Total pages in book: 125
Estimated words: 118114 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 591(@200wpm)___ 472(@250wpm)___ 394(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 118114 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 591(@200wpm)___ 472(@250wpm)___ 394(@300wpm)
It hurt like hell. But Vic was quick, strong and knew what he was doing. When he was done, he patted my now located shoulder—hard. Bastard. I still managed a thanks.
My hand locked in London’s and I strode toward Tristan and Chess. “This device better work.”
Tristan cocked a brow and picked up a little rectangular black box sitting on the hood of the SUV. “I’ve been developing it for months. It’ll work.”
I shrugged. “Not my issue if Deck kills you if your device fails and blows up his buddy.”
Tristan gave a cocky smirk. “You think I’d risk using it on Chess? I know what the fuck I’m doing.”
After spending some time with Tristan, I hated the cocky bastard at first, but now I was getting that he had the right to be cocky. The guy came from the farm, stayed away from his family, even after he escaped, and spent his life pulling together resources to get Chess out from under Vault’s clutches. I’d give him a margin of error even if the device killed Connor.
“I may let you live after all, Tristan.”
He huffed. My sister scowled at me before looking to London. She stepped forward, held out her hand and introduced herself. “So, you’re the reason my brother finally grew some balls.” I scoffed. “Nice to meet you. I’m Francesca, Chess, Kai’s sister. And this is Tristan. I’ll let Kai tell you about him.”
London shook both their hands. It was odd doing something so normal when there was nothing normal about any of us or what was happening.
“Tristan,” Tyler called. “We need to do this now. He’s waking up.”
Chess and Tristan moved to the back of the SUV and I put my hands on London’s hips. “I need to know, baby. Did you run away from me? Did you leave the house and they found you?”
“You know the answer to that, Kai.” She reached up and cupped my cheek. “You don’t trust anyone and I get that, but you’ll need to learn to trust what your body is telling you.”
I burst out laughing at her using my own words thrown back at me. Words I said to her our first night together. She looked tired, bruised, and thin, yet she smiled.
I growled before I hitched her up onto the hood of my car where we’d first begun four years ago. “You belong with me, braveheart. That’s what my body is telling me.”
“Mine, too.”
I grabbed her on either side of her head and kissed her.
HIS KISS WAS slow and gentle as if he were afraid I’d break, but then his control faltered and he kissed me like I wanted him to. Owning and powerful, with nothing able to split us apart.
His hands were all over me as he pressed into me until I lay on the hood of the car, his weight on top of me, mouth hard and bruising. My hands on his hips, I pulled him closer even though he couldn’t get any nearer. I just needed every inch of him touching me, making this real.
He pulled back, hands on either side of me, resting on the car. My chest rose and fell with ragged breaths and tingles sparked through my body.
He lifted his hand and stroked the side of my face with his knuckles. “A lot of shit has gone down since my house.” He hesitated and it was so unlike him. “London, that day I saw you in the cell… I couldn’t get you out.”
That moment played in my mind over and over again. Before I saw his face through the bars of my cell, I’d known it was him. His scent drifted in to me like a breeze of hope. Then it was like being punched in the gut when I met his hard, cold eyes. I knew then that he wasn’t there to save me.
“I know,” I murmured.
“And what I said.” Kai’s one hand rested on my hip, his other cupped my check. “Fuck, I needed you to live and the best way was for you to give in to them. I didn’t know when… or if I could get to you.”
Kai never experienced love or trust, but I had. No matter what he’d said to me that day, no matter how crushed and angry I was that he walked away, I knew Kai and why he’d said it.
I went dead inside and trusted he’d come back. I gave them what they needed to see, a girl lost and broken with no hope, and I quietly got stronger.
“You never gave up.”
He said it as if he couldn’t yet believe that I was in front of him.
“I never gave up on us.”
I saw the conflict on his face as he looked down at my hand resting on his chest. His heartbeat was steady and rhythmic like it always was. It was the comfort I needed because no matter how I felt about Kai, he would always carry in him a darkness that scared me. But when I touched him, felt his heart beat, it reminded me that he was real, that this man whether I wanted it or not, was inside me. A part of me. We were tied together.