Total pages in book: 90
Estimated words: 84982 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 425(@200wpm)___ 340(@250wpm)___ 283(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 84982 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 425(@200wpm)___ 340(@250wpm)___ 283(@300wpm)
My hands clenched and unclenched in my lap. I took a deep breath and held his gaze.
For a moment, he’d looked like a lost boy. When he’d spoken of his mother, there had been a pain that flickered in his eyes even though I knew he wouldn’t want me to notice it. The man sitting across from me looked nothing like a boy, and thinking of the fact that he had once been a kid, a child, I saw him differently.
He had been struggling with things all his life, but no one seemed to care or take notice that he might need help. They knew. King knew. His own brother knew. They’d all warned me. But why did they not help him? Why was it they acted fearful of him if they cared for him? The women he brought in and fucked, then tossed out, did they not see this? Question why he was this way?
“I heard you—or rather her,” I told him. “It’s why I left. I had come to look for you and talk about the night before. In my room. But you were with someone else. Already. The very next day. I can’t do that. You were right. I am boring and unexperienced. I can’t do things with you like we did, then watch you turn around and screw some other woman. Bringing me here won’t change that. Eventually, we will have to go back, or they will find us.”
He leaned back in his chair as he listened to me. Like most times, it was hard to read what he was thinking. He had the ability to close off his expressions so well that you thought he felt nothing. But he did. I knew he did.
“You shouldn’t have left me.”
“You were fucking another woman.”
He shoved back his chair and stood up. I watched as he stalked around the table, then towered over me before leaning down and grabbing my chin.
“You shouldn’t have pushed me. You ran. I chased. I won’t let you get far. Ever. You let me between your legs. Gave me a taste of that sweet pussy. Now, I need it. I need it like I need the ease you give me. I crave the way you taste. It’s mine. It will always be mine. I’ll kill anyone else who thinks they can touch you.” He released my face and pointed to my plate. “Eat!”
I jumped, startled by his sharp command. My heart was beating against my chest so hard that I was sure he could hear it. I stared at the food on my plate. Panic and desire whirled inside me. Reaching for my burger, I saw the mac and cheese oozing from underneath the bun. I picked up the top, and there it was. My favorite burger toppings. Mac and cheese and mustard with a pickle. No one I knew liked their burgers this way. I had been made fun of it for years. Esther refused to watch me eat burgers, claiming I was gross.
How had he known?
Because he’d been stalking me.
I put the bun back and lifted my eyes to look at him. He was seated across from me again, and his dark eyes were watching me.
“Did I do it correctly?” he asked.
I nodded.
He smirked and picked up his burger to take a bite. He didn’t take his eyes off me, and I knew he wasn’t going to until I ate something. I knew he didn’t intend to kill me. That was a good thing. But he also had decided no other man could touch me but him.
I took a bite and chewed my food. His shoulders seemed to relax as he watched me. Was my eating really that important to him?
“I fuck hard,” he said. “And I can’t hurt you. So, I fucked someone who I didn’t care about hurting. She didn’t mean anything. They never do.”
That might be so, but it was still not enough. I couldn’t accept it. I’d already let him in enough that I cared. I felt things. I didn’t want him to be in any trouble. He wanted to protect me, and I realized I wanted to do the same for him. This path he was forcing me down would end up shattering me. What if I fell in love with him? What then? I’d know he had sex with other women? He’d keep me as some fragile virgin for the rest of my life. I wanted kids one day. I wanted a family. Yes, there was a very messed-up part of me that wanted Thatcher Shephard, but he couldn’t give me the other things.
“I can’t,” I said, trying to think of the right way to say this. “If you aren’t going to fuck me but you want to keep me all to yourself, then that means I’ll die a virgin. I don’t want that. I want to get to live a real life. A full one. Where I have sex, even kids one day. I want a husband. A family. You care about me. So, why don’t you see that I would need those things?”