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)
“Get her out of here now!” King told someone.
I didn’t look to see who King was speaking to, but I was real thankful King was here.
I placed a hand on Thatcher’s chest. “Calm down.” I hoped that worked.
This was disturbing. He’d just hit a woman. I was trying to process that. How had he just whacked her across her face like that? She was a female. What if he’d broken her nose? Or cracked her teeth? Oh God, what if the cops came back?
“Capri, step back some,” King said behind me.
Thatcher grabbed me and pulled me against his chest, locking me in so tightly that it was hard to breathe. “No,” he snarled, sounding unlike his normal angry voice. This one was … not okay.
I couldn’t see anything but his shirt that he’d pressed my face against. King was still there though. I hadn’t heard him walk away.
“Thatcher, you’ve got her too tight. Can she breathe?” King asked.
Thatcher’s hold immediately eased, but his arms were still like steel bars around me. I sucked in a deep breath.
His heart was hammering against my ear. I needed to get him alone and snap him out of whatever this was. Telling King that with my face smooshed against Thatcher’s chest was hard to do though.
“Why don’t you let her go?” King suggested.
His body flinched. “No,” he replied in a deep, gravelly voice.
Then, he scooped me up and began stalking away from the stables. The veins in his neck stood out, and his jaw was so rigid that I was afraid he was going to crack a tooth.
I reached up and touched it. “Thatcher,” I said softly.
He inhaled sharply, then let it out slowly before dropping his gaze to mine. Damage. So much damage in those depths. How did I handle this? Him? He had hurt a woman over me. She’d simply said words, and he’d have kept hurting her if I hadn’t stopped him. If she had been a man, would he have … killed him?
I swallowed, realization hitting me. He had meant that. It wasn’t a threat. He’d meant it. He would kill anyone who he felt hurt me. This wasn’t going to be okay. People would say things to me. I would get hurt at some point. Thatcher couldn’t end them over it. He’d be in prison. On death row.
My stomach turned. What was I supposed to do? What if Ruby charged him with battery? My eyes burned, and bile rose in my throat. I couldn’t let him ruin his life, protecting me.
He stopped walking, his eyebrows drawing together as he studied me. He read me too well. I needed to mask the turmoil going on inside me, but I couldn’t. I was barely keeping myself together.
“What’s wrong?” he demanded.
“I’m scared,” I admitted.
“Of me?” he asked, sounding pained.
I shook my head. “No, for you. She could file assault and battery charges. You could go to jail.” A sob escaped me as tears filled my eyes. Saying it out loud was worse than thinking it. Now, it was real.
“Don’t cry,” he said, sounding almost panicked.
“I can’t help it,” I replied as another sob broke free.
His hold on me tightened, and a wild look came over his face. “You can’t cry.”
Well, too bad. I was going to. I buried my face in his shirt. I had just gotten him, and I was going to lose him. Over a stupid mean girl who hadn’t grown up.
“I won’t go to prison,” he said, pressing his lips to the top of my head.
“Yes, you will,” I cried.
“No, I won’t. She signed an NDA before ever being allowed onto this property. And even if she hadn’t, she knows not to say a word. She knows … what would happen to her if she did.”
I sniffled and blinked, staring at his chest, waiting for him to explain. He didn’t. He started walking again.
Dread settled over me. The foreshadowing that you could taste and wished you couldn’t, knowing that there was a part of you that had accepted some of the truth deep down, but feared the full disclosure would be too much, weighed heavy on my chest.
“What would happen to her?” I asked the words.
He didn’t slow or stop walking. His beautiful face was tense, but the emotions I’d seen earlier were no longer present. He was back in control.
“What happens when you piss off the Southern Mafia. No one wants to do that.”
• Forty •
“When I get locked in a place inside, you are what brings me out.”
Capri
Neither of us had said a word. He’d put me in his truck, then taken me back to his house. Once we were there I had gotten out of the truck quickly. When he had walked over to me, I had stepped back and held up both hands, stopping him from picking me up again.