Series: The Rossi Crime Family Series by J.L. Beck
Total pages in book: 62
Estimated words: 56905 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 285(@200wpm)___ 228(@250wpm)___ 190(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 56905 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 285(@200wpm)___ 228(@250wpm)___ 190(@300wpm)
He rolls away from me and shamefully I miss his warmth immediately. No sooner than he’s gone he’s back again unlocking the cuffs while lowering my arms down beside me. Once I’m uncuffed he starts to rub my shoulders, massaging the tense muscles with his strong fingers. Holy hell does that feel good. I bite my lip to stifle a moan and instead force myself to feel something other than lust, or love for this asshole.
“Stop that! Stop acting so nice, and stop touching me!” I pull away and sit up, the anger roaring inside me makes me sit up a little too fast, which in turn causes pain to erupt in not only my shoulders but also my ribs, where that bastard got me with the knife. I grit my teeth and suck in a breath, but it does nothing to calm me, not when the air is filled with Luke’s stupid scent.
“You need to take me back to my apartment. You can’t expect me to stay here with you. Have you forgotten about the fact that I greatly dislike you?” I tell him while trying to get up. I grip onto the nightstand to steady myself; my equilibrium is off a bit still.
“Well, for one, your moans of pleasure last night didn’t exactly confirm you greatly disliking me.” He retorts, smirking. “And I’m not expecting you to stay here, but you’re not going back to your apartment either. Did you forget about the dead body in your bedroom? Or that someone tried to kill you last night.”
Ugh, asshole.
Narrowing my eyes, I say, “Then drop me off at the police station.”
Luke gives me a disbelieving look. “Don’t play dumb, you know I can’t do that. We need to leave town. I’ve got something set up for us.”
I’m almost shocked at the balls that he has. Almost.
“We? I’m not going anywhere with you. I have a job here, a life…a good life, one that was perfectly fine until you decided to jump into it again. So, there will be no we in this grand plan of yours. I’m not just leaving, and especially not with you.”
His pale blue eyes grow dark, like the sky with a fast-approaching storm, and a shiver of fear runs down my spine. “I’m not giving you a choice, Grace. I’m telling you. You are coming with me, even if I have to drag you kicking and screaming.” He’s not warning me. He’s not threatening me. He’s telling me what’s going to happen, and I hate it. Hate that he thinks he can just make me go wherever he wants. Who cares if he saved my life? He doesn’t own me.
“I have a boyfriend!” I blurt out, placing my hands on my hips, staring him down with a glacial look. “He’ll call the cops if I don’t meet him for breakfast this morning.” The lie rolls off my tongue so easily that if I didn’t know it wasn’t true, I might even believe it.
Luke, however, doesn’t. The disbelief in his tone evident, as he rolls his eyes. “Is that so? What's his name?”
“George,” I only half lie. I did go out with a guy named George recently. It was only one date and he never called me back, which seems to be happening to me a lot now that I think about it. I shake my head at the thought.
“George. The legal assistant, right? Five-eleven, short brown hair, and glasses?” My mouth literally hangs open at his words. I’m not just shocked, I’m actually kind of afraid of the things he might know. How the hell does he know this?
“Hhh-how do you know that?” I stutter, wanting to smack the stupidly handsome grin off his face.
“You went on one date, that’s hardly considered dating and I highly doubt you are supposed to have breakfast, since I told him if he ever contacted you again I’d break more than just his fingers.”
“You!” I snarl, and walk over to him, pushing a finger into his chest. I crane my head to look up at him, that grin of his growing wider and wider by the second. “You are the reason I never get a second date, aren’t you?”
“Of course I am. You didn’t actually think I was going to let you date anyone, did you? You’re mine, Gracie. I told you that you would be mine forever the night that you gave yourself to me for the first time. I warned you...”
I can still remember that night like it was yesterday…
“I want you to be my forever and I’m warning you, you will be.” Luke whispers against my cheek that night in church. I can feel the heat of his breath against my skin and it makes me shiver. I’ve wanted to give him this part of me for a long time and now it happened. He’s vowed to be my forever. There is no way I can say that what we did was wrong, not when it felt so right, and definitely not when it’s all I can seem to think about.