“Jaime,” he gritted out. Seeing the resolve on her beautiful face, he bit out, “Fine. I’ll go with you.”
She had to have heard him wrong. “Sorry?”
Pinching the bridge of his nose, he repeated, “I’ll go with you.”
“You’ll go shopping?” she said slowly, stunned.
“Yes.”
“But you’ll be off doing Beta stuff.”
“I have Tao and four enforcers—I can delegate.” He noticed the surprise on the faces of those around him, but he paid them no attention. He was only interested in ensuring that the stubborn female beside him didn’t hand herself over to Glory’s brothers on a platter.
The workaholic was actually prepared to take most of the day off? Nah, surely not. She glanced around the room as she said, “I’m being Punk’d, aren’t I?”
“‘Fucked’ is what you’ll be getting, but that’s for later.” She studied his face, still incredulous. “But you hate the mall.” Yeah, he did. He hated shopping, period. “I hate the thought of you in danger more.” Aw, how could she resist him when he said stuff like that? “Okay, big guy. You can come.”
“Why thank you,” he replied acerbically.
“Great,” said Dominic, “you guys can drop me off at the tattoo studio first. I’m getting the finishing touches done to my tattoo.”
Jaime went to ask him about it, but Dante’s words distracted her.
“I have a condition, though.”
“A condition to what?” she asked, both suspicious and confused.
“To coming with you shopping instead of making your day miserable by hounding you. I get to buy you something.”
That would have excited her if he hadn’t said it like a threat. “Define ‘something.’” His impish smile surfaced. “You’ll see.”
Five hours later, she saw. And gawked. When she could finally speak, she said, “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“Nope.”
“You can’t buy me this.”
He folded his arms across his chest—a gesture that said this was nonnegotiable. He’d anticipated resistance, because he knew Jaime well enough to know that she wasn’t the slightest bit materialistic. “Yes, I can. You’re mine, I protect what’s mine, and you’re going to accept this. The end.”
“Dante, I’m serious.”
“Baby, so am I.”
“I thought you meant chocolates or maybe a pair of shoes or something. Not a brand-new top-of-the-line car!” His grin was totally unapologetic, which peeved her even more. “Dante, I’m not letting you spend that much money on me.”
He advanced on her. “Hey, I’ll spend my money on you if I want to, when I want to.” She made a slashing motion with her hands. “Look, I appreciate the offer, but it’s too much.”
“No, no more arguing. I had the patience of a damn saint today. I let you drag me around the mall, and I hardly moaned at all.”
He was right. Call her mean, but Jaime had quite enjoyed dragging him, Tao, and Ryan from store to store. Whenever Dante tried rushing her, she had slowed her pace until he finally received the message and stopped pestering her.
While Ryan often manned the entrance, Dante would personally escort her around every store while Tao escorted Shaya. It had been hilarious watching Dante’s huge frame try to squeeze through racks of clothes. It hadn’t been hilarious when the female assistants openly stared at him or flirted.
Several times Jaime had shot snarls at the women or placed her hand on his arm possessively, warning them away. She literally hadn’t been able to stop herself from doing it.
He naturally found that funny. The only thing that had saved him from getting a whack over the head was that he hadn’t once—no, not even once—responded to the ogles or the flirting. He had been solely focused on Jaime, despite most of his oglers being model material. That had scored him some serious bonus points.
He lost some of said points when he tried telling her what she could and couldn’t wear.
Basically he wanted every inch of her body covered at all times. She had just given him an indulgent, “sure thing” smile and then bought what she wanted anyway. He soon gave up.
She hadn’t been able to resist asking questions like, “Do these jeans make my ass look big?” and “Does this skirt make my calves look fat?”
Sheer and utter horror had flashed across his face every time, as if he’d sensed that there might not be a right answer. Each time, however, he would say, “No, baby, you look beautiful, you should definitely buy that,” which of course could be translated into “Please get me out of this fucking store.” Just when she’d thought he’d forgotten about his “condition,” he’d informed her that they had one more place to go before collecting Dominic at the tattoo studio. She hadn’t for one second suspected that he meant a car dealership. Why would she? Normal people didn’t go and spend more than twenty thousand dollars on a girl they had only been seeing for, like, two minutes.
Okay, she could admit to herself that she seriously liked the silver Chevy Captiva, but damn it, that wasn’t the point. She shook her head at him. “Dante—”
He fisted a hand in her hair. “It’s important to me that you’re safe, and as much as I’d rather chauffeur you everywhere, my job is too demanding for that. Plus, I know that would make you feel suffocated, and then you’d get pissed at me all the time. Wouldn’t you? Wouldn’t you?”
“Yes,” she admitted.
He released her hair and smoothed it out. “I’m not good at relationships, baby. Most likely because I haven’t been in one since I was eighteen years old. The ones before Laurie weren’t serious.
I get that I’m going to mess up often, especially when I get all controlling and overprotective. This car is a compromise—I get to know that you’re not driving that tin can that you’ve been insisting we get fixed, and you get to have your independence. Okay, you get to have some of it. For it to be a compromise, you have to meet me halfway here.”
He really was trying, she suddenly realized. It wasn’t often you could get a controlling person to make any kind of compromise about anything. What bothered her was how expensive this compromise was.
Reading her mind, he said, “It’s just money, Jaime. I have plenty of it, and I want to spend some of it on someone who matters to me.” Trey—like most Alphas—had hands in many pies, and it was Dante who had educated him on business. He had investments of his own that had all paid off, and he wasn’t one for splurging. But with Jaime it was different. He wanted to buy her things, wanted to spoil her in the way that her parents had never been able to when she was younger. “Is that really so awful?”
His soft, cajoling tone almost had her saying no without thought. She knew he could afford it, but that wasn’t her point. “If I accept this now, you’ll try to buy me other expensive stuff, too.”
“No, baby, I won’t try to do that. I will do that. But I’ll do that even if you don’t accept it.” Ignoring her groan, he gently turned her so that she was facing the vehicle and curled his arms around her. He whispered into her ear, “You know you want it, Jaime. I know you want it. I heard you once before say you love the new-car smell. I can’t wait to christen it. You can ride me in the front seat. Up and down, up and down, up and down on my cock until—”
“You’re such a goddamn jerk!”
Ignoring her attempt to wriggle out of his arms, he laughed, relishing the scent of her arousal.
“Ready to drive your new SUV to the tattoo studio?”
A sizzle of excitement and anticipation ran through her. Sure, she was still a little uncomfortable with him buying something this expensive for her, but she also knew that this was more than just a gift to him. This was an effort to make their relationship work, even if it was a strange method. Although his overprotective streak had the potential to drive her crazy, she didn’t want to change him. She cared for him just as he was, and she understood that in order for this to work, she would occasionally have to accommodate his weird ways. “Don’t think this means you’ll get your way all the time, Popeye.”