Each of us has a soulmate, Asher. In some lifetimes, we don’t find them, but in others, they find us. When that happens, don’t you lose them. If you lose your soulmate, the sun inside you will die.
Chapter Seven
Angel
Ash Doss was just as I remembered.
Tall. Broad. Handsome. The kind of handsome that made a bystander look twice, not because they’d never experienced his kind of beauty, but because they need a bit more before neverseeing him again. Though right now, he reminded me of a grizzly bear who’d just come out of hibernation, covered in thick brown fur and struggling to find its way back into the natural way of life. His hair was curling at the back of his neck, the waves of deep brown on top disheveled as if he’d been running his hand through them, and his beard was longer than that summer day, nearly touching his chest. Thick and unruly.
Grizzly bears were also very dangerous.
Just like him.
He also possessed devastatingly beautiful warm brown eyes which could pierce through every single wall a person constructed around their soul. One look, one gentle but steady look, and I was ready to melt into his arms.
It could never happen.
There wasn’t a chance in heck itcouldhappen.
I couldn’t help but wonder if life had been kind to him since the day he saved me. Since moving to Astoria, I’d done some research on Red Snake Investigations. They offered private security, private investigations, bounty hunting, and a number of other things.
“Would you stay?” I murmured, pressing the issue.
He was ready to leave. In fact, he’d been ready to leave from the moment our eyes met across my living room. I’d never seen someone visibly lock up, but he did at the sight of me. I didn’t know how to feel about that, but my emotions—and head—were all over the place.
He dipped his chin further, giving me the best view of his eyes. Goodness. Swirls of dark chocolate surrounded the small, almost hidden dim golden ring around his pupils. The warmth of his irises reminded me of the end of summer, just before autumn arrived. The sunsets were also more golden around that time of year, with less variety of colors. Golden sunsets have alwaysbeen my favorite. Ash had two sunsets of his own, and I hadn’t anticipated how much I would want to run into them.
“Angel…”
Goodness.
My body, already having been on a roller coaster tonight, should have been tired. His voice sent shock waves through me, and when he said my name like that, which had been a total of two times tonight, my heart caught on fire. Too much voltage. Too much sunlight. Too much…Ash.
A muscle jumped at the top of his cheek, and I knew underneath his thick beard, he was biting down on his jaw, trying to find a way to tell me no.
“You don’t have to stay long,” I blurted. His eyes flashed with…uncertainty? Disgust? I couldn’t be sure. He was a hard person to read, and I was horrible at reading people. “Or if you need to go, I understand.” I dropped my head, looking at our feet. His black tennis shoes were soaked, covered with mud. I wiggled my toes in my white socks, fascinated by the contrast. “If you do stay—and I’d be so grateful if you did—I’ll just need you to take off your shoes.”
“Excuse me?”
My head snapped up. “I mean—only if you’re comfortable with that,” I stammered, raising my hands. “I would never want you to do something you didn’t want to do. I—well, I have a new living room in my rug.”
With a raised brow, the disgust-slash-uncertainty in his eyes shifted to something else entirely. Humor? “You have a new rug in your living room?”
The temperature in my face rose, and without a shadow of a doubt, I knew I was as red as a damn tomato. “Yes. Wait—what did I say?” I breathed, my heart beginning to race.
“I don’t want to stay if I make you uncomfortable,” he said gently, looking behind me. “And I definitely don’t want to ruin your pretty living room by tracking mud in.”
My own thoughts were being drowned out by the overwhelming pounding of that stupid organ in my chest. “You think my living room is pretty?”
The humor in his eyes all but vanished along with the small suns, his pupils taking over. My breath stalled, locking it in the middle of my chest, as he leaned down, inches from my face. “You sure you want to let me in here?”
“What are you, the big bad wolf?” I asked, trying and failing to make a joke. Goose bumps spread across my arms again like wildfire, and even though I wanted—no, I needed—to look away, to break this spell, I couldn’t. I was ensnared in his burning gaze, silently hoping he would touch me. Some days, I could hardly remember it, the strength of his touch. Then on the days my memories decided to invade, the ones of his touch acted as my anchor, a guide to the present.
His answer was gruff, absent of humor. “Something like that.”
“Oh.”
My lips. His eyes were on my lips.
