Total pages in book: 96
Estimated words: 88656 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 443(@200wpm)___ 355(@250wpm)___ 296(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 88656 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 443(@200wpm)___ 355(@250wpm)___ 296(@300wpm)
In that moment, with our bodies joined, our faces open, and our hearts exposed, I finally saw the clue that I’d been missing. What I saw was that Kage did want to hurt me. Desperately. He needed to take all of the pain in his heart and unload it on me.
Because he was damaged. I didn’t know exactly what that damage was or just how deep it ran, but it was a big part of who he was. And I had to be willing to accept his pain, and strong enough to take it.
Only then would I ever be able to love him.
Later as we lay together in Kage’s bed, my back spooned against his front, he reached around and toyed with my necklace charm. I smiled dreamily, on the verge of sleep.
He ran his fingertip back and forth across it for a long time before he spoke.
“I want this,” he said, so quietly I almost missed it.
“My necklace?” I asked in a groggy voice.
“No.” He hesitated long enough that I turned over and looked at his face.
“What do you want?”
“This.” He grabbed my necklace again and flipped the Claddagh charm upside down.
My heart got all tingly and warm, and a goofy smile spread across my face. Then, when the reality of what he was asking sank in, I got shy. Bit my lip and looked up at him through my lashes, surprised to discover that I was flirting with him.
It scared me to death, but I wanted it, too.
“Here,” I told him. “You do the honors.”
He untied the rawhide, flipped the necklace over, and tied it back. Then he admired it for a long time, a hint of a smile on his tempting mouth. Eventually, I leaned over and kissed him.
He cleared his throat. “Did you enjoy the show tonight?”
I chuckled. “Show? The Rockettes is a show, Kage. That was a massacre.”
“No, it wasn’t,” he scoffed.
“What? Yes, it was. You totally dominated that guy. And the way you followed my orders… that was ridiculous. I still can’t believe it. You were right, though.” I touched the cut beside his eye, which didn’t seem so bad now that the blood was cleaned up. “I couldn’t stand seeing you get hurt. It tore me up.”
Kage’s expression turned serious. “Jamie, that wasn’t really a fight. That was just a show for you. I couldn’t really do any damage to the guy in the first round, because you wanted him taken out in the second. That meant I couldn’t really get in the zone. I had to keep it together… for you.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, really.” He put his hand to my cheek and ran his thumb across my lip. “As for getting hit, that wasn’t supposed to happen. Not in that fight. But I just couldn’t really get into the zone without tearing him to pieces. I was just playing around killing time, and he landed a lucky shot.”
“Oh, I forgot about the kick. At the beginning of the fight.”
“Now that one was on purpose.”
“What?” I stared at him.
He shrugged. “I let him kick me.”
My mouth went slack in disbelief. “Why would you do that?”
“Because I like it.” He cocked his head to the side and looked me straight in the eyes. “It gets me in the mood.”
I didn’t have a response for that.
He leaned in and kissed me. I kissed him back, but my mind was preoccupied. I reached up to feel my necklace. Ran my fingers across it in the same way Kage had done earlier, feeling the texture, and wondering if I’d ever really get to know the guy who had just been officially declared my soulmate.
21
WHEN Kage and I pulled up in a cab just after noon, there were so many cars outside my family’s house it looked like Thanksgiving. My mother’s and father’s matching white sedans were inside the garage with the door open, my sister’s Mustang sat in the driveway beside what I assumed was her fiancé Chase’s pickup truck. There were two strange SUV’s parked along the road in front of the house.
The most interesting car of the bunch, however, was a little silver VW Cabriolet with a pair of miniature pink pom-poms hanging from the mirror. I had seen that car more times than I could count. It belonged to Layla.
What the hell was my ex-girlfriend doing at my mother’s house?
I didn’t get a chance to warn Kage, who had jumped out of the car and gone around to the trunk to get our luggage, because my parents rushed right out to greet us.
Mom looked good. I supposed I had expected the cancer to have altered her appearance, but she looked just the same as the last time I’d seen her. Maybe even better. Her copper hair glistened in the afternoon sunlight, and her freckles were dark enough that I knew she’d still been outside doing her spring and summer gardening.