Total pages in book: 125
Estimated words: 117510 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 588(@200wpm)___ 470(@250wpm)___ 392(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 117510 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 588(@200wpm)___ 470(@250wpm)___ 392(@300wpm)
Shoulders sagging, she sighed, and her scowl eased just a little. “I know, I get it. If our situations were reversed, I’d be glad the incorporeal went after me rather than you and Asher.”
Knox’s brows snapped together. “Never fucking ever be glad of something like that.” She raised one imperious brow at him, and Knox honestly just wanted to bend her over something and fuck the haughtiness right out of her. Instead, he rose to his feet, plucked her off the sofa, and then sat with her straddling him. “Better.”
Thrusting both hands into her hair, he soothingly massaged her head. Her eyes fell closed on a soft moan. He didn’t want to talk anymore about the incorporeal or the Horseman. The bastards had stolen enough time from his day; he wouldn’t give them even a second more of it.
“You’re trying to distract me,” Harper accused.
“I simply don’t want either of us to spare another thought for those who would do us harm, let alone talk about them.”
Neither did Harper. She was emotionally worn out by the whole thing, and she knew she’d have a difficult time sleeping tonight—if she even managed it at all. When Knox had strolled through the door earlier, she wouldn’t have guessed anything bad had occurred if Levi hadn’t been behind him with his eyes glittering and wearing an expression so grim that her stomach had knotted.
She hadn’t just been angry because Knox had been relieved that he was the focus of an attack this time. She was angry with herself, because she’d assumed Knox wouldn’t be directly targeted. She should never have made any such assumption. But as she figured such a revelation would annoy him, she instead said, “We could talk about what took you to Jolene’s house.” His fingers paused their massage as a new tension stiffened his muscles. Harper’s heart leaped. “What? Is it bad? It’s bad, isn’t it?”
Knox combed his fingers all the way through her hair and settled his hands on her upper arms. “I had some questions that I suspected she could answer.”
“About what?”
“Devon’s brother.”
Harper frowned. “Why the interest in him?”
“I don’t like that he wants what’s mine. He does, Harper; don’t deny it.”
Honestly, she still found it difficult to accept that Drew felt that way. But after the way he’d acted earlier, she’d reached one conclusion. “Okay, it’s possible that he doesn’t want me to be with you out of some misplaced concern. But Drew is totally focused on his own life—”
“Which was why Jolene told him to stay away from you until he was prepared to step up to the plate and give you what you needed.”
Harper tilted her head. “She told you that?”
“Yes.”
While it was the kind of thing Jolene would do, it was still hard for Harper to imagine Drew giving that much of a shit about her. “Well, he didn’t step up, which tells you all you need to know. If he’d really wanted me as much as you think he does, he wouldn’t have stayed in Cuba.” There. That proved her point perfectly.
Sliding his hand around her neck, Knox gently breezed his thumb up the column of her throat. “Baby, he has a tattoo of a sphinx between his shoulder blades. A sphinx with no wings. Lying with a hellcat.”
It took a moment for those words to truly sink in. Harper’s demon hissed, beyond enraged that another male would brand himself for it that way. “Seriously?”
“Do I look like I’m fucking kidding?”
“Wait, how do you know?”
“He likes to hang up pictures of himself doing extreme sports. Levi saw the tattoo on one of the photos when he visited Clarke’s shack.”
She decided not to ask what Levi had been doing in Drew’s home. “You said the tattoo is on his back, right? Maybe that sort of represents him turning his back on what he once wanted and putting it behind him or something. I’ve had clients who want tattoos that remind them of what they’re keeping in their past.”
Knox slowly shook his head. “The hellcat was snuggled up to the sphinx protectively.”
She swallowed. “There are other sphinxes out there.”
“With no wings? Come on, Harper, accept the fucking facts. Why are you searching for reasons that I might be wrong?”
“It just doesn’t make sense to me. Plus, I don’t want you to kill my friend’s brother.” Even if the little bastard had marked himself for her, like he was under the impression she’d be his to claim whenever he was ready for it.
“I will if he tries to take you from me.” Knox curled his hand around her chin and pulled her close. “Speak to Devon. Tell her to talk to her brother and keep him away from you. I’ve told Jolene to do the same and to make sure he gets rid of that fucking tattoo. Because nothing—not even you, baby—will keep him safe from me if he tries stealing you from me.”