Total pages in book: 162
Estimated words: 156796 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 784(@200wpm)___ 627(@250wpm)___ 523(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 156796 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 784(@200wpm)___ 627(@250wpm)___ 523(@300wpm)
He was fully dressed, elbows on his knees.
“How long have you been watching me sleep?” I demanded, my voice still sleepy.
“A while,” he said. That was all he said. He didn’t move, didn’t blink as his eyes kept hold of mine.
Ice grasped my soul. “You’re not leaving me, are you?” I asked, my voice no longer snatched by dreams. No, it was grasped by a nightmare of him convincing himself to leave in the darkness.
His body jerked, and some of that horrible blankness left his expression. “Never.” The word was a vow. A promise.
But uneasiness still clutched the bottom of my stomach.
I pulled back the comforter, my naked body exposed to him.
He let out a harsh hiss.
“Prove it,” I demanded, the tenderness between my thighs forgotten, only because the tenderness of my heart drowned everything else out.
Gage was across the room before I could blink.
And he did prove it.
Twice.
I was still assaulted with goose bumps every now and then throughout the week following that, something feeling… off. And not Gage’s usual off.
I didn’t ask him what it was because I knew asking was no use. When Gage wanted to tell me something, he’d tell me. And he’d do it in his own time.
I also didn’t because I was a coward.
I convinced myself it was a throwaway fear for my article, since everyone was so convinced it was going to get me kidnapped or killed. It garnered attention around the office, mostly because no one realized I had it in me.
Jen had taken me out for virgin cocktails to celebrate. I was going to invite Gage, so the two of them could finally meet, but she insisted it be just us two.
“He steals you away often enough,” she’d said with a wink.
Gage had known I’d had in me. And though I’d expected him to be mad as hell about the whole thing, he hadn’t exactly had the chance to yell at me, what with being arrested and all that.
Well, almost arrested. Troy had skillfully avoided me since then.
But since our conversation had veered off me doing a story of a well-known drug dealer, exposing him, and onto Gage’s past, we hadn’t exactly had a chance to discuss it. I’d expected Gage to make a chance, being alpha male and protective and all that.
Amy couldn’t believe he hadn’t already. She’d said, “Brock would’ve had me locked in some kind of cabin in the woods somewhere with nuclear weapons poised at every possible entrance and exit until he thought the threat was eliminated.”
I’d laughed because I thought she was joking.
She wasn’t.
It turned out every one of those men was protective as all hell.
Gage hadn’t even put a ‘guard’ on me like the rest of the woman had during the early months of their relationships. Then again, the early stages of their relationships had been full of bombings and kidnappings, so I kind of understood why Gage hadn’t put one on me.
And I knew he loved me.
He showed me every day.
Not in the same way the rest of the men did, but in his own dark, depraved and inventive ways.
But Amy was rubbing off on me, because I found a little piece of myself not wanting flowers or chocolates or nipple clamps—though Gage had come home with those and they were fabulous. I wanted a bodyguard to show he cared about me possibly getting kidnapped by a drug lord.
I obviously wasn’t overly worried, mainly because I worked for a small-town newspaper, not the New York Times, and he was a small-time drug dealer who probably didn’t even read the newspaper, let alone ours.
Also because I simply wasn’t interesting enough to get kidnapped. Gage being my boyfriend was all my life could handle. Then again, Gage in anyone’s life was going to be more than most people could handle.
Gage probably knew all those things, but still.
So I broached the subject. Not about the bodyguards, just about his lack of general fury on the matter.
“You think I’d be mad about you writing the story?” he asked, seeming genuinely surprised.
“Well, yeah,” I said. “You’re, um…”
“Insane?” he finished for me.
“You,” I corrected.
He shrugged. “Same difference.”
I rolled my eyes. “But you were pissed off about me being outside the bar that night.”
Something worked in his eyes and I caught it, but then it was gone again and slipped through my fingers.
“Yeah, babe, I was pissed because I was pissed at myself for not getting the fuck away from you. I was also pissed at you for doin’ such a thing without so much as a fucking weapon.”
I chewed my lip. “Well you were there, and you’re a weapon.”
His eyes flared, focusing on my lip. “Yeah, I fuckin’ am,” he agreed. “But you didn’t know I was there, so that doesn’t count.”
I huffed out a breath. “So it wasn’t the act itself? Of putting myself in danger?”