“And they say romance is dead…” I joke.
He rises back to his feet. “Really? I’m sure I read something like that in a Nicholas Sparks book before.” He smirks.
I roll my eyes. I’m almost impressed he knows who Nicholas Sparks is, though I can guarantee he’s not read a single word in one of his books.
“You staked your claim on me in front of the entire bar, infront of my club, this is my way of markingmyterritory.” He reaches between my legs and swipes a finger through the mess he made and brings it to my lips.
I wrap my mouth around his finger, his flavour exploding on my tongue as I start to suck. Lust flashes through his eyes as he watches me.
He growls, ripping his finger from my mouth and replacing it with his lips. It’s a hungry kiss, stealing not only my breath away but all rational thought. All I can feel, smell and taste is him.
He breaks the kiss, taking my face in both of his hands. “You’remine.”
I nod. “Only yours.”
It’s almost two a.m. when my phone pings on the bedside table next to my head, snapping me awake.
I’ve done my best to ignore them, but not this one. It chills me to the bone.
Killian is sound asleep beside me as I stare at my phone screen, my heart pounding so hard I can feel my pulse in my eardrums.
Are we being watched?
31
“What does this one mean?” Kaia asks, trailing a lazy finger over one of the tattoos on my right peck. It’s a pocket watch in the palm of a skeletal hand, entwined with vines and flowers.
“Time’s precious. Life’s too short to waste it by putting shit off or waiting around. It can be taken from us so easily.”
“And this?” she dusts her fingers over my shoulder and down my upper arm, following the soft lines of feathers that form the wing of an angel. It carries on around my back and over my shoulder blade, and the opposite shoulder, bears the black, jagged wings of the devil. The perfect balance between good and evil.
“The devil’s wing represents the bad within me, but the angel’s reminds me there’s good in me too. Though, sometimes it feels there’s more bad than good.”
Kaia rises onto her knees and straddles me. “Sometimes good people do bad things for the right reasons, it doesn’t make you a bad person, and there’s so much good in you, Killian. I’ve seen it, I just wish you could see what I do.”
I sit up, wrapping my arms around her waist as I take her mouth.
What the hell does this girl see in me?
I have no idea. All Idoknow, is she doesn’t see the same damaged shell of a man I see staring back at me every time I catch my reflection in the mirror.
She sees something worth saving. Worth…Loving.
But she doesn’t know the things I’ve done.
She has no idea the plan I set in motion. She has no idea I’m using her to get to her father and that all of this is just temporary.
She’ll never want me again when she learns the truth. My stomach clenches at the reminder.
But in this kiss, under her feather-like touch with her warmth seeping from her body into mine, I can pretend this is my life, myfuture.
Just for a little while, at least.
I break the kiss, unable to hold back my smile as I peer up at her, savouring this moment, etching it into my mind so I can remember it when she’s gone.
“What?” she asks.
“Nothing.”I love you.
