Total pages in book: 90
Estimated words: 84982 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 425(@200wpm)___ 340(@250wpm)___ 283(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 84982 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 425(@200wpm)___ 340(@250wpm)___ 283(@300wpm)
She was mine. No one was coming and taking her from me.
• Thirty-Five •
What in the world had I gotten myself into?
Capri
I took a deep breath and let Thatcher’s scent soak in. His hand tightened on my hip, and I glanced up at him to see his focus on the movie. He’d let me choose the movie, but I’d barely seen any of it. Curled up against Thatcher on the sofa with his arm wrapped around my body, like he was holding on to me so that no one could take me from him, was distracting.
When I’d had to get up to use the bathroom, he’d locked his arm down so tightly that I couldn’t move. I’d had to explain what I needed to do, and even then, he had let go of me reluctantly.
This was the end of day four up in the mountain cabin with him, and with each second I spent alone here, I was more attached. The sight of him made my stomach flutter, my pulse quicken. I felt warm all over. I hadn’t forgotten that he’d brought me here against my will, but I couldn’t honestly say if he’d come up to me and asked me to come with him, I would have said no.
He had gone about it a way that was disturbing, but he had done it because he wanted me. He wanted me so badly that he’d snatched me up and run. I didn’t understand his thought process, but I also knew he wasn’t like everyone else. His brain worked differently.
He didn’t scare me anymore. It was me that I was scared of. I was the one who had fallen in love with this man, and I knew that when it ended, when he no longer clung to me like his favorite toy, I would never recover. There wouldn’t be another Thatcher for me. No other man could make me feel like he did. He was one of a kind, and I was the lucky one to get his complete attention … or possibly obsession. I didn’t care what it was. I just cared that I had him.
Under all the crazy and psycho that people loved to label him as was this vulnerable little boy who hadn’t been loved properly. He was different, and because of that, he’d been emotionally neglected. Thinking about it hurt my heart so much that I had to fight back tears. I wanted to weep for the boy who had thought he wasn’t loved. He wasn’t like everyone else, but it made him who he was. It made him Thatcher Shephard. Sexy, mysterious bad boy.
“You’re not watching the movie,” he said in a gravelly tone.
I grinned and tilted my head back to look up at him from where I had laid it on his chest, just below his shoulder. “How do you know that?” I asked.
He flicked his eyes to the screen, then back to me. “What’s happening right now?”
I had no flipping idea. I’d chosen Taken with Liam Neeson as a joke since he’d abducted me. He had smirked and pressed play. I hadn’t watched this in years, but glancing at the screen, I tried to figure out where we were at in the movie.
“He’s gone to find his daughter,” I replied, knowing that was the plot of this movie and what was happening in about eighty percent of it.
“Is that so?” he asked, reaching over with his other hand and running the back of his knuckles across my cheek. “You’re adorable, even when you’re being a smart-ass.”
I started to tell him that I wasn’t so sure I wanted to be adorable when his entire body went rigid and his gaze shot from my face to the back window. Then, he was up, pushing me down on the sofa and reaching under the cushion of the burgundy recliner to my right and pulling out a pistol.
His head snapped around toward the front door, and he moved so damn fast and quietly that I couldn’t even hear his feet on the hardwood.
What was happening? Had they found us?
Dread pooled in my stomach. What would they do to him?
I saw his shoulders relax somewhat as he reached for the door and jerked it open.
“You almost got shot,” he snarled, then turned and walked back to stand in front of me.
I leaned over just enough to see who it was. King walked inside the house, followed by Storm, Sebastian, and a man I had never met.
“It was Sebastian’s idea to check the back first,” King replied. “I told him you’d hear him.”
“Five years?” the man I didn’t know said. “You’ve had this place for five years and told no one?”
“Capri,” King said. “How are you?”
Thatcher’s stance changed completely. His body was once again rigid, and I didn’t trust the gun in his hand. I sat up on my knees and reached for his arm to touch it. Calm him down.