“Don’t. Don’t think it. That’s not what that was about. At all. You’re beautiful. The most beautiful fucking woman I’ve ever seen. Even with that fucking word inked into you. If you hear anything and choose to remember it, remember that. That you’re beautiful. That you always will be.”
I squeeze my eyes shut tight, so sure that he’s just patronizing me now. “Then why… why did youstop?”
I nearly let out a yelp of surprise when his hand smooths over the crown of my hair and I feel his hot breath puff against the tender juncture where my neck and earlobe meet.
“Because, Ami, taking things slow, a little at a time, savoring it… there isn’t any harm in that. I want to do right by you. Treat you right. Not take anything from you that you’re not ready to give. I don’t want you to look back on this and regret it because you thought it was what you wanted, but when it was over and done and the hormones cooled the fuck down, it wasn’t. I want you to be sure. I’ve never done a single romantic thing in my life. I’ll never bring you flowers or chocolates or bullshit like that. I probably won’t remember your birthday, so let me do this for you. Even just this once.”
I can’t help myself. I want to lean into him. He lets me rest my forehead against abs that defy humanity. Those rock hard ridges beneath that smooth sheeting of skin don’t feel human at all. He feels like a mountain, like the earth. He smells like it too. Raw and spicy, like danger and darkness and hard work. Like oil and grease and gas. Like leather and… and likehim. It’s beautiful. Every bit of that heady scent that comes together to define him. To make him who he is.
“This doesn’t change anything,” I bite out as reality comes leaking back into the foggy spaces in my brain and all those cells that were overheated and distracted reassemble and turn back on to think rationally again. “There’s still a set of papers out there… we might be married, but we shouldn’t be. We both deserve our freedom.”
“Want to explain what this is then?” His hand strokes down my hair again and I have to bite back the urge to purr.
“This is just hormones,” I pant. “Maybe it was what we both needed at the exact right time, but it doesn’t change that we’re wrong for each other. Always will be. The math is never going to add up.”
I could scream at the gentle strokes of his fingers through my hair, tugging at the snarls in the strands, combing so very gently and sweetly. Far too gentle. Far too sweet. I hate that I want to keep my eyes closed. That I want this moment to last for hours. That I want to wrap my arms around him and tumble him back to the bed with me and just hold him and be held.
Being held.
It’s not something I ever thought I’d be able to do without freaking out.
Yet here I am. Imagining it. Yearning for it. Wanting it with every fiber of my being.
Abruptly, Gage’s hand stills on my hair. “We’ll see about that,” he rasps, the words like a promise shimmering in the air between us.
They’re like a vacuum, sucking all the air out of the room. Out of my lungs. Out of existence. I can’t open my eyes. I don’tdare open them, because I can’t bear to see the expression on his face. The burning in his eyes.
I’m frozen to the edge of the bed, even when I hear his heavy footsteps retreat to the kitchen. Even as the soft rasp of his clothing sliding back into place drifts into the bedroom. Even as he retreats further and my front door closes tightly behind him and I’m left alone.
I don’t feel alone.
I still feel himeverywhere.
His presence fills me up, a balm over all my ragged edges. I try to conjure up the bad feelings. The bad memories. The terror. All I get is peace. Serenity. Nothingness.
Not a void.
Just an absence of all the bullshit that’s plagued me for years and years.
My eyes fly open and I call out, even though I know it’s too late. “Don’t do anything stupid. Gage. Please.”
I know this isn’t the end. It’s just the beginning.
I’ve seen his scars. I know that Gage is a survivor, like me. His body is a battleground. He’s been through hell and back, far worse than I have. I might have been ill used once, but he looks like he was abused physically foryears. He’s a hard man and I know that vengeance simmers in his soul. He’s already walked through the fire, let the flames sear and lick his skin, come out scarred but hardened, like clay in a kiln. He’s no phoenix. He’s like a brick. Unbreakable, rough, steady, and true.
He has his brothers at his back. Men rougher than he is. Men who he calls family.
And I know they won’t rest until they have justice.
He might think he’s avenging me, but I can’t let him do it. I can’t let him throw his life away to give me the absolution I never thought I’d have. Justice I was too weak and scared to find for myself.
I have to stop him before something terrible happens.
Even if it means finally telling everyone my secret.
Chapter 18
Gage
