Total pages in book: 107
Estimated words: 103141 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 516(@200wpm)___ 413(@250wpm)___ 344(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 103141 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 516(@200wpm)___ 413(@250wpm)___ 344(@300wpm)
“Don’t romanticize me.”
“I’m not.” He shakes his head.
My eyes find his mouth, study the bow shape of it, notice again the scruff, the freckles that decorate his face, one larger and a little darker, close to his ear. I hear his breath catch, see his pulse beat in the base of his throat, and…fuck, what would that taste like? How would it feel for it to beat and throb against my tongue? What is this pull I feel to this man?
I step back, needing some space, needing to break whatever this moment is, before I do something I can’t take back.
“Come on.”
“Where are we going?” Abbott asks.
“For a walk. You should get some fresh air.” We both should. He’s already going to spend most of his final days locked in this cabin.
The least I can give him is that.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Abbott
Things with Rian are different today, and I’m trying to figure out why. First, the breakfast surprised me, then whatever that conversation afterward was. I don’t know what to think about it, and honestly, I don’t know what to think about myself either, because my head is a jumbled mess where he’s concerned.
I hate him.
I hate what he stands for, who he is, and what he does. He’s going to be the man who kills me—if I can’t figure a way out of this situation, that is. Then why do I feel an unexplainable connection to him at the same time? Why do I feel sorry for him? Why do I care about his relationship with his son and wonder why my own father can’t care enough to want to make things right with me the way Rian does with Cillian?
It’s a mind fuck and not a good one. I’ve always prided myself on being grounded in logic, knowing right from wrong, and living by what I feel is right. But here is this man, this murderous, dangerous man who lives in the gray, and there’s a part of me that wants to understand why.
“Okay,” I say when the silence has stretched too long between us.
We go back to the bedroom, the one I’ve been sharing with him the past couple of days while he slept.
“I can help you wash up.” He can’t have a shower yet, but I can give him a sponge bath.
“No, thank you. I can do it.”
“Well, I’d like a shower,” I reply. I haven’t had one since arriving here.
“Okay. I won’t look.”
So clearly, I can’t even shower on my own, though I don’t know what I expect.
Rian waits outside of the bathroom while I undress and get in, then I hear him join me in the bathroom, the sink running while he washes up.
I wrap a towel around my waist when I get out and see him eye me, his gaze locked on my shoulders. “What?”
“Freckles,” he says.
“Yep. I got a lot of them. If I promise not to pocket a razor, can I shave?”
He nods, and watches me the whole time like he’s learning something, like he doesn’t know how to shave and I’m teaching him. It’s unnerving but also makes goose bumps travel up and down my skin, make it heat in ways that I really shouldn’t feel.
He steps out again while I get dressed and then I meet Rian in the room. “I’ll help you get a shirt on.” There are two suitcases full of clothes that his friend brought. I find a button-up shirt, since that would be easier, then make my way to Rian. He’s standing by the bed now, gun sticking out of the waistband of his pants.
My gaze flicks to it, then back to Rian’s face again, and he pulls it free, setting it on the bed. “You don’t like guns?”
“Not particularly.”
“Have you ever shot one?”
“No.” I shake my head. “And I don’t want to, either.”
“Good.”
I frown, not having expected that to be his response, but then, it seems I never know what to expect from Rian.
I lift my arms and begin working the sling free. “How old were you when you first shot one?” From everything he’s said, I’ve gathered that what he does is a family business, something that was passed down to him from his father. Is his son involved too? Did Rian bring Cillian into this angry, violent world he lives in?
“Four,” he says.
“Jesus.”
“It is what it is. My father had me kill my first man at eight.”
My hands stop moving, resting against him as though I’m frozen in place. I feel the walls of my heart soften, like that one admission is breaking down the protective case I keep around it—that I always have, not just because of Rian.
I don’t want to feel sorry for him, but I do. “Eight?” I ask, as though I didn’t hear him correctly.
“Yes. My father hated him. He brought me into a room with the man tied to a chair. He was bloody and beaten when my father handed me the gun and told me to kill him. I stalled for a moment because, well, I was a fucking child, but I understood what death meant, and I knew it was coming.”