Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 92941 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 465(@200wpm)___ 372(@250wpm)___ 310(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 92941 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 465(@200wpm)___ 372(@250wpm)___ 310(@300wpm)
I staggered back.
“It happened so fast,” she said, crying as her hands framed his face, moved to his hair, and wrapped around his neck. “I was asleep.”
Zeke’s hand wrapped around the back of my arm, holding me in place.
“Thank God, you’re all right,” he said, kissing her cheeks. That upturned nose. The cupid’s bow I was already obsessed with.
“Steady,” Zeke murmured, too quiet for human ears to detect.
“You’re all right?” she—Millie—asked.
Her name was Millie. It fit her. Now that she was out of the hole, I could see her in her entirety. There wasn’t an angle anywhere. Every part of her was soft and sloped.
She was mine. My body tensed as I fought the urge to step forward and break the man’s neck.
“My darling,” she sobbed. “You’re not hurt?”
“No,” he whispered into her neck.
“I was so frightened,” she breathed, her dirty fingertips digging into his back.
We watched like a couple of voyeurs as they composed themselves and were still standing frozen as they turned toward us.
“Thank you,” the man said, keeping his arm around my mate as he reached out to shake our hands. “Thank you.”
Zeke shook his hand first. I forced myself to do the same.
“I’m Alan Davies,” he said. “And this is my wife, Millie.”
That’s when I noticed where the arm wrapped around her waist ended. His hand was placed protectively on her slightly curved stomach.
All the air left my lungs.
“Zeke and Beau Boucher,” Zeke said for both of us. I was glad of my brother’s presence. My entire body had locked as I forced myself to look away from my mate’s abdomen.
“Please, let me buy you dinner.”
“No need,” Zeke replied. “We’re just happy to do our part.”
“You’re Yanks?” Alan said in surprise.
Their voices faded in and out as I stood there, fighting every instinct I had. She was married. My mate was married to a human. It made my skin crawl. She was standing too close to him. Her hands were all over him, still moving as if to assure herself that he was really there. His hold was possessive. Loving. I fought the bile rising in my throat.
“We actually have an appointment,” I heard Zeke as if from far away.
I nodded, meeting Millie’s eyes for a moment before forcing my feet to move. Zeke no longer had a hand on my arm, but his presence beside me was bracing as I made myself walk away from her. My ears were ringing. Heat rolled over me, pulsing with every beat of my heart.
Zeke tried to talk to me, but I couldn’t hear him. Every step away from her was agony. My skin was on fire. My chest ached, and my stomach roiled with nausea.
By the time we got back to our lodgings, I was sweating.
“He’s already been called up,” Zeke said, pushing me until I’d dropped onto the sofa. “Didn’t you hear him? He’s leaving in a few days, and Millie is going somewhere in the country.”
“What?” I asked distractedly. She’d been so close, I could’ve touched her. Why hadn’t I reached her before that miserable human showed up?
“He’s shipping out in a couple of days, brother,” Zeke said, handing me a drink. “He’ll be gone. With the way this war is going, he won’t be back.”
That jolted me out of my stupor.
“He could.”
Zeke scoffed. “Doubtful.”
“She loves him.”
“She’ll forget him.”
I thought about the way she’d gazed at him, the adoration and relief in her expression.
“She won’t,” I said, throwing the drink back. It burned pleasantly. I’d need the entire bottle to keep me seated inside that small flat. “She’s carrying his child.”
“Many things could happen before—”
“Don’t say it,” I ordered sharply. The thought of my mate losing the man she loved and the child she carried was almost as bad as the fact that she had them.
Our mother had lost two children before she met our father. Even at her happiest, there was a shadow behind her eyes a hundred years later.
“You’ve found her,” Zeke said in awe, dropping to the chair across from me. “You’ve actually found her.”
“Too late,” I breathed, bracing my elbows on my knees.
“It’s not,” Zeke argued. “You wouldn’t have found her if it was impossible. That’s not how it works.”
“How the hell would you know?” I snapped.
“Have you ever heard of such a thing?” he asked, throwing his arm out. “You just have to be patient.”
I ground my teeth together. I didn’t have the capacity to argue with him, not then. I couldn’t stop thinking about her eyes. Deep brown. Like the coffee my father drank in the morning, not even a splash of cream. The small huff of laughter she’d let out when I spoke. I’d done that. I’d made her laugh. Me. The curve of her hips and shoulders, the fullness of her breasts, the small roundness of her belly. The bare feet, slender and delicate, that had curved carefully over the rocks.