Total pages in book: 28
Estimated words: 26056 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 130(@200wpm)___ 104(@250wpm)___ 87(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 26056 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 130(@200wpm)___ 104(@250wpm)___ 87(@300wpm)
“No! I’m okay.” I sidestep from Cyrus who comes up behind me. “We’re just leaving.”
Their hands rest on their sidearms, sizing up the situation with shifting eyes and flat expressions. “We noticed your car here and another vehicle pull up and were concerned.”
“Really, guys. Thank you, but it’s okay.” I look at Cyrus, my cheeks burning. “I need to go. Thank you for everything.”
“Everything?” he hisses between clenched teeth and I can see the tent in his jeans in the bright headlights.
“Yes, everything.” I pick up my bag, fumbling inside until I find my keys, opening my car door. “I need to go.” I repeat, more so trying to convince myself.
It’s the universes way of giving me an out. Breaking the tension. I have a complicated life. One I need to return to whether or not it fits some girlish fantasy I’ve conjured.
Cyrus steps my way as both guards pull their guns. “The lady said she needs to go,” one of them says and I hear Cyrus grunt as slip into the driver’s seat and close the door.
After all, it was an emotional day. Trauma bonding, right? That’s what’s happened here. Cyrus is a stranger. Whatever this is, it will fade with a hot bath and a few shots of Patron.
“I’m never letting her go.” Cyrus’s voice vibrates through the car window as invisible fingers reach around my heart and squeeze.
I answer with a weak wave as I put the car in drive and cut across the yellow stripes in the empty lot.
My eyes burn as I look in the rear view, seeing Cyrus standing there with the guards watching me pull away.
Chapter Four
Cyrus
She’s mine.
Fucking mine.
And I think she knows it. I know she feels it. But she’s refusing to admit it.
It’s been a fucking week but it’s felt like a year. Ten.
A hundred.
Thinking about the destruction I inflicted on my own house the other day, part of me has to wonder if she isn’t right to stay away.
I know what I am. What I’ve always been. I’m the dangerous one, the one who never quite fit in with the legitimate life. Tor had his moments, but in the end he was always above board: lawyer, business owner and now family man. Sophia went to culinary school and developed skills she could use to build a career.
Me?
I learned how to sit at a card table and not lose more than I won. I figured out how to intimidate people with a single glance, so whoever it was would pay up what was owed and I wouldn’t have to get my knuckles bloody.
I invested in deals for illegal guns. I made friends with people who had fewer scruples than Al Capone. People that needed a guy like me that they could call on. Not all of them were on the wrong side of the law, but every single one put the gray in morally gray.
Fuck, I don’t like it. I never liked it. But it was always easy money and after my sports career imploded, what the hell.
It was that or start drinking.
I know taking that hit to the head changed me as well. I was always the darkest of my siblings but after my injury, something switched, and I gave zero fucks about anything but my family.
Until her.
Until Anna.
I’ve followed her. The day after her softball game, I showed up at the Welsh Center knowing she was there, demanding to get five minutes of her time. I even had a ring in my back pocket, ready to get down on one knee. It’s insanity.
I spent the entire night after we met in my jewelry vault picking out the most precious, rare and perfect ring for her. I didn’t care that most people would think I’ve come completely undone.
But, she wouldn’t see me. She had her assistant tell me she was very sorry but her schedule was full for the rest of the day. I thought about kicking the door down if it wasn’t for the kids sitting around watching me. They didn’t need to be traumatized by my shit.
Instead, I went to her father. Her fucking father. I was going to do this right. Ask for her hand, not that it mattered, but I felt like it would matter to her.
But, that fucker Niko.
He told me I was wasting my time, that his daughter would never look twice at a guy like me. I should have told him I knew what she sounded like when she came, just to rub it in his face, until he told me she’s fucking engaged.
That little tidbit was what sent me over the edge. I punched his door so hard one of the hinges popped, and he banned me from his poker games. Like I give a flying fuck about poker. All I care about is her. All I need is her.