She blinks. “Sure. He’s a little… intense for my tastes. Too much symbolism.”
I scoff a laugh. “And Dumas isn’t?”
She shrugs. “At least there are swordfights.”
I suck my bottom lip into my mouth, eyeing her. “Alright,” I grumble, as if reading with her is an imposition. “Let me get changed out of these preppy clothes.”
Her nose wrinkles as she looks me up and down. “Your pants are stained with ketchup.”
I glance down at my khakis. The dark red mark on them isn’t ketchup; it’s the blood of a teammate I caught talking shit about me, but I don’t want to correct her. There’s no fear in her eyes as she looks at me, and I like that.
I want to keep it that way.
“I’ll be back in a bit.”
She returns her gaze to her book. “Bring whatever you want to read. Let’s see what we can do.”
We.
I like the sound of that, alot.
Present
Max: 27, Ember, 23
She’s docile as I speed down the freeway, checking the rearview mirror every few seconds to make sure we’re not getting tailed. Her eyes are shut, fluttering in her sleep, and her hands are tied—because the girl already tried to kill me once, and I’m not giving her a chance to do so again.
She doesn’t remember me. Something happened to Ember to erase me from her memory, and I’ll bet my left arm that the motherfucker,Dagon, had something to do with it.
My phone starts buzzing in my pocket. I fish it out, seeingTobyflash across the screen, and pick up, pressing it to my ear.
“Yup?”
“What the fuck happened?” he roars.
I wince. “A shitshow. I take it you saw?”
“Yes, Max, I fucking saw. I saw Dagon running away with a bullet hole in his back, then I saw you dragging agirlout of there by the hair. I repeat: what. The fuck.Happened?”
I cast another sideways glance at Ember. She’s sleeping peacefully, chest rising and falling, supple breasts tempting me for a taste with each inhale.
Soon.
“I collected my chosen,” I say, returning my eyes to the road.
There’s a long, pregnant pause on the other end of the line. I can almost hear Toby having a meltdown.
“You didwhat?” he hisses. “You were there to killDagon, not kidnap awoman. You failed, Max. Your first fucking failure. Cain and Greyson—”
“Have both failed once or twice themselves. Nobody’s record is spotless.” Mine was up until now, and previously, I took great pride in that. But now… well, Ember is worth the price of a mishap.
She’salive, and she’s here. With me. Once we have averylong talk regarding where the hell she’s been, I plan to enjoy every new curve on her body, and let her enjoy every muscled ridge on my own.
Christ, she’s beautiful. So beautiful I almost forget that she abandoned me at the lowest point in my life, when I needed her the most.
“Leadership won’t be happy about this,” Toby grumbles.
I tense. “Don’t forget that you’re speaking to leadership right now, Tobias. I made a call based on information you aren’t privy to,” such as seeing the girl who’s owned my heart since she was a teenager, “and that’s that. Clean up the mess from the tech side. Wipe my face from every CCTV—”
