Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 72543 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 363(@200wpm)___ 290(@250wpm)___ 242(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 72543 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 363(@200wpm)___ 290(@250wpm)___ 242(@300wpm)
When we finally arrive at my house, he rotates to face me. “Do not bring up seeing them together. It’s our secret. Understand?”
“Understand?” I ask incredulously. “Don’t talk to me like that.”
He grabs my arm and pulls me close—so very close that I can smell him and feel his hard body. “Our secret, Alana.”
My body tingles with the way our thighs touch, with the impact of this intimacy after hours of being alone with him, wishing he’d kiss me, knowing it would be wrong.
“Say it,” he presses.
“Our secret,” I agree.
He studies me several beats, seeming to weigh my commitment to that vow, before he sets me away from him. “I need to go before I do something we both regret.” He rotates on his heels and leaves me standing on my front lawn.
I blink back to the present just as the elevator doors open on our floor, and there is acid bubbling in my belly. The history between me and Damion is a river that runs wild and deep. What if my mother’s history with his father runs just as wild and deep? What if every tear she has shed in front of me was all a show? What if she wants to be with Damion’s father?
What else would she do for that man?
The problem is, I have no answer. I don’t even know who she is anymore.
Adam steps out of the car, checks the hallway, and then motions for me and Damion to follow, only to point to a spot beside the door where he intends for us to wait. The very idea that we have to be concerned about someone waiting on us inside turns the warmth of moments before into discomfort. What do they know that I do not? Damion’s behind me now, his hands on my shoulders as he turns me to face him.
“Relax, baby. He’s just being vigilant.”
“What don’t I know, Damion?”
“My father as well as I do.”
I think of his reaction in the diner that night, so many years ago. He knows his father. He knew what was happening between him and my mother wasn’t innocent. A chill runs down my spine as I think of those flowers that we have yet to talk about and the card attached: What I give, I can take away.
I dig in my pocket, pull out that note, and hand it to Damion. Damion stares down at it and then lifts his gaze to mine. His expression is indecipherable, but his jaw is a band of muscle, his body next to mine is steel. “I know Adam told you about this.”
“He did.”
“What does he think he gave me?”
“He’s arrogant enough to believe he allows those around him to live and thrive. Therefore, he’s God. He gives those around him the very breath they breathe.”
A chill runs down my spine. “And he can take it away,” I whisper.
“Yes, baby. That’s what I’ve been telling you. He doesn’t just believe he can. He believes it’s his right.”
Chapter thirty-eight
I want to ask Damion so many things right now.
Does he know if they were having an affair way back then? Does she hate him because he knows things I do not that he might tell me? And I want to tell him I’m sorry for how she treated him, but the elevator dings to our right. I’m so very on edge that I whip around to watch Kelvin step out with a load of my things in his arms. Adam exits the apartment, and the moment of truth with Damion is lost.
Adam clears us to enter the apartment, and Damion catches me to him and kisses me. “We’ll talk. We have a lifetime to sort out the details. Let’s get you settled and them out of here.”
A lifetime.
Those words rush through me, as confusing and sweet as rain on a scorching hot sunny day. But maybe they are not all that confusing at all. We have known each other a lifetime. We’re connected. There is nothing that can erase that bond, and I shove the naysaying in my mind away, refusing to give it a voice.
I push to my toes and kiss him. “Yes. Let’s get me moved in.”
His hand presses warmly, possessively, on my lower back, and he murmurs, “I love you, Alana. Don’t ever forget that.” The thundering of his heart beneath my palm drives home the promise of a storm before us in that proclamation.
“I love you, too. And don’t ever forget that.”
He kisses me, a long stroke of tongue, before catching my hand in his and leading me toward the door. A few minutes later, I’m in his—no, our—enormous closet organizing my clothes while the sound of male voices lift, followed by laughter, Damion’s laughter, and it’s sweet music to my ears. Too many years passed without that sound in my life, without him in my life.