Total pages in book: 69
Estimated words: 69352 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 347(@200wpm)___ 277(@250wpm)___ 231(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 69352 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 347(@200wpm)___ 277(@250wpm)___ 231(@300wpm)
I bit my lip, and he studied me, freezing.
“Is this…”
I knew what he was asking.
Was it too much.
I shook my head. “I’m…that part of me…I…”
I searched for the words, and he let me, watching me carefully as he completely unloaded his pants pockets onto the counter.
His phone. Wallet. Keys. Cash. Change. A pocket knife. His third pencil he’d lost for the day. A chalk stick. And a…gun. A tiny one. One that was so small I’d never suspected he’d even had it in the first place.
“That part of my issues…that’s really a non-issue now. I can have sex. I can be with a man in any sexual manner. I’ve worked that out with a therapist a while ago,” I explained quickly, the words coming so quickly that they were like ants pouring out of a disturbed hill. “My issues stem from other places now. I can trust with my body, but not with my heart anymore.”
I hoped he got what I meant by that.
I was very…standoffish.
If I was being honest, with Asher, I’d not been the girlfriend he deserved.
I was there, and present, but I wasn’t actually there.
He didn’t have ‘me.’
My body? Sure. My heart? Absolutely not.
There was no one in this world that I could trust with that thing.
My brothers didn’t count, either.
They were family.
He finished emptying his pants, pulled the belt out of the belt loops, then walked up to the chute opening and pressed his jeans against it. The pipe sucked the jeans out of his hand, and he chuckled.
When he did, the rib muscles at his side flexed, and my eyes were drawn to a spot right under his armpit—a tattoo—that I hadn’t seen before now.
Vengeance.
I looked at it for so long that Cutter cleared his throat and said, “You okay?”
I looked up at him and said, “If you ever see Lyle…I don’t want you getting in trouble for me. I don’t care if you kill him. I don’t care if you help Shasha string him up by his toes and torture him for the rest of his life. What I do care about is other people paying for my stupidity. I should’ve never been with him. I should’ve left when my brothers said to. I should’ve come to Shasha and Dima when I realized how dangerous Lyle was. But I didn’t. I stayed because I was just so freakin’ desperate to live my own life that I didn’t care how I had to live it. I made the biggest mistake that I’ve ever made, and I don’t want anyone else to pay for that.”
He studied me for a long moment and said, “If that man comes anywhere near you, he’s dead. I’ll do it in a way that won’t blow back on you, me, or your family. Not my club. Not anyone. I learned from my mistakes with my father.”
I bit my lip.
“I haven’t been caught yet, darlin’. Trust me.”
Then he turned the shower on, dropped his shorts, and got in.
I saw the flash of a white backside, much in contrast to the tanned skin of his back, as he disappeared behind the clear shower doors.
The only thing stopping me from seeing him fully was the red towel that I’d hung there for aesthetics.
I watched him for a few seconds too long, because eventually he said, “Vacuum?”
Did he just tell me, without telling me, that he’d killed before and hadn’t gotten caught?
And why was the idea not appalling to me?
I went to get my stick vacuum out of the hall closet, and when I came back, it was to see that Cutter was now onto the soap part of his shower.
White suds were running down his body in rivulets, and I couldn’t stop myself from watching as he rubbed my rose-smelling soap all over his body as I vacuumed up the sawdust.
When I was done, I replaced the vacuum, then went to sit on my bed because I didn’t know what to do.
I knew what I wanted to do, though, and that was sit in the bathroom and enjoy the show.
Which was why I sat on the end of my bed with my hands underneath my thighs and stared straight ahead.
If I turned slightly to the right, I’d be able to see him in the bathroom mirror.
The shower turned off, and I closed my eyes.
He came into the room moments later and said, “I’m decent.”
I opened my eyes and saw him wearing my red fancy towel around his waist.
I bit my lip as I watched water slide down from his wet hair to the towel. All the way down his chest, his abs, and then into the hollow of his hip before the towel absorbed the drop.
I’d never wanted to be a water droplet more in my life.
“We’re not even married yet and you’re watching me like you want to devour me,” he teased.