Total pages in book: 63
Estimated words: 58883 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 294(@200wpm)___ 236(@250wpm)___ 196(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 58883 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 294(@200wpm)___ 236(@250wpm)___ 196(@300wpm)
Kat cries freely, but her mouth curls into a smile, and her joy is obvious as she cradles my face in her hands. She wipes my tears away with her thumbs, and I return the favor.
“Whenever I think life is unfair, that it’s handed me a raw deal, all I have to do is look at your face, and I remember that I’m the luckiest woman in the whole goddamn world.”
“Look at us, a bunch of crying, lovesick fools,” I say.
“Better to cry over the lost years than to never have a true love that was meant to be.”
I kiss her full pink lips gently, over and over, treasuring their warmth and vitality.
She kisses me back and wraps her arms around my neck, yanking me in close. “Heath, the ocean brought you to me,” she whispers.
I break the seal of her lips with my tongue and she opens beneath me, pulling me under like the swift tide. I love Katelyn Shaw irrevocably, and I’ll gladly drown in the ocean of her love if she’ll have me.
EPILOGUE
Six Years Later…
Heath
My arms are wrapped around the most precious thing in my universe as we walk, one small step at a time, on unleveled rocks and gravel.
“Can I take this blindfold off?”
I hold her hands firmly against her soft, round stomach, “Two more steps.”
“You know I’m not the best with surprises.”
“I know, Princess, but you might as well get used to it because I like surprising you.”
We’ve been married for five years—the best five years of my life. It would have been six but we had to wait a year until Eddie could be considered legally dead. It killed me to wait, but Kat kept telling me she wasn’t going anywhere. Not that I’d let her leave, even if she wanted to.
“Ready?”
She starts bouncing on the balls of her feet. “Yes! Where are we?”
“Our new cabin in the Catskills.”
She whirls around and stares at me, unshed tears held hostage in her eyes. “You bought us a cabin?”
“With five acres of land. I guess I bought a few cabins. The place is completely secluded.”
She wags her eyebrows, “Secluded, huh?”
I grip the top of her sundress and rip it off her body, watching as it pools on the dirt under our feet. “Secluded. Just how I like it. I plan on having your ass naked and at my mercy twenty-four hours a day.”
I tug her toward me, bend down, and nip at her ear. Kat told me she likes it rough, that the games others made her play are ones she wants to play with me, willingly.
I bite on her ear lobe, whispering in her ear, “Run.”
Kat giggles and I watch her feet strike the ground as she runs into the brush forest.
I walk slowly. Might as well let my prey believe she’s got a shot at winning. Where’s the fun in catching her too quickly? It’s the chase, the hiding and seeking that enhance the play. After Kat took a bullet and I thought I’d lose her, I vowed never to be rough with her again. To only make love to her, kiss her tenderly, and when we had sex, to do nothing more than gaze into her eyes with love. Until the day Kat herself told me she needed more. She needed the aggression. She wanted me to be rough and forceful. She told me that, with me, it wasn’t abuse but a necessary component of her pleasure. I think it’s her way of washing away the past and embracing who she is today.
The weather is warm even with the changing leaves starting to fall off the trees. It’s the time of year where beauty of autumnal colors arrive, but can still bask in the summer heat.
The leaves scrunch under my feet as I take off into the forest after the only woman I’ve ever loved. “Ready or not, Princess, here I come.”
Kat runs behind a tree, assuming I won’t find her, but the truth is she could go to the end of the world, and it still wouldn’t be far enough. I’ll always find her because Kat is an integral part of who I am. She’s the only person who knows all sides of me. She embraces it all, the good and the bad, and while our love may be imperfect, it’s ours to have and to hold. Ours is a love that transcends time and place, equally comfortable in the pits of hell or the clouds of heaven. Kat is everything to me, and I know I mean the world to her.
I walk gently on the forest floor so my feet don’t make a sound as I near the tree she’s hiding behind.
“Come out, come out wherever you are,” I taunt.
Kat pokes her head from the other side, and panic flashes in her eyes before she darts into the forest.