Total pages in book: 132
Estimated words: 135300 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 677(@200wpm)___ 541(@250wpm)___ 451(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 135300 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 677(@200wpm)___ 541(@250wpm)___ 451(@300wpm)
I’m about to scream, but Kane knocks his arm aside and punches him in the face so hard something cracks.
Do something! Before they kill each other.
My pulse beats so fast it turns my hurting stomach.
Lee dropped his flashlight and it rolled across the cellar. Now the light burns against the wall, showing two thrashing shadows.
Thankfully, Kane’s military training and muscle gives him the upper hand.
After a few more blows so fast I can’t see them, he has Lee pinned against the wall again.
The lunatic’s face looks battered, smeared with blood and dust.
For a second, I think it’s over.
But I see the way Lee’s hand moves, twisting the gun toward Kane’s stomach.
And Kane’s hands are too busy holding Lee down to notice. There’s nothing he can do to stop the gun’s slow, snaking journey.
His face is slick, straining, his eyes wild with effort.
I have three seconds.
I pop up quickly.
I don’t care about the danger or the glass cutting the palms of my hands as I lunge for the statue.
Yes, it’s just as heavy as it looks.
A freaking boulder.
Muscles I never knew I had scream in my back as I heave it up, high over my head.
“Margot, no!” Kane warns. “Stay back!”
Lee smiles, more reptile than ever with new gaps in his teeth.
“Fugg you, Saind,” he slurs. “Gonna kill you.”
The gun inches closer.
Kane’s neck muscles bulge in stark relief.
My arms are shaking.
I can’t hold this statue much longer, I—
“Drop it, you asshole,” Kane rasps. “Last chance.”
“Nodding else madders,” Lee gurgles.
The gun barrel digs into Kane’s stomach.
Lee’s bloody smile widens.
“Y-ou you’re the reason my life’s shid. They’ll know shoon. The whole wide whirld.”
“Go ahead,” Kane snaps, right in his face now, pressing his bulk into the gun. “Shoot me. Won’t change a damn thing. Nothing will do that when you chose violence. You chose to be a slave to your past.”
“No!” I whisper.
I know what he’s doing.
He’s still redirecting him.
This brave, beautiful man will die ten times just to keep a madman’s gun away from me.
Kane cranes his neck and looks at me.
“That’s something I’ll never be again thanks to this woman,” he whispers softly.
Oh. My. God.
Lee coughs and spits blood on the floor next to Kane.
“Shud the fugg up!”
“No. I heard what you told her. I lost my life once, too.” Kane looks back at Lee again, and I slowly lower the statue. The gun hasn’t moved, but Lee frowns, hesitating. “Took me forever to find it again, but I did. I filled that chasm. After meeting Margot Blackthorn, I can die happy if you shoot me tonight. I found the woman I love.”
Love.
He loves me and I’m so freaking gutted I can’t move.
That’s why he stayed.
That’s why he put his kids on a plane and rushed back for me.
That’s why we’re both here, staring death in the face.
That’s why he’s prepared to die any second, to give up his life for mine.
It’s all a violent blur now.
All the early mornings in the kitchen.
Late nights under the twinkling stars and glowing planets.
The laughter and kisses.
The sweetness, the standoffs, the memories we made with Sophie and Dan—of course it meant something.
Only the entire world.
“If you kill me,” Kane growls, “then you’re giving up on your only way back. You can still be human. You can stomp out that fire, that hate, that ugliness before it ruins you, Lee.”
Silence.
There’s a massive lump in my throat as my lips twitch and I whisper, “I love you too.”
Not how I ever imagined we’d say those words.
Absolutely the most messed-up timing.
But that just makes it truer, holy vows written in adrenaline and blood. If this maniac murders him in front of me, at least we—
The statue starts to slip in my hands and I lunge for the ground.
Lee slumps against Kane’s hold with a groan, his head hanging.
It’s like he’s a human balloon deflating, a long ribbon of blood and saliva drooling from his mouth.
His chest heaves out a sob.
Then after the longest second, his gun falls to the ground.
Amazing it doesn’t go off.
Kane reaches for a loose brick beside Lee’s head and with one swift hit, he knocks him out cold.
“Just in case. He’ll live,” he tells me, letting the man slump to the floor next to his gun, lifeless.
I’m still on my knees, gripping the statue, staring in wide-eyed horror.
He gently pries my numb hands away, and he still somehow has the energy to carry it back to its stand.
Battered, bruised, and bleeding, he’s perfection.
The most wonderful man alive.
And miraculously, he is alive.
Holy shit, we survived!
“Never walk up to a man with a gun again, duchess,” he says with a thin smile.
“No choice. I thought he was going to shoot you,” I whisper brokenly, giving in to rest my forehead against his chest.
He smells like blood and sweat and stone, mingled with testosterone.
It’s like breathing pine needles, but I don’t care.