Total pages in book: 62
Estimated words: 58940 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 295(@200wpm)___ 236(@250wpm)___ 196(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 58940 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 295(@200wpm)___ 236(@250wpm)___ 196(@300wpm)
“The way his eyes follow you, wherever you go. How he both relaxes and grows more agitated when he’s near you. The look on his face when you left.”
Her breath hitched, pressure growing behind her face.
Ashley had turned around in the front passenger seat to look at her, and even Ben glanced in the rearview mirror.
“Anything I need to know?”
She rolled her eyes. Her brother-in-law sort of sucked at interpersonal relations. “Nope,” she said with finality.
Subject closed.
She and Cody weren’t right for each other. She’d known that from the moment she met him. They may be powerfully attracted to each other, but all they knew how to do was fight.
She closed her eyes and passed a hand over her face.
She just had to see him one more time and then she could walk away. Start her new life. Without him. And without her CJ Steele house.
Pain twisted in her heart, dragged down and gutted her. All her excitement for her new life without Jeremy had fled. Only emptiness remained.
Still, she had a short-term plan. Cody didn’t know it, but she’d taken the cash Ben had transferred to him for the drop to Rabago. She had it in the duffel at her feet. She wasn’t going to keep him involved any longer. She planned to find Jeremy and bring him to the meet-up. If they both showed up with the money, Rabago would have to let them walk away, clear of any obligation. If she didn’t bring Jeremy, there was a good chance he’d end up dead. She owed him this much after he’d saved her life.
She fiddled with her phone in her lap, scheduling the Uber to take her to Jeremy’s cousin’s, then back to Colorado Springs that night. Yeah, it would cost a fortune, but it was worth it to be able to definitively put all this behind her.
She’d deal with the rest of her life tomorrow.
14
Cody prowled restlessly around his place while Mark unpacked weapons.
“Twenty members of my pack will be here in a few hours,” Mark said. “I think that should be enough without you risking any from yours. I want everyone to stay in human form and use a gun. I can’t explain away torn throats and claw slashes a second time.”
He nodded absently, not asking when the first time had been. Everywhere he looked he saw signs of Melissa’s stay. The rubber band she’d used to pull back her hair lay on the coffee table. She’d left the Chromebook he’d bought her in the kitchen, her clothes were stacked neatly folded on the dryer.
“I’ll be in the garage if you need me,” he mumbled, needing to be alone.
Dammit. He’d acted like an idiot. Had he really accused her of being a gold-digger? That wasn’t her, and he knew it. This was a woman who cared deeply about a piss-poor teen with blue hair, and about an abused shifter family she’d just met. A woman who said she’d never forgive his father for throwing him out. A woman who worried for her good-for-nothing ex-boyfriend who had endangered her life.
Why had he kept his identity as CJ Steele a secret from her?
The truth may be as simple as the fact he loved hearing her wax on about him. Did that mean she didn’t care about him, the person? That she only cared about some ideal she’d created in her mind about who CJ Steele was?
Maybe.
Maybe not. She loved his work. And he was the man who’d created that work. Could she come to love him? Her body certainly responded to his touch. And the times when she’d let her guard down—which admittedly, he hadn’t made easy—things had been easy between them. So easy, it might have scared the hell out of him. He’d never felt so close to a female, especially not one he’d just met. Especially not a human. Part human.
Part shifter.
But every time they got close, he had to shove her away. He’d been scornful, closed off, and a downright jackass on several occasions. Now that she had her sister and Stone back, she wouldn’t need him. He’d have no excuse to be near her, to keep her close to him.
He should have marked her!
But no, that wouldn’t change things for her. He’d still be in the same boat—needing a female who may not ever want to see him again.
If only he’d shown even a smidgen of charm. Of chivalry. If only he’d made more of an effort to get to know her, or to show her more of himself. Instead he’d been prickly and defensive.
Each minute that passed made him grow more agitated, as his true mate drew farther from him.
His fingers worked mindlessly, tinkering with the Ducati. Cleaning and greasing the same parts over and over again.
Minutes turned into hours. His mind fogged into a haze of self-abasement, alternating with the steely determination to win Melissa’s affection at all cost as soon as Rabago had been taken care of.