Total pages in book: 158
Estimated words: 145803 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 729(@200wpm)___ 583(@250wpm)___ 486(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 145803 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 729(@200wpm)___ 583(@250wpm)___ 486(@300wpm)
“I want a relationship, Vienna.” His voice was quiet. “I want you to give us a chance. Tell me what to do so you know I’m serious.”
“How long would you stay working, Zale, if we did start a relationship? Your work seems dangerous, and it’s obvious you could disappear for months and I wouldn’t know if you were alive or dead. That doesn’t seem like a good fit with me. I’m a worrier.”
“We’re a good fit.”
He just stated it, as if it were a fact. His gaze never left hers. He acted so certain.
“You make no sense, Zale. You’re a highly intelligent man. Other than that, I don’t know the first thing about you and you don’t know the first thing about me. You’re talking as if that month and a half we had together is the same as the two years Sam and Stella had. It isn’t. They had time to get to know one another. A lot of time. We spent most of our time having sex.”
“I made love to you. I might not have known that was what I was doing every single time, but that was it. I knew it was different, and you had to have known it as well. Every time I touched you, it felt different. Sometimes, Vienna, I couldn’t sleep. I would just lie awake and watch you sleep, breathing you in, terrified of what I was feeling for you.”
“And yet you left without a single word.”
He nodded slowly, thoughtfully, his expression never changing. But his eyes did. She was watching closely, and the color deepened, turned a dark chocolate, almost a velvet. She pressed a hand to her stomach to keep away the sensation of rolling. The roller coaster again. She couldn’t afford to live her life on a ride at a theme park.
“I didn’t know how to protect you. Or give you a promise. I had to think things through. I had to know for certain that I wasn’t going to ruin your life if I inserted myself into it permanently. Men like me don’t do that easily, Vienna. We have to know we can protect the people we choose to have in our world. I had to know if I could even be in a relationship and make it work. I wasn’t going to insist I could and then back out later.”
“You can’t know that about yourself.”
“I’m good at looking at my weaknesses and strengths. In my line of work, I have to be. The one thing I don’t ever do is bullshit myself. I can make a life with you. I’m loyal, Vienna. That’s one trait I have. And I’m capable of loving the right person. That’s you. Stop shaking your head.”
She might consider keeping him just for his foot massages. The entire time he’d been presenting his case, he’d never stopped rubbing her feet and calves. That felt so good. She should have been tense, but his hands kept her relaxed and mellow.
“Snowflake, you didn’t date anyone else. According to Sam, you didn’t look at anyone else. It wasn’t like you haven’t had chances. I didn’t look at anyone else. We fit.”
“Do you have any idea how annoying you are?” A ghost of a smile lit his dark eyes for a moment, catching at her heart. “You didn’t answer me, Zale. How long are you going to stay working?”
“At least another year.” He didn’t so much as hesitate. He didn’t look away from her either.
She put her head back and looked up at the ceiling. “If I had a job where you couldn’t contact me or know where I was or even if I was alive, would you be all right with that, Zale?”
“Absolutely not.”
He had that weird purr in his voice that sent a chill down her spine. She brought her head down to look at him again. Narrowing her gaze, she glared at him. “Why are you giving me attitude? You’re the one with the high-risk job, not me.”
“Is that so? I believe you’re the one hanging off cliffs or wading through chest-deep snow to retrieve bodies. I’ve seen some of the videos of the rescues you’ve done. They’re heart-stopping. The one where you rappelled down the canyon to that kid with the water rushing below you, treating him on that narrow ledge that looked like it was going to crumble any minute, terrified me. I wouldn’t say what I do is half as dangerous as what you do. I can control my situations. You can’t control nature, Vienna.”
His expression remained the same, but his voice betrayed him. It was the first time she’d ever heard his voice shake. His eyes went diamond hard. Almost black obsidian. He looked a force of nature and every bit as scary.
“No, I can’t,” she agreed. “But I plan carefully. I don’t leave anything to chance. I know the things that can go wrong, and I plan for those.”