Total pages in book: 195
Estimated words: 185573 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 928(@200wpm)___ 742(@250wpm)___ 619(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 185573 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 928(@200wpm)___ 742(@250wpm)___ 619(@300wpm)
“I want all of you.” Her breath blows against my lips.
I give her all of me. Every fucking inch. When I’m completely buried inside her, we both fall still. Our eyes lock, and a tremor rolls through her, followed by another. After a few minutes, she nods at me to indicate she’s ready.
I roll my hips, and fuck, it’s the best thing I’ve ever felt in my life. She’s so tight and warm and mine. I tell her as much. With every thrust, I declare it. She smiles up at me with an expression I’ll never forget, warmth radiating from the depths of her eyes.
“You’re mine too, Madden. Forever.”
My entire body jerks as my dick explodes inside her, releasing a fuck ton of pent-up frustration and want. My head collapses into the crook of her neck, and she strokes my hair as I get control of my breathing again, my cock softening inside her.
“Bianca—” As crazy as it sounds, I’m on the verge of telling her to get the fuck out of this place with me. Desperation claws at me with an urgency that doesn’t make sense.
“Don’t.” She presses a finger to my lips. “Don’t ask me anything right now because I’ll agree to it, and you know that’s not fair.”
I nod, despite the tightness in my chest, and she releases me as I pull away and climb off the bed to dispose of the condom. I don’t have a private bathroom in the bunkhouse, but I have a couple of towels, so I use one to clean myself and then sit down on the bed with the other. Bianca’s skin heats as I clean her up too, taking care to be gentle with her because I know she’s probably sore.
When I finish, I toss them both into the hamper and then slip under the covers with her. She rolls onto her side and spoons into me as I wrap my arm around her waist and kiss the top of her head. She fits like she belongs here, and honestly, I wouldn’t even care if someone walked in and caught us right now. Nothing could make me let her go.
“Stay with me tonight,” I tell her.
She snuggles deeper into me with a happy little sigh. “I was planning on it.”
I’m almost asleep when she stirs me with her raspy voice. “Madden?”
“Hmm?”
“I just want you to know I meant what I said. I’m yours in every way that matters.”
Emotion strangles her voice, and right now, I know more than anything she just needs me to validate that because she’s already thinking about this being snatched away.
“I know, peaches,” I assure her.
She nods against me, and we settle into the silence, staying that way for the rest of the night. When the morning light breaks through the windows, I realize we must have split apart. Because I can’t feel her warmth against me, and when I reach over, the other side of the bed is cold too.
My eyes snap open, settling on Bianca’s empty space. She’s not there, but she left a note. A note I don’t want to open because this churning in my gut tells me I already know what it is.
“No.” I shake my head in refusal. She wouldn’t do that to me.
I tell myself she’s probably at breakfast. I’ll see her in the dining room. But when I reach for the note, all I find are seven neatly written rows of goodbye.
I don’t know how to leave you, Madden.
My heart feels like it’s been ripped out of my chest, and it will never beat the same again.
If I’d told you, you would have asked me to stay, and I would have wanted to.
But I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t do everything in my power to save my father.
You deserve one hundred percent of someone, and it can’t be me as much as I want it.
But please never doubt that you have one hundred percent of my heart.
I will always love you.
Bianca
Chapter 23
Lyric
Two weeks pass in a fog of repetition. Kodiak comes three times a day to deliver my meals. Every morning, at breakfast, he asks me the same question.
Am I ready to tell the truth?
When I fail to give him the response he wants, he leaves without another word. But before he does, I catch him staring at me for a few seconds too long. Sometimes, I think he’s questioning his own sanity. Other times, it feels like he’s memorizing the details of my face.
I know very little about this man, and I find that the longer I spend here, the more it bothers me. At first, I was certain he’d have murdered me by now. But those fears have ebbed away, only to be replaced by curiosity. How does he know this mystery woman he thought was dead? And how does he afford a house like this in the middle of the desert?