No one ever took care of her before the way he did, or looked after her or just made her smile. The few times she'd had a boyfriend none of them ever defended her the way he did. Most of them simply ignored it or dumped her.

As difficult as it had been the first time she trusted Trevor, she realized she was going to have to do it again and risk her heart, because she knew there would never be another man that made her feel the way he did or loved her as much as she hoped he loved her.

"At this point I don't know what the hell to say or do to show you how much you mean to me. I tell you I love you and you play it off. I tell you I want to buy you a house where we can raise our family and you ignore it. I know tonight was not the best first date, but you know what?" he asked, pulling onto their street. "I don't care if no one knew we were together for the last couple of months and I could care even less if they have a problem with it."

He pulled into their driveway and threw the truck in park and killed the engine, but he didn't make a move to leave. "I don't care what I have to do, Zoe. I'm not letting you go. I've f**ked up big time and I'm sorry, but there's nothing I can do to change the past. I won't sit here and lie to you and tell you that I'll never screw up again because we both know that I will, but I will never hurt you on purpose, Zoe. You have to know that."

Trevor sighed heavily as he rubbed his hands down his face. "I'm not going to push you tonight, Zoe, but you need to understand that I'm not letting you go. Not now, not ever. I'll let you return to your apartment if that's really what you want, but you should know that if you move out I'll just buy the building or the one next to it and if you quit your job and go somewhere else I'll just follow you there, too," he said calmly, which was a little freaky, she had to admit.

"Oh my god, are you talking about stalking me?" she asked, trying not to smile. It was really sweet in a Bradford kind of way.

"Yes, but if it comes before a judge we'll just call it a little misunderstanding," he said with a shrug.

"And you really think the judge will buy that?" she asked, reaching for her door because she was exhausted and even though she was trusting him not to break her heart, she still needed a little more time to adjust to this and figure a few things out.

"Probably, they bought it the last few times so I have no doubt they'll buy it this time."

She was about to ask what he was talking about, but then decided it that it was probably for the best that she didn't know.

Chapter 32

"What the hell is wrong with me?" Trevor asked no one in particular in the dark living room, but Toby felt the need to answer him by licking his toes, again.

With a small sigh he pulled his foot back only to have Max take that as his cue to renew his earlier attack. He winced as he gently pulled his foot away from the playful pup and sat up, dropping his head back and wondering why he'd let Zoe push him away again.

Well, at least she wasn't sleeping in her own apartment tonight. That was progress, he thought as the two pups worked as one to pull his blanket away from him. To make them happy he made a half-hearted attempt to pull the blanket back, but after a minute he let them win. Of course if he hadn't snuck into her apartment four hours ago and shut off her heat she'd probably still be there "thinking".

For a solid week he'd forced himself to give her space so that she could "think." Although he was allowed to check up on her, bring her food, help take care of the dogs and take her to the doctor's to get her stitches out they hadn't talked much. Their conversations were short and sweet and did nothing to ease the nagging feeling in his gut that she was going to leave him.

If his uncle hadn't suspended his ass for a week from work for the incident at the bar he would have asked for the time off to help take care of Zoe. His uncle gave her a paid week's vacation so that she could catch up on some rest. Granted, he could have really done without the lecture, well, more like yelling when his uncle dropped by to tell him he was suspended.

Of course his uncle hadn't known the reason behind the fight and he hadn't told him because he didn't want to embarrass Zoe again. He allowed his uncle to rant about not acting like an idiot, especially when he had a baby on the way and that he was lucky that there were plenty of witnesses willing to state that they saw Hank put his hands on him first. After his uncle ripped him a new one, Jared went next door and from what he could hear, fussed over Zoe for the next hour.

His uncle was kind enough to stop by to see him on his way out to tell him that he'd kick his ass the next time he got into a bar fight. Then again his uncle had stopped by the next day with a six pack and a grunted apology for threatening to kick his ass. As it turns out his uncle overheard the real reason behind the fight when he walked to the coffee truck and heard Hank retell the tale with a few added choice words about Zoe. If his uncle hadn't fired the man on the spot, he was pretty sure he would have landed his ass in jail that night after he hunted the bastard down and beat his ass into a coma.

As much as he'd love to go pay that ass**le another visit he had bigger issues to deal with, like the stubborn woman currently sleeping in his bed. If he couldn't fix this and get her to talk to him soon he was afraid that he would lose her for good and he wouldn't be able to handle that.

Which is of course is why he decided to take matters into his own hands.

First he'd shut off her hot water, hoping she'd come to him to fix it since she was a little bath addict. Had she? Nope. There'd been no knock on his door or yelling his name through the wall. So, he'd been forced to up his game.

He kidnapped the dogs.

When she went down for her mid-morning nap he snuck into her apartment, lured the dogs out with a pair of his boxers and as soon as his boys latched on, he dragged the growling pups as they did their damndest to rip his underwear apart. For four hours he waited for her to come looking for the boys and just when he was sure that he had her where he wanted her, the damn dogs demanded a walk, wrecking all his plans. After their ten minute walk through the slush he wasn't too surprised to find Zoe waiting in the hallway for the boys. That failure caused him to go a little further.

He kidnapped her.

Okay, so kidnapping might be an exaggeration, but he'd made damn sure that she wasn't going anywhere until she talked to him. Not only had he stolen the spark plugs out of her car, but he also placed her car on cement blocks and stolen her tires, just in case she had a set of spark plugs lying around the house somewhere. When that plan obviously failed he snuck into her apartment and shut her heat down.

Now that had definitely worked because not even an hour later she came knocking on his door, wrapped up in a blanket, shivering. Of course being the good landlord that he is he went and had a look and wouldn't you know it? The heater was broken. He came back and explained it to her as he generously offered his own bedroom.

After a slight hesitation she accepted his generous offer with a small smile and he patted himself on the back for another fine job. That is until she shut the bedroom door in his face and proceeded to take a long hot bath without him and he'd been forced to sleep on the couch with the two traitors.

"Why can't I catch a break?" he grumbled.

"Trevor?" she said, sounding unsure. "Are you awake?"