Total pages in book: 158
Estimated words: 144908 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 725(@200wpm)___ 580(@250wpm)___ 483(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 144908 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 725(@200wpm)___ 580(@250wpm)___ 483(@300wpm)
“Damn it, Ambrielle, stay still. You aren’t going anywhere. Let me put this cream on you and we can talk about it.”
“There isn’t anything more to say, is there, Master? You’re willing to throw your life away for all of them, but you aren’t willing to live for me.” She dashed at tears on her face, but she didn’t move, and she didn’t turn around.
He’d been furious with her. Now he didn’t know what to feel. There was a mixture of hurt and anger in her trembling voice, and he really didn’t know what to do with that. He slowly applied the cream, buying himself a little time. The moment his stroking fingers had applied a gauze bandage over the wound, she threw herself across the bed and rolled to the other side. Immediately, she stalked to the closet and yanked out a pair of leggings from the drawer where he’d put them when Ink had brought a small suitcase filled with clothes.
“I wasn’t throwing my life away.”
“I’m not talking about it with you. You lied to me. You promised me you wouldn’t lie to me, and you did.” She pulled a long sweater from the shelf and jerked it over her head. “I’m going for a walk.” She sat on the floor and yanked on her boots.
Her dark hair fairly crackled with anger, and yet he felt the weight of her tears. The pressure in his chest increased.
“Princess, you aren’t making any sense. How did I lie to you?” He eased his arm out of his vest. Using care, he folded his colors and set them aside. “Ambrielle, answer me.”
She looked up from where she was still sitting on the floor and then pressed her forehead into her palm. “You took an oath when you married me. You’re supposed to protect me. You’re supposed to put me first. Not Czar or Blythe. Not your club. You didn’t give me a thought when you were so willing to die right then.”
“I think of you every minute of the day since I laid eyes on you. I think of you when I take a breath. Don’t tell me I don’t think of you, princess, because you don’t know shit if that’s what you think. What you don’t know is how the club works or the rules we live by. The rules, by the way, you agreed to when you married me.”
Her head snapped up and she looked up at him for the first time, a little frown making her look more lost than ever. He had an insane desire to kiss her until that frown was gone. Instead, he began to take off his shirt.
“The rules of the club? Of Torpedo Ink? I agreed to rules?”
Those long lashes of hers fanned down, blinking. Making his heart ache. Bog. She was beautiful beyond belief. Inside, where it counted. She shook her head. “I don’t remember that, Master.” Her hands came up to rub her temples. “I know I get confused. After what happened with my parents, and I still can’t force myself to really look at that head-on yet, I have entire blocks of time gone. Entire conversations. I may have agreed to rules and then forgotten them.”
That was his woman. Honest to a fault. “Yeah, babe, when you married me, you became part of Torpedo Ink. Czar is president. Blythe is his wife. We’re sworn to protect the president at any cost, including our lives. We protect one another after that. Does he like it? No, he does not. But that isn’t up to him. You don’t have to like it either, but you do have to abide by the rules, just like the rest of us.”
She looked up at him with stricken eyes. “You don’t even hesitate, Master. You just throw yourself right in front of God knows how many guns shooting. You terrify me. You sat out on the patio of the restaurant like a sacrificial lamb, surrounded by men who intended to kill you. You didn’t even flinch.”
“I flinched when you left the safety of the others and came outside, where it was going to be much harder to protect you. I wasn’t worried about those men surrounding me. I knew I could kill them. I’d already worked out exactly how it was going to go down. Lana was my backup. Then you came out and I had to make sure Lana protected you, not me.”
“You tapped on your chest. In code. That was what you were doing, telling her to look out for me. I was there to protect you.”
“You were in that restaurant to learn. You’re supposed to be keeping your eyes open and watching how everyone positions themselves. How they interact. What they say. You keep your mouth shut and pick up how we weave our nets and collect our prey. I made a hell of a mistake today because I was tired and pissed as hell at you, maybe still under the influence of the anesthesia they put me under. You never want to lie to Jackson Deveau. He’s a human lie detector. When you talk to him, you word everything carefully so there isn’t a lie for him to hear. There at the end, he asked me if I knew who the shooters were after. I told him I didn’t know a fucking thing. I went so far as to ask if they could have been after Hannah. But I stated I didn’t know who the shooters were after. He let me walk, but he’ll give that some thought and he’ll be coming around—and soon.”