Total pages in book: 49
Estimated words: 46098 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 230(@200wpm)___ 184(@250wpm)___ 154(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 46098 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 230(@200wpm)___ 184(@250wpm)___ 154(@300wpm)
She read my expression before I spoke, and suspicion narrowed her eyes. “Club business?”
“Yeah,” I replied, because that part was true.
Her mouth tilted. “Is it my business too?”
I hated and loved her all at once for that question.
“It touches your life,” I admitted. “Which is why I’m telling you instead of making you guess. We’re going after Bellatrix.”
She unfolded from the bed in one smooth motion and planted her feet on the floor like she was bracing for a fight. “Then I’m going.”
“No.”
She crossed her arms and tapped a finger against her bicep. “I can stay in the van. I won’t get in the way. I just—” She faltered, and it killed me. “I just don’t want you shouldering this alone. You’ve had my back. Let me have yours.”
“That is my favorite sentence you’ve ever said,” I told her, too honest for my own good. Then I closed the distance and caught her jaw in my hand, not hard, but enough that she felt the strength in my resolve. “But you’re mine. And you’re carrying our kid. There is nothing on this earth that would make me agree to put you in danger. Not now. Not ever.”
Her chin tipped up another notch. “I know how to stay out of the way. I won’t try to be a part of the action.”
“I know. That isn’t the point.” I pressed my mouth to hers, slow. Then a second kiss that was sharper and deeper because I needed the taste. When I pulled back, her eyes were glassy with heat and frustration. “I walk into hell so you don’t have to, angel.”
She was still simmering when I stepped to the closet. I reached up to the highest shelf and pulled down the box Kane had slid into my hand three days ago. I hadn’t asked him to make it, though I’d intended to, but he hadn’t waited for me to find time. He’d handed it to me after we found out about the baby. He understood the timing, especially with his own woman pregnant.
I cracked the box and took out the vest. Black leather. Smaller than mine, a perfect fit for her. Her name was stitched across the left breast, but the patch I cared about most took up the whole back. The Redline Kings logo in the center and the words PROPERTY OF AXLE arched beneath it in bold.
I turned and held it out to her.
“Be my old lady.” The words felt tight in my throat because I’d never said them to anyone, and I never would again.
She looked at the vest and then at me. Heat, shock, a flicker of fear that wasn’t about me at all.
When she didn’t make a move to take it, a small pulse of hurt thumped in my chest. I didn’t let it show, but she must have seen the hint of fear anyway because her face turned soft.
“I want it,” she said quickly, almost tripping over the words. “I want you. I want this.” She lifted her chin, her gaze unwavering, but with moisture gathered in her stormy gray eyes. “But I don’t want you to give it to me now because you think you might not come back.” She stepped close, and her hand touched the leather, then flattened over my heart. “Go handle that bitch. Come home to me. Then give this to me, and I’ll wear it with pride.”
I huffed out a laugh, not because her answer was funny, but because it was perfect. She was fucking perfect. For a second, all I could do was look at her. My heart thumped hard, and my every instinct screamed for me to admit how I felt. But like the vest, I wouldn’t give her the words until nothing was hanging over us, so she knew for sure that I meant them.
I tucked the vest back into the box, set it on the dresser, and fisted a hand in the hem of the shirt she was wearing to pull her to her toes.
“Fine,” I growled, mouth slanting over hers. “But you'd better be waiting for me when I get back. Naked and in our bed. Because I want you wearing my brand and nothing else the next time I’m buried deep inside you.”
Color climbed her throat as her eyes flared, and her fingers bit my shoulders. “Just keep that picture in your head so it brings you back to me.”
I kissed her once more—hard enough to burn something into both of us—then broke away before my control was lost. I strapped on my blade at my ankle and holstered my gun at my hip. Then I took one last look at her standing by the bed, afraid for me, but with faith braided tight behind her eyes.
“Waiting for me, angel,” I said, voice low.
“Be careful,” she whispered. “Then be fast.”