He continues walking, but I dart after him, jogging up the steps as I toss my purse on the deck near his bare feet. “Cade! I’m talking to you. Which is lucky, considering you just handed me over to your friend, like I’m some sort of goddamn toy to share.”

That stops him in his tracks, the muscles in his back held taut. Everything about his body screams predator. It screams get away from me, but I’m too impulsive to heed a silent warning like that. I step closer, closing the space between us, letting his pine scent wrap around me—letting it intoxicate me.

“You think I’m just some bimbo you can pawn off on friends?”

He spins now, all fire and brimstone. “I think I can’t get you out of my head, no matter how hard I try. I think you’re too damn tempting and that I’m too damn complicated. I think you smell like him, and I can’t fucking stand that.”

I blink, letting my eyes scan his red cheeks, the flare in his dark eyes, the way his nostrils rise and fall under the weight of his labored breathing.

“The gall. The absolute gall to complain that I smell like the man you shipped me off with, who was nothing but a gentleman. The man who, under different circumstances, I might have had fun with because he’s a fun fucking guy. But instead, I spent all night stewing over you, Cade Eaton. You and your grumpy fucking face, and your stupid broad shoulders, and round Wrangler ass. So . . . fuck you.” My finger pokes him in the center of his rock-hard chest. “And double fuck you for being jealous when you have no right. If I smell like him, you smell like bullshit.”

I spin away, but Cade is faster. His hand shoots out and wraps around my arm, stopping me in my tracks. I jolt around to face him, my body drawing into his so naturally.

“Keep talking like that and I’m going to fuck the filth right out of your pretty mouth.”

I arch a brow at him as goose bumps break out over my body. The air between us sizzles. “Excuse me?”

He swipes the back of his hand over his mouth, like he’s pulling away the filter that’s been there all along. “You heard me, Red. You keep barking at me like that and I’m going to put you on your knees, open those strawberry lips, and fuck your face just to shut you up.”

My mind whirs. The man before me is not the same man I’ve been living with this past month. This is another version of him. A version he’s hidden. A version I can work with.

A version I like.

The words sound harsh, but I know Cade well enough to know his words are often frustrated, but his hands are always gentle.