Total pages in book: 75
Estimated words: 71275 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 356(@200wpm)___ 285(@250wpm)___ 238(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 71275 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 356(@200wpm)___ 285(@250wpm)___ 238(@300wpm)
The first time I had been back for Sunday breakfast after knowing the truth was interesting. Finding a way to associate the Mafia and these people I had come to care for was easier than I had thought it would be.
Having morals and realizing that your loyalty could shake the ground on which you’d thought you stood firm wasn’t an easy pill to swallow. It was a reevaluation of yourself. What you had become. What made you who you were. Your core.
“This isn’t a family event,” he said as my curl slid from his fingers.
“Then, what is it?”
He slipped a finger under my chin. “It’s Maeme wanting to check on you.”
She worried about me more than anyone ever had. One of those things that nagged at me. I had known many people in my life. I had been placed in different homes. Had to trust strangers. Never had I trusted any of them the same way I did Maeme. With her, I truly felt that she cared. She wanted me safe.
It seemed unfair. Why couldn’t I overlook the bad with King? Trust him like I did her. They were the same essentially. They were a part of this dark underworld thing. She’d lied to me just like he had.
I hadn’t slept with her. I hadn’t fallen in love with her. It made a monumental difference. One I could not control. One I wished I had power over.
“She doesn’t have to feed me for that,” I replied.
King took another strand of hair between his fingers and chuckled. “I’ll let you tell her that.”
He knew I would never do such a thing. I said nothing in return as I stood there.
“Come on, sweets. You know you want to go spend hours in the library.”
That was true. Maeme’s library was full of books I wanted to get lost in.
“So, you’re not staying?” I asked him. Unsure what I wanted the answer to be.
“No, I’m not. I’ve got somewhere to be,” he replied. “But I’ll be back tonight. I’ll bring tacos.”
He’d be back. Just hearing him say it made my mood improve.
“I need to get dressed,” I said, moving back away from him. “I won’t be long.”
The last thing I saw before I spun around to rush back into the bedroom was the amused gleam in his eyes. He knew I was weak. His coming every night was him trying to break me down. Win my forgiveness and regain my trust. And I wanted him there. Another one of my problems, but at least I was willing to admit it. I wasn’t lying to myself. Someone had to be honest with me. Might as well be me.
If he was here, then he wasn’t with another woman. But then I already knew he’d taken a woman to the tack room two weeks ago. I’d had the unfortunate experience of hearing them in there. Was that something I could handle, knowing if he did it again? I didn’t feel as if I could ask or if I could even be angry if he chose to. I had drawn a line, and I was the one enforcing it. He was free to do as he pleased with anyone else. Although the idea crushed me.
My mood instantly sank again as I put on a pair of shorts, a blouse, and my sandals. King was a very sexual man. He had his kinks, and he was used to women throwing themselves at him. Just because he was coming here to babysit me at night didn’t mean he wasn’t tying up some female in the tack room and doing those things to her before he screwed her.
“Give me a grocery list, and I’ll go grab what you want today,” King called from the other room.
I glanced at myself in the mirror. I’d forgotten what it was like to go without makeup. When I’d been married to Hill, I’d had to cover up the bruises so often, and he believed I was being lazy if I didn’t put it on every day. I brushed my fingers over my cheekbone. The smooth, unmarked skin reminded me what all I had been given here.
They had lied to me. But they had also saved me. The reflection staring back at me wasn’t the same trusting, wide-eyed girl I had been before marrying Hill. There was a darkness in my eyes that time had placed there. Betrayal had stolen so much from me. A large part of who I was had been snatched away.
Not by the people who have given me somewhere safe, but by the man I had married. All Hill had ever done to me was take from me. Hurt me. Steal any cause for happiness.
King had lied to me, but he’d never hurt me. Being around him made me happy even if I didn’t want it to. Letting myself love him was a mistake, but it was already done. I just didn’t know where we went from here or how.