Total pages in book: 61
Estimated words: 56628 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 283(@200wpm)___ 227(@250wpm)___ 189(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 56628 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 283(@200wpm)___ 227(@250wpm)___ 189(@300wpm)
Before I could ask who she wanted me to protect her from, she passed out in my arms, her soft snores letting me know that she was out cold. As I looked down at her, I realized then that everything she had said to me when she had gotten there had been a lie.
Someone ruined her, and I had a feeling that someone had been Vin.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Adelaide
Ilooked up at Tristan when he stepped back into the clubhouse. He’d been out most of the day working in the garage, but he hadn’t cuffed me to the bed again, for which I was thankful. And he’d given me free reign of the clubhouse too instead of locking me up in his room.
But I couldn’t stop the itch beneath my skin. I needed a way out. This shit with me and Tristan was toxic as fuck. I couldn’t do this. Not again.
Where the fuck was Joey? Why wasn’t he here? Why hadn’t Tristan told Joey that I was back home? If he had, I knew Joey would’ve been here already, wrapping me up in his arms and doing his best to make me comfortable and help me heal, just like he had before.
My eyes caught River’s from across the room. His lips tilted up the slightest bit in my direction, warming my heart, giving me strength that I hadn’t even known I’d been seeking. I’d always thought that River was attractive, but the way he’d held me yesterday when I had completely fallen apart? My heart skipped a beat in my chest. He was warm and strong. Safe, which was something I hadn’t been in a year.
Zyla handed one of the guys a beer, her lips tilting up a little as Jesup walked in behind Tristan. “Things changed a lot, didn’t they?” I asked her, noting the way Jesup shot her a wink that had her cheeks burning red.
She shrugged as she turned her attention to me. “You were gone for a while, Adelaide,” she reminded me.
I was only supposed to be gone for a couple of hours at most, but Rodney had found me. Everything went fucking downhill from there. The last time I’d been in the clubhouse had been the last time I’d tasted freedom.
I glanced at River again. His blue eyes were already focused on me, and when they caught mine, they softened slightly, understanding and strength for me in their depths. My chest swelled. I hadn’t been looked at like that… well, ever.
River had come to my rescue that night. I didn’t want to call Tristan, and I hadn’t wanted to call Joey.
I wanted someone who never looked at me with judgment. Someone who looked at me without pity.
River jumped out of his truck, his boots making a soft thud on the dirty ground. He had made it to me in record time, just as I knew he would. When he’d given me his number in case of an emergency, he’d told me anytime day or night, call him.
I was so glad that offer still stood.
“Fuck, darlin’,” he breathed as he kneeled next to me on the trash-littered ground, but there was no pity in his eyes. Instead, there was a burning rage in them. “It’s going to hurt like fuck for me to move you, but I need to get you to the hospital.”
“Okay,” I whispered, my voice sounding hoarse to my own ears.
He eased his arms beneath my back and knees, easily lifting me against his chest as his arms flexed around me. He wasn’t wearing his cut, and he had a beanie on his head, hiding his dark hair and mostly concealing his identity from anyone that might see him.
I whined in pain, my breaths shallowing. He brushed his lips to my bloody forehead. “Easy, darlin’,” he soothed. “I’ve got you. You’re not alone. I’m here.”
Tears slid down my cheeks. “I feel like I’m dying,” I choked out as he set me in the passenger seat of his truck.
He gripped my face in his rough, calloused hands, locking those beautiful, blue eyes on mine. “Live for me, Adelaide,” he pleaded. I swallowed thickly at the raw pain and fear for me in his eyes. “Can you do that? Can you live for me?”
Slowly, I nodded. He brushed his thumbs over my cheekbones. “No matter what hell you endure, darlin’, live for me, yeah?” He brushed his lips over mine. I sobbed. Everything hurting so much, but he was doing his best to soothe me. “Just live.”
Troy and Kyle stepped up to the bar, drawing me out of my memory—that sweet, bittersweet memory where River gave me a taste of what it was like to truly be cared about.
Live for me.
I’d fucking lived. I hadn’t done a goddamn thing else, but I fucking lived. I kept my promise to him.