Things We Burn Read Online Anne Malcom

Categories Genre: Alpha Male, Contemporary, Sports, Virgin Tags Authors: Anne Malcom Advertisement1

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I focused on my breathing, willing my heart to beat evenly.

I glanced at the open door. There was no lock. I wasn’t trapped. The air was cool. No officers, no yelling inmates, no stench of body odor and metal. I didn’t have to be on guard, ready, waiting to see if Knox’s protection detail had expired.

Most importantly, Avery was in the next room. I could hear her getting ready for bed. I wasn’t wondering where she was, if she’d moved on to another man, if she was safe. She was there. With me. Pregnant with my baby.

My fucking baby.

Lightning illuminated the room. The crib I’d put together. The chair that Avery had sat in, watching me. There were rolls of wallpaper in the corner. Clothes with tags still on them sitting on top of the dresser. Impossibly tiny clothes.

I’d insinuated that the baby might not have been mine.

She’d recoiled as if I’d hit her. I felt pain, agony shredding at my insides seeing her flinch like that. Seeing her shrink before me. She didn’t battle me. She didn’t keep her trademark calm. There was none of that. None of my Chef. She wouldn’t meet my eyes, she spoke timidly, froze like a scared rabbit.

I wanted to hold her. Fuck, I wanted to gather her in my arms and forget it all.

Maybe that was the right thing to do.

I couldn’t, though.

I was too fucking angry.

But I loved her too much to leave. Ever.

I would never leave her. Never leave my baby.

But I didn’t know how to forgive her either.

AVERY

I was in bed. I’d rushed my normally militant nighttime routine. Since I’d moved here, I’d been given something I hadn’t had in years: free time. Endless amounts of it. Enough to make me insane. Nowhere to go in the morning. Nothing to prepare. No menus to design. No food to buy.

Only sorrow to digest, only a baby to grow.

Hence the dog. Hence me becoming addicted to reality TV and detective novels.

And the routines. Morning routine. Nighttime routine.

My en suite was overflowing with all sorts of body and face products courtesy of Kiera, who was sent endless amounts of things in PR. In my prior life, I sometimes indulged in a skincare routine, but most of the time I did nothing more than wash off whatever makeup I’d remembered to apply, brush my teeth and maybe slather on moisturizer.

Now I exfoliated. Used serums. Oils.

All pregnancy safe, thanks to Kiera’s research. I hadn’t even realized there were things you couldn’t use while pregnant.

After researching, I realized that pregnancy was more about what you ‘could’ have. And even those things were highly debated.

Though I should’ve put double the amount of time in to make myself look good, smell good, considering I was getting into bed with Kane, I was in fight-or-flight mode. All I managed to do was wash my face, brush my teeth and tie up my hair.

I didn’t want to get caught midway through my routine by Kane. I felt self-conscious, uncomfortable. I didn’t know how to move around him. Didn’t know how to occupy the same space. And soon, he’d be in my bedroom.

Nightwear proved to be a problem. A big problem.

I didn’t take many things with me when I left New York. Yes, I left in a panic, but even if I hadn’t, I didn’t form attachments to material things. I took as many clothes as I needed for the immediate future, keeping in mind my body was going to change, and I’d have to purchase more anyway. I brought basic toiletries and my chef’s knives.

And Kane’s shirts.

He didn’t have a drawer in my apartment, but he’d had things there. He liked me wearing his shirts when I wasn’t naked, so he left worn ones. And I kept every single one of them. I hadn’t washed them. Slept in them every night until they only vaguely smelled of him. I thought that’s all I had left of him, tees with fading scents and painful memories.

Now he was here, and I didn’t want to be caught in one of his shirts. Didn’t want to show my longing for him when I couldn’t be sure he felt the same for me.

But I didn’t have anything else, unless I wanted to wear sweats—which I now owned copious amounts of. The other option was underwear. I’d been naked around Kane many times, but the thought of sharing a bed with him in my underwear, especially while exposing this new body … I couldn’t stomach that.

His shirt it was.

I’d dive into bed, yank the covers up and hope that he only wanted to share a bed because of practicality’s sake, and he hadn’t slept on a decent mattress in months.

The thought stabbed me.

In the midst of this, it was somehow easy to forget that Kane had been locked away. Sleeping in a cage. Controlled. In an environment that I couldn’t imagine.


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