Total pages in book: 192
Estimated words: 189782 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 949(@200wpm)___ 759(@250wpm)___ 633(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 189782 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 949(@200wpm)___ 759(@250wpm)___ 633(@300wpm)
She rounds a corner, and I prowl silently after her.
I can track her through a blizzard, through the densest forest, across the most treacherous terrain. Here, in the sterile, controlled environment of the hospital, it’s too easy.
She stops again, her head turning slightly. She feels me. Our connection defies logic, an invisible thread that binds us together.
I miss her with a ferocity that borders on madness, my yearning a physical ache.
But I can endure pain, the scars on my back a constant reminder of that. Denver’s cruelty knew no bounds, and it forged me into the man I am today.
That life, those lessons, they serve me now.
I move closer, the distance between us shrinking. She pauses to talk to someone, her soft lilt swirling over my skin.
Then she’s on the move again, and I chase.
She’s my prey, but more than that, she’s my world. I’ll never let her go.
I stay with her until her shift ends. When she shuts herself in her room, I approach her guards.
It’s the same thing every day. They know what I’m going to demand before I open my mouth.
“We’ll call you if she leaves or receives visitors,” Stanley says.
I can storm in there, but she’ll tell me the same thing she told Leo last week.
Find your way back to Monty. Talk to someone about your childhood abuse. Then come back to me.
If I want to fix it, the problem isn’t in that room. It’s out there with Leo and Monty.
With great effort, I turn away and leave the hospital.
Monty is waiting when I step outside, his presence as commanding as ever.
He stands in the parking lot beside my motorcycle, cutting an imposing silhouette against the setting sun. But as I draw nearer, I see the unraveling.
His suit hangs in disarray, the once-immaculate fabric now rumpled and creased. His shirt is untucked, and his tie hangs loose around his neck. His hair looks finger-raked to hell, wild strands falling over his forehead.
His love for Frankie gouges new wrinkles on his face. Dark bruises shadow his eyes. Whiskers dust his chiseled jawline.
He misses her ruinously. It permeates from his very being.
But those arctic blue eyes haven’t lost their sharpness. They meet mine, and I nod in acknowledgment.
We may not always see eye to eye, but we have a common goal—to protect Frankie.
“How is she?” he asks, his voice hoarse and controlled.
“Safe.” I delete the final few feet to join him. “I won’t let anything happen to her.”
“Neither will I.” A flicker of something unreadable crosses his face. “Are we going to talk about this?”
“Are you ready to talk about it?”
“No.”
“Do you want to spend the rest of your miserable life without her?”
“That’s out of the question.”
“Then we’re going to fucking talk about it.” I straddle the bike. “Meet me at the distillery.”
51
Monty
—
The chill of drizzling rain soaks through my tailored suit as I step out of the Bugatti, gripping the wrapped picture frame in my hand.
After the conversation with Kody two days ago and the first session with my psychiatrist this morning, my thoughts are swirling up a storm, leaving no corner of my mind untouched.
But I push it all aside and focus on the task ahead.
The seaplane base sits before me, the dock, hangar, and facilities barely visible in the gloomy mist.
Leo’s new venture.
Taking my advice, he decided to start his operation with a float plane service and was able to lease a few old planes to get him going.
It won’t be long before he’s operating tours out of Sitka and making a killing doing it.
Success runs in his blood.
My shoes crunch against the gravel as I weave around the buildings, peering into the windows. My bodyguards arrived in a separate car. I barely notice them as they spread out around me.
I find him in the hangar, busy with a task I can’t quite make out.
“Give us a minute,” I say to his guards and mine.
Everyone steps out, leaving me alone with him.
Standing on a ladder, he drills screws into the eaves. Buckets of water scatter the ground around him. He must be repairing leaks in the metal roof.
He moves with purpose and intensity, his muscles rippling beneath his oil-stained shirt as he works. The sight of him, so absorbed in his task, sends a pang of something—regret, maybe?—through me.
I step out of the rain and approach the ladder. He doesn’t acknowledge me, but I know he senses me.
The tension between us lives and breathes, refusing to be ignored. It’s been two weeks since our confrontation with Frankie, but the anger and hurt still simmer. We haven’t seen each other, and our texts are limited to conversations about Frankie’s security.
I’m here to change that.
“Leo,” I call out.
He doesn’t glance at me, his focus unwavering.
I step closer, the picture frame heavy in my hand.
He continues working, not even a twitch in my direction. That stubborn set of his jaw…it’s fucking maddening. But I understand it. Hell, I feel it, too.