to stop it. Of course, none of her neighbors had bothered to come and see what was going on.
Who would do this? Why?
She walked around the room. There wasn’t one thing that hadn’t been trampled on, thrown around or broken.
“Tara?”
She turned around with a gasp, taking a few steps back in fright. It took her a moment to realize that it was Derrick standing in the doorway and not some stranger intent on doing her harm.
“Derrick! You scared the living daylights out of me!”
“Sorry, love. Are you okay? Are you hurt?” He stepped forward and grasped hold of her shoulders, his gaze roaming over her.
Tears filled her eyes and it wasn’t until that moment that she realized how scared she was. She’d managed to disguise how shaken she was last night after being mugged. She was good at acting tough even when she was trembling on the inside, but somehow this was worse. Someone had invaded her home, had wrecked everything she owned.
She felt violated.
Maybe if she wasn’t feeling vulnerable from the mugging she could have coped better, could have hidden her feelings better. But she was raw and afraid and she couldn’t help the tears that dripped down her cheeks.
Tara rubbed her cheeks, embarrassed by her display of emotion. “Sorry, I’m fine,” she muttered.
“Nothing to be sorry for, love. Christ, someone really did a number on your apartment. Wonder what the hell they were looking for.”
Derrick rubbed her shoulder as he spoke. He had a slight English accent that she usually found sexy. Today she was too upset to really notice.