Total pages in book: 67
Estimated words: 61692 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 308(@200wpm)___ 247(@250wpm)___ 206(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 61692 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 308(@200wpm)___ 247(@250wpm)___ 206(@300wpm)
I don’t move.
I don’t even dare breathe.
“You killed him?” Her voice is that of a little girl. A teenager who lost her father. An innocent daughter who lost her hero. I can’t find words, so I nod. And when her eyes meet mine, I see it. Shimmering in her bright blue eyes is her heart, cracking with each word, every memory, and it’s all my fault.
I warned her. I told her I’d hurt her, break her heart. And I did.
16
Raina
It’s surreal when you’re face to face with a killer. It’s something I could never describe because I couldn’t give it justice with words. Knowing your father was murdered in cold blood is one thing, but when you’re the one in love with his killer. That’s another thing completely.
Glancing at him, I realize one thing. He’s dangerous and deadly, but it makes me want him even more.
He doesn’t move. I know he’s waiting for the tirade. For the anger. For everything I should be giving him. But I can’t. I don’t. I knew what my father had done. So as I look at Franco, I see the guilt in his dark eyes, but it’s not guilt over killing my father.
No.
That would be fruitless.
It’s remorse over hurting me. Shaking my head, I pull my hand from his and he reluctantly lets me go. Turning, I head toward the floor-to-ceiling windows that overlook the city. “You know, there were times when I wondered how he died. I wondered who the man was behind the gun. It played on my mind day and night. And you know what I did during those moments, hours, minutes?”
He’s silent, but I don’t turn to him. I can’t look at him as I voice the next words. As I admit that I’m not angry. Perhaps a little hurt, but not angry.
“I lay in my bed, I looked at the photo of the stranger, and I imagined it was him. I pictured his strong hands holding a black Glock, or perhaps a handgun with a silencer, and I saw his fingers press the trigger. I heard the shot. It echoed through my mind every night. The sound would ricochet around me and the strange thing was, that was when I realized how fucked up I am.”
“What?” He rasps the question and I place a hand on the glass, recalling those nights alone. Those nights when I found my father’s secrets. When I learned the man I called daddy wasn’t what he said he was. When I learned that secrets and lies were what broke my family apart.
“It’s true. I learned that I wasn’t his daughter. Because the only thing I thought of, the only thing I did every night after, even before my father’s death, was think of you. I’d fallen for a stranger in a photo. You gave me my first real orgasm without even touching me. You showed me a part of me I didn’t know I had, you ripped it from the cold darkness where it hid and you gave it light.”
He’s behind me then. He moved so swiftly, I didn’t hear him approach. But his body is behind mine in an instant. “Raina.” He caresses my name in his thick accent. Dripping confusion and hunger. “What are you talking about?”
“I…” My words fall short because I can’t admit it. I can’t tell him I sought him out but couldn’t find him. I didn’t know his name, and I couldn’t find any information in my father’s documents. I’d waited too long after his death. When I went into his study, everything was gone. The police had taken it all. And so, my stranger was gone.
“Can you feel this?” He strokes my arm. It’s a gentle, almost tentative touch. Sweet. Soft. Different to how he normally touches me. I nod. “Not my fingers, bella,” he murmurs against my neck and I dip my head to the side to allow him access to the sensitive flesh. “This tethered connection. It’s… intossicante,” he murmurs.
“What?”
“Intoxicating, Raina.” His lips plant a soft kiss on my nape. “That’s what you are to me. I can’t deny myself you. You’re my addiction. A wicked sin I could never pray for salvation for taking and enjoying. I won’t survive this life without a shot of you to my veins every day.” His words are filled with emotion, affection, something deeper than we both agreed to. Something I wanted, but he couldn’t give.
As I turn in his arms, I regard him. I see it swimming in those mocha pools. His eyes remind me of those espresso shots he loves to drink. Deep, dark, and bottomless.
“I’m not leaving. I can’t. I know you told me I shouldn’t do this, but as they say, the heart wants what it does. And mine…” I lean in, my lips on the scruff of his jaw and I revel in the way it scrapes along my cheek. “My heart wants yours.”