Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 67905 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 340(@200wpm)___ 272(@250wpm)___ 226(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 67905 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 340(@200wpm)___ 272(@250wpm)___ 226(@300wpm)
I swallowed the bite of disappointment. “Do you ever think about leaving?”
“No.”
“You’re rich enough—”
“My wealth is my business.”
“I didn’t mean to offend you.”
“I’m not changing my life for anyone. If you want to be in it, you have to accept me as I am. I’m the fucking Skull King. Period.”
I loved the soft version of Theo, when he was kind and gentle, his voice almost like a whisper. Then this version came out, the man who laid down the law like I was a soldier who was expected to follow orders. “You don’t want children?”
“No.”
“You might change your mind—”
“No.”
“You may want other things later in life.”
“There is no later in life, sweetheart. I’ll probably be dead in the next ten years.”
“Why?”
“Why?” he asked. “Because I’m not arrogant enough to assume I’m invincible. At some point, there will always be someone smarter and stronger to replace you. It may be one of my own men. It may be an outside opponent. I don’t fucking know. But I won’t die in a rocking chair in front of the TV. It’ll be a bullet to the head or a knife to the throat. And if I’m really fucking lucky, it’ll be quick.”
“If that’s how your life is going to end, then why do you stay? Why do you do this job?” Was there a paycheck big enough to make it worthwhile? “It’s not the money, because you already have enough of it. So what is the reason?”
He stared at me with that silently hostile expression.
I waited for more. Hoped for more.
“Because I don’t have anything else.” His voice didn’t falter. His tone didn’t change. But the words were packed with so much sorrow. “This job and my life have become one. I’m nothing without it.”
“That’s not true, Theo. You have Axel.”
“And Axel has a wife and two kids. He has his own family now.”
“You could have that too, Theo.” I’d be happy to have that with you.
“And as I already said before—” he spoke with restraint, like his patience had officially expired “—I don’t want to go through that.”
“I don’t understand how a man so brave can be so scared.” Too scared to live.
He looked away and took a moment. His eyes were still and he didn’t blink, his mind elsewhere. His attention eventually came back to me. “I said I would try, and that’s the most I can offer you. I’ll try to have a different perspective. I’ll try to move on from the past. I’ll try to be more like Axel. But with nearly guaranteed certainty I’ll walk away.”
“With nearly guaranteed certainty, not complete certainty.”
“The gap between the two is minuscule, sweetheart.”
“But it’s there,” I said. “There’s a chance.”
With a body rigid like a stone gargoyle, he stared.
I didn’t take my chance with Theo when I should have. I bet on the wrong horse and lost my life savings at the track. I wouldn’t make that mistake again. I wouldn’t date normal guys and wish they were Theo. I wouldn’t force my heart on someone unworthy, when there was only one man who had earned it. “And any chance with you is worth taking—no matter how minuscule it is.”