Total pages in book: 91
Estimated words: 91064 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 455(@200wpm)___ 364(@250wpm)___ 304(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91064 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 455(@200wpm)___ 364(@250wpm)___ 304(@300wpm)
But Rory knows me.
He knows that if I were ever going to be loved, it would need to be hard.
He loves me hard right now.
When my fingers dig into his back, his teeth graze my throat and he slides my leg up to wrap it around his waist.
His next thrust is deeper. Harder.
I reach down and squeeze his ass and arch into him.
He whispers in my ear.
“Ye’re the only woman I’ve ever fucked this way.”
“What way?”
“Raw,” he groans.
And I growl in response. We are animals, consumed by this primal heat between us. Instinct takes over.
Hands grope and squeeze and clutch while our lips and teeth clash against each other. We can’t get enough. The frenzy is all that exists. To get closer. Deeper. Harder.
More, more, more.
We are greedy. And when we come, it is explosive.
When he collapses beside me and buries his face in my chest, he doesn’t say the three little words I dread so much. He says only two.
“Thank you.”
Twenty-Seven
Rory
“Hey, hot stuff,” Mack greets me with a slap on the ass.
I glance across the room at her husband- my boss- and his attention is otherwise distracted, thank fuck.
“Are ye trying to get me fingers cut off?” I ask her.
“Oh please,” she says. “Lach knows better than to try to put a leash on me by now.”
“Aye.” I take Keeva off Mack’s hip to give her a cuddle. “I suppose so.”
“Who are you fighting tonight?” she asks.
“Nobody.”
“Nobody?”
“I’ve some other business to attend to,” I say. “With Alexei.”
Mack is quiet, but observant. The woman is too bloody smart for her own good, and I haven’t a clue how Crow keeps up with her.
“She won’t like that,” Mack tells me.
“I don’t follow.”
“Don’t go digging around in her past,” she insists. “She needs to tell you herself.”
I keep myself occupied with the baby, but Mack is still after it.
“Scarlett will turn on you so fast you won’t even see it coming,” she says. “It isn’t easy for her to let people in, Rory. And she will see it as a betrayal if you go behind her back.”
“She’s already told me a few things,” I admit. “I just need some names.”
She stares at me, and I don’t like it.
I’ve been patient. I’ve let a lot of things slide with Scarlett that I wouldn’t have if it were anybody else.
And everybody’s on my arse about what they think is best.
Just this morning, Crow was bitching and moaning about me taking too long to get to the club when he needed me. He’s all bent out of shape because I set up this meeting with Alexei in the first place.
But he did the same for Mack when he was in my position.
And she’s done the same for her friend Talia when the situation warranted it. Yet here they both are, calling the kettle black. Leaving Scarlett to her own devices and hoping she doesn’t get murdered by one of these pricks is not an option. And if they can’t see it that way, then it’s their issue.
I hand Mack the baby and she frowns.
“I mean it, Rory,” she yells as I retreat. “If you do this, you’re signing the death certificate on this relationship. That’s a fact.”
The door closes with a slam behind me, and Crow rings me a minute later.
I ignore it and get into my car.
“Drink?” Alexei asks as I take a seat in his office.
“No thanks, mate.”
He nods and gets down to business, which is what I like about the bloke.
If there’s someone that needs being found, Alexei will do it. He can do just about anything on a computer, the extent of which I probably don’t even want to know.
And while he’s not technically part of our syndicate, he’s an ally. So, he helps us from time to time in exchange for our assistance when he needs it.
He has the file on Scarlett already, sliding it across the desk and leaving me to it.
The level of detail is more than I was prepared for.
Every part of Tenly Albright’s life is chronicled in these papers. Important milestones. Report cards. Photographs and news articles.
They are all right here in my hands.
I am hungry for these details. And it doesn’t feel wrong, like Mack said. I want to know these parts of her, no matter how ancient.
It comes as no surprise that the girl was a genius, even twelve years ago. But she certainly doesn’t look like the shy, somewhat awkward girl in the family photos. The girl dressed in ball gowns and school uniforms.
She’s not smiling in any of the photos. And there’s a sadness on her face that she doesn’t wear openly anymore, but it still exists inside of her.
I want to know her thoughts as she poses next to her friends and a family that looks so different from her. She doesn’t belong in that world, and she never did.