Total pages in book: 58
Estimated words: 53361 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 267(@200wpm)___ 213(@250wpm)___ 178(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 53361 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 267(@200wpm)___ 213(@250wpm)___ 178(@300wpm)
“I need to face them,” I whispered. “I don’t really know why, but I feel I need to do this.”
Since leaving London six years ago, I’d rebuilt myself piece by jagged piece. I’d slept on park benches and in shelters. I’d worked jobs that left my feet aching and my spirit crushed. I’d learned to survive on my own terms, not theirs. But somewhere deep inside, a part of me still cowered under my father’s disapproval and my mother’s cutting remarks. That part of me needed to die tonight.
“These people hurt you,” Marcus said, his voice dropping into that quiet register that made everyone else strain to hear him but somehow reached me with perfect clarity. “They’ll probably try to manipulate you.”
“Oh, I know they will,” I said softly. “It’s what they do.”
The muscle in his jaw jumped beneath his beard. His instinct to protect me, to shield me from pain, was written in every line of his body, in the way his gaze constantly scanned our surroundings.
“I don’t like this. They hurt you, and I’m not sure how I’ll react.”
“I know,” I said with a smile. Marcus was nothing if not protective. Just the other day Marcus had growled at the older gentleman who owned a coffee shop I frequented because he’d bought my coffee. Thankfully, the man, who had to be pushing ninety, had merely patted Rancor’s arm and told him to treat me right. Rancor had shaken his hand and promised to do just that. “But I’m not the same person who ran away from them. I’m stronger now.” I reached up, placed my palm against his bearded cheek. “Because of you. Because of what we’ve built together.”
The gold band and the single diamond solitaire on my finger caught the light from the restaurant’s entrance, a reminder of promises Marcus and I had exchanged just two weeks ago in a simple ceremony at the compound. The memory of that day flooded me with warmth, pushing back against the chill of apprehension.
“I just worry they’ll try to take you away from me,” Marcus admitted, his vulnerability striking in a man who showed it so rarely. “People like that, with money and connections, they think they own people like me.”
I shook my head firmly. “They can’t take what isn’t theirs to begin with. My heart, my future, those belong to you and me. No one else.”
Around us, Nashville’s elite streamed past in designer clothes, their conversations a blur of business deals and social climbing. None of them spared us a second glance, though we stood out like wolves among sheep. Marcus in his suit that couldn’t quite disguise the predator beneath. Me in a dress I’d bought specially for this night, wanting to armor myself in the trappings of the world I’d left behind. Kind of ironic given we were going into a place where the bill for the two of us was likely to top five hundred dollars.
“I have to face them. I need to look them in the eye and show them I survived without them. That I’m happy despite them.”
Marcus brushed his thumb across my cheek, wiping away a tear I hadn’t realized had fallen. “Then we do it together,” he said. “But the first sign they’re hurting you, we leave. That’s the deal.”
I nodded, swallowing past the lump in my throat. “I love you so much.”
He smiled, taking my hand in his, our fingers interlacing. He brought my fingers to his lips. “I love you, too, honey.”
We turned together toward the restaurant entrance. The gleaming glass doors reflected our images back at us, distorted and strange. I barely recognized myself in the tight black cocktail dress, my hair swept up in an elegant twist. Marcus looked dangerous even in formal wear. The tattoos crawling up his neck, peeking out from his dress shirt, added to his predatory aura. He got more than his fair share of admiring glances from every single woman in the entire place. A few men too.
Just before we stepped inside, Marcus leaned down, his breath warm against my ear. “When we’re done here,” he whispered, “I’m going to take you home and peel this dress off you so slowly you’ll beg me to tear it. Then I’m going to taste every inch of that gorgeous body until you forget these people ever existed.”
Heat bloomed across my skin, starting at my neck and racing upward. Then downward. In that moment, I found strength in the promise of his touch, in the life we’d started far from the toxic world of my past. Funny, I had to find this kind of peace in a motorcycle club with a compound full of ex-cons and the women who loved them. Kiss of Death was more my home now than my parents’ house had ever been.
I smiled up at him, a genuine one for the first time since we’d arrived. “That, Marcus Wheeler, is the best incentive I’ve ever heard for getting through a miserable dinner.”