Beast

  Leo took advantage of the moments it took him to finish chewing his food to think his next words through this time. He took a drink of his soda and wiped his mouth slowly.

  “I was disgusted with myself,” he admitted, hoping this wouldn’t cost him, but he couldn’t think of a lie fast enough. “You may have a baby face, but the rest of you is . . .” He glanced around nervously. “I shouldn’t have been looking at you at all but didn’t realize it until my eyes made it up to your face and you looked so damn young . . .”

  He stopped to shrug as he picked up another taco because he couldn’t tell her the whole truth. His nearly going hard for what he’d been certain the moment he’d met her eyes was a kid, was beyond disgusting.

  Her laughing had him glancing up at her again, and he stopped short before taking a bite of the taco. “What?”

  “Oh, wow. And here all this time I was thinking you were disgusted with my fat ass.” She laughed again. “That’s not the funny part. I was pissed, you know. It’s just ironic how wrong I was.”

  Leo stared at the twinkle in her beautiful eyes for a moment before taking another bite of his food. Again, he took his time, needing to keep his mouth shut for a while. Already, he’d said way more to this girl than he ever intended to.

  “So, were you really going to finish that interview or was that just something you said to get us out of there?”

  Since he’d already admitted to having been looking at her that first day, and in a way he shouldn’t have, hence his disgust, Leo didn’t bother hiding the smirk this time. He kept chewing slowly without immediately responding as she continued to stare at him, with a raised brow.

  “I was gonna get back to you eventually.”

  Her mouth fell open, but she closed it quickly, and once again, his eyes followed her every move. “No, you weren’t.” Before he could think of a proper come back to that, she added. “Can I just ask you why? Were my questions really that intrusive? Am I too pushy?”

  Leo peered at her as he took a drink of his soda. “I got sick and then just got busy.” He managed to keep a straight face because at least it was half true.

  “Look. You don’t have to own up to it, but I think I know when I’m getting blown off.” She cocked a playful brow then shrugged. “I’m a first-year college journalism student. I’m trying to learn from my mistakes, so I was just curious why you blew me off.”

  Though Leo caught the effort to keep the playfulness to a minimum in the smile that spread across her face, there was no hiding it. It had his heart speeding up for two reasons.

  One: she could say all she wanted that she was only asking for the sake of strengthening her journalism skills, but Leo knew better.

  Two: as much as he was trying to fight any conversation with this girl getting too cutesy, it was exactly the direction this seemed to be going. Worse yet, he was enjoying it a little too much.

  Despite his misgivings about this, Leo couldn’t help smirking. Never in his life had a smile been so contagious to him, and he felt hopeless to try to fight it anymore. “You really expect me to believe anyone’s ever blown you off?”

  She started to smile then stopped to ponder that for a moment. “Hmm, I guess not. But I know when—”

  “Nope.” Leo shook his head, feeling too pleased with his make-believe triumph. “I think you owe me an apology.”

  “Apology for what?”

  “What do you mean for what?” He feigned shock—another first for him.

  Since when did he become this cheesy guy? But the insanity went on along with the nonsense he continued to vomit. “First, you accuse me of doing something you obviously know nothing about, and second, you accuse me of not owning up to it.” He brought his hand to his chest, remembering a time when he had been this playful. A time that felt like a lifetime ago. “I’m appalled.”

  Seeing her laugh made his whole ridiculous rant worth it. Even as he bit into his taco, he couldn’t take his eyes off that breathtaking smile.

  “Okay, I apologize,” she conceded, albeit with a roll of those big beautiful eyes. “So, are you really gonna let me finish interviewing you?”

  “You don’t have paper or pen.” He smiled smugly, shoving what was left of one of his tacos into his mouth.

  “Don’t need them. I have an excellent memory,” she shot right back, moving her empty plate aside.

  “Are you sure you don’t want anything else?” Leo asked, looking down at her plate. “Two tacos ain’t shit.”

  “No, I’m good.” The smile waned ever so slightly, but then she seemed to remember something, and her eyes went big again. “Oh, before I forget and this was why I asked you to give Rodney my number, since I figured it was pointless to ask you. This has nothing to do with my story on the work-release program, so it’s off the record. I have another story I’m working on. Well . . .” She frowned, taking a swig of her soda.

  It was only then that Leo noticed she wasn’t doing nearly as much throat-clearing as she had in the previous interview. Clearly, his far more lighthearted demeanor today had made her more comfortable. He could only hope his saving her from Rodney’s inevitable advances and admitting more than he’d planned on, along with his teasing, didn’t have her thinking they’d be friendly after today.

  “It’s more like research for my investigative journalism you’d be helping me with, not an actual story, since I don’t have enough for a story yet. And it’s not that I think you’d know every criminal in the Los Angeles area or anything. It’s just that . . .”

  Now she cleared her throat then paused to take another sip of her soda.

  “Easy with that soda,” Leo warned with a smirk. “There’s caffeine in that too.”

  As expected, the color in her face deepened a bit. I fucking love it! The words nearly slipped out. He managed to avoid having them spew out as they had so much with her already. But the big smile couldn’t be helped.

  “Don’t be nervous, Ali.”

  Their eyes met and there it was: another moment like they’d had the last time he’d been around her. It was a simple comment, but Leo knew better. The tone, the playfulness, the irrepressible smile along with the fact that he felt incapable of looking away from those somewhat stunned eyes . . . It was too damn obvious what was happening. He wasn’t just being lighthearted. He was flirting with her, making it clear just how drawn he was beginning to feel to her when it was the last fucking thing he should be admitting even in an unspoken way.

  She blinked, mercifully releasing him from what’d begun to feel like a hold she had on him.

  “I’m not,” she said softly. “I just don’t want you to think I’m making assumptions about you. You said yourself that you’d been in some trouble in the past, and with you having been in jail, I thought maybe you’d know or had heard something about the key players in the drug-dealing world in this area.”

  “I might,” he admitted without a flinch before she could beat herself up too much about asking.

  Truth was he did know a lot of the scum of the area. Too many of them. Hell, not too long ago, he’d been a big part of that scum. More than anything, he needed to derail the direction this interview had taken and move this along. They’d been sitting there for over a half hour, and this was the first question that had anything to do with her journalism that she’d asked him.

  “So, it’s been rumored that there’s been some drug-trafficking on campus. Even worse, we’ve heard some of the faculty might be involved.” The innocent surprise in her eyes almost had Leo smiling again. As if that would be so unheard of. “Professors even, but we haven’t been able to get any leads.”

  Leo peered at her for a second. “How’s that investigative journalism? Sounds like something the cops should be looking into, not a first-year journalism student.”

  “Well, I’m pretty sure they are. But I mentioned how hard it’s been to impress my editor, right? So, my friend Jen, who’s also in the class, and I thought maybe if we could break the case and get the excl
usive on it, we’d definitely have a chance at the front-page headline.”

  Leo listened, ignoring what hearing how anxious she was to impress this editor did to him—again. She told him about Marcelo, her friend’s brother, trying to get them some info.

  “What we know so far is that one of the guys dealing goes by the street name Scar, but according to Marcelo, he’s just a small-time pusher, not someone who’d be involved in something this big.”

  Leo listened intently because he had heard of a Scar. He wondered if he might know Marcelo too but didn’t ask more about the guy because his thought process was sidetracked when she told him the next part.

  “We thought we witnessed an on-campus exchange,” she said this with that same air of innocent excitement. “Even took a picture of it, which mind you, we were caught doing and were even chased.”

  “They chased you?”

  “Yes! One of the guys, that is, the one doing the exchange—Scar.” Her tone was that of someone completely unaware of the real fire she could be playing with. “It was how Marcelo was able to identify him from the photo we showed him. We managed to lose Scar the first time he chased us on campus but then saw him again a few days later when we were standing at the bus stop. He drove by, made a skidding U-turn when he saw us, and we ran.”

  “The fuck? And you’re still investigating him?”

  “He didn’t catch us again, and that was weeks ago,” she said this as nonchalantly as she’d told him everything else. “Only other time he scared us again was last week when he very creepily said good morning to us, addressing us by our full names. ‘Morning, Allison Rico and Jennifer Navarro,’” she said in what might’ve been a cute attempt to sound like a dude, only Leo was too caught up in her alarming account. “Other than that, he hasn’t been around a whole lot, so we haven’t had any more incidents. But he’s not even who we’re interested in anymore. We want the big fish behind all this.”

  Leo stared at her as the visuals of the dreams he was still having assaulted him.

  “I can think of a few possibilities, but I’m not telling you. You have any idea how dangerous this is? This guy went out of his way to point out he knows exactly who you two are.”

  The infuriatingly adorable disappointed look on her face should’ve done him in. But he’d be damned if he’d give in. If she thought he’d have any part of her getting herself into further danger, she was dead wrong. And Leo had been an idiot for allowing himself to get so fucking chummy with her today when he knew better—knew from the very start she’d be nothing but poison.

  Glancing down at his watch, he wiped his mouth. “Less than half an hour left. You might wanna get started on the questions about the work-release program.”

  For an instant, it appeared she might protest; then she did it again. Just like when she’d admitted to noticing a lot about his expressions and calling him out on it before, he’d noticed hers throughout every conversation they’d had since. It was as if, in such a short amount of time, she’d become this intuitive to his ever-changing moods—especially when it came to her—but she didn’t push.

  Leo wasn’t sure which was more alarming: the entire conversation today or that she let this go just like that, lifting an understanding brow as she went on with her interview without further argument. Leo could sense things when it came to her now too. Even if they did get through this interview finally, one thing was very clear. Just like he knew it’d be even more impossible to dig her out from under his skin after today, determined little Ali wasn’t done tormenting him.

  He’d concentrate on getting through the rest of today for now and worry about that when the time came. But one thing was for sure. After today, there was no way Leo would be able to stomach even one more of Rodney’s perverted comments about Allison. Further proof of how easily Allison would be trouble for him. Unless Leo wanted to risk blowing this and being sent right back to a jail cell to finish out his time, there was no doubt in his mind about this now. He needed to get this perfectly straight with that asshole first thing.

  Eleven

  Allison

  It’d been several weeks since Allison had lunch with Leonardo that first time. But she accepted that it’d likely be months if ever that she’d stop experiencing what she did every time she walked into the gym now. The accelerated heartbeat. Her insides spinning faster and more out of control with every step she took into the gym. She thought it might calm with time, but each time it only got worse.

  Fortunately, with Lila being so incredibly busy promoting her upcoming fight, she was gone too often to question or worry about Allison’s social life. Not that Allison had much of one. But she’d worked out a perfectly synchronized gym schedule that often led to her running into Leo. For starters, she made sure her time there was only when Lila wouldn’t be, which was a lot lately. She also tried to mingle with other gym members and trainers, both female and male alike. She hoped it’d make it less obvious who was hands down the only one responsible for her motivation to be there as often as she was now. If it ever got back to Lila that she’d been seen chatting with the work-release guys, Allison would be able to retort how many others she often chatted with as well.

  Her sister knew Allison was far more social than she’d ever been. So, if it should ever get back to her, it shouldn’t surprise her. Allison was ready with all her “I’m an adult” and “Everyone deserves a second chance to prove themselves” rebuttals to anything Lila might throw at her about her continued connection with Leonardo. But so far, none had been necessary. Poor Lila was just too consumed with everything going on in her own busy life. Allison was determined not to give her more to deal with. But she just couldn’t bring herself to stop feeding that temptation to see him again as often as she could.

  It didn’t happen every day because that’d be too obvious. But at least twice a week now she and Leonardo just so happened to run into each other around his lunch time. They’d grabbed a few more tacos and burgers from the other place across the street a few times now, each time getting to know each other a little better. He was still so hot and cold, but as nerve-wracking as it still was every single time they spent any time together, it did feel as if they’d begun to build an unlikely camaraderie of sorts.

  Allison wasn’t even sure what she was hoping for. She wasn’t sure yet if even considering anything with a man who said women were poison was wise. All she knew was she couldn’t get enough of what he did to her now, especially when he looked at her as he often did. After several weeks, she was convinced now she wasn’t just imagining it anymore. She did something to him too.

  As hard and as cold as he could go, it was happening less and less. She was seeing more of the lighthearted side of Leonardo each time they chatted.

  “Look.” She smiled big as she walked up to Leonardo, instantly losing herself in his intense eyes.

  She handed him her phone so he could read the main headline of the latest edition of her school’s online paper. “I finally made the front page, and it was the story on the work-release program that got me there. So, I wanted to thank you.”

  As he’d been doing more and more lately, Leonardo gazed in her eyes for a long moment without saying anything, before taking the phone with a smile. Allison breathed in deeply, trying to calm her racing heart, but it was becoming increasingly harder to do so. Each time she was near him now, it became clearer that whatever rules, restrictions, or walls he’d initially put up when it came to her were slowly coming down.

  Allison assumed he was reading more than just the headline since he was quiet for a few long moments. “Thank me?” He finally looked up from his phone. “You wrote the story. Stuck to your guns until you finally had all the answers you needed. You earned this, Ali, and it’s well deserved. Congrats. You should celebrate.”

  She smiled, taking the phone when he handed it back. “Thank you,” she said as she walked alongside him.

  “This is gonna sound like a weird question.” The comment had Allison looking up
at him curiously. “You don’t have drug paraphernalia or weapons in your car, do you?”

  Allison peered at him, puzzled by the question but even more surprised to see the man laugh for the first time ever.

  He shook his head. “You’re too much, Ali.”

  Apparently, her expression was as befuddled as she’d felt. Allison laughed now too, warmed by the sweetness in his eyes, despite the odd turn their conversation had taken. “Why would you ask me that?”

  “I’ve been hearing good things about that new seafood place on Lorena,” he explained, still smiling big as they walked out the front door. “Haven’t tried it but just now had a thought. Maybe we could go check it out for lunch to celebrate your story making the front page. Only I can’t have you on my bike without a helmet. Can’t chance getting pulled over. It’s not far from here but not close enough to walk there and back in under an hour. So, I was thinking, if you want, we can go in your car. You just can’t have anything in your car that violates my probation. So, no mace or bongs?”

  “No.” Allison laughed nervously, even as her insides went a little nuts.

  Silly as it sounded, despite them having lunch together on several occasions now, driving to a sit-down kind of restaurant where they wouldn’t be ordering at a window made it feel more formal—almost like a date—since he did say they’d be celebrating. Clearing her throat, she nodded, gesturing toward where her car was parked.

  “I have nothing illegal in my car or even legal like pepper spray. Even though I do own a bottle, I just don’t have it on me today.”

  “Bongs are legal in California now,” he said with a smirk. “I just can’t be around that shit, not while I’m on probation anyway. You’re free to smoke away though, just not around me.”

  “Are you kidding? My sister would kill me.”

  “Why? It’s just like alcohol now,” he said as they reached her car. “As long as you use it responsibly, you’re good.”