Total pages in book: 80
Estimated words: 76446 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 382(@200wpm)___ 306(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76446 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 382(@200wpm)___ 306(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
I drove myself out to the bridge Sugar had lost her at, going to the edge, looking over, finding I needed that reassurance. That she could survive the impact, that she could get to a shore.
Now that I knew I hadn't killed her, I couldn't be the reason she met her end.
Once, I hadn't had a choice.
This time, I did.
Or, at least, I hoped I did.
If this was just personal, just a woman getting back at me, I had a feeling Reign would let me play it out. Sure, he'd amp up security. He would make sure nothing like this could ever happen again.
I'd endure a lifetime of ribbing after all was said and done. But no one would demand blood from her.
But if she'd gotten herself mixed up in something, or - worse yet - if she had created something with the intention of coming for what Reign had worked so hard to build, to keep together even in the hardest of times. Well, if that was the case, I had no idea if I could do it.
Save her.
And, fuck, I had to save her.
I owed her that.
After all of this.
After everything I had put her through.
After all the lies and manipulation.
The least I could do was make sure she walked away from it all this time.
Something I hadn't been able to do the last time.
I just walked away from the wreckage.
And her.
In doing so, I had left something vital of myself behind.
Something only she had ever owned.
- PAST -
Roan - 15 years ago
It shouldn't have been so easy.
She was in a foreign country.
I was a complete stranger.
And she was drop-dead-fucking gorgeous.
There was no reason that she should have been an easy target.
I almost didn't recognize her when I had walked through the bank after setting up an account under my new name.
In my head, I had been picturing someone with a good seventy pounds extra on, someone a little uncertain, maybe hesitant to talk to me.
So the reality, a fit woman - maybe even somewhat slight - wearing a pair of tight gray slacks and a white silk tank top, her long shiny hair twisted up at the back of her head, happy, eager even, to talk to me, simply made no sense.
She shouldn't have agreed to leave with me, to go out to eat with me. Not with such little prompting anyway. I had figured it would be weeks of coming in to 'do some banking' before she felt familiar enough with me to leave the premises with me.
But I had underestimated her level of isolation and loneliness. She was dying for conversation, for connection.
That first day, we'd taken a walk in the sunshine. She'd let down her hair, turned her face up to the sky, soaking up the rays while telling me that she'd barely seen the sun in weeks, always being cooped up in the bank.
We'd eaten zhingyalov hats, washed it down with tan - some kind of yogurt drink, talked a bit about why she was in Armenia, why I was - supposedly - in Armenia. On business. Which she didn't ask for me to elaborate on. Because almost no one asked you to elaborate on that, let alone a girl her age who was likely intimidated by the idea of a businessman, and didn't want to sound young and uninformed if she couldn't keep up on a conversation along those lines.
It had been light, easy.
And it had been nearly effortless to get her to agree to meet me the next night for dinner.
"So, do you like Armenia?"
That had been my leading conversation after we placed our orders at the restaurant, her finger tracing anxiously down the sweat on the outside of her water glass.
No alcohol, despite being able to order it. Armenia was a little odd with their drinking age. Over twenty-one was just like the US, but if you were eighteen to twenty, if you were with someone over twenty-one, you could also drink.
I'd ordered a drink.
Because drinking was always a good thing on jobs. It loosened assets up, made them talk more.
And, normally, someone her age, always keen to prove themselves an adult, ordered a drink.
She'd ordered water.
"Honestly, I don't even know," she told me, shrugging her shoulder made bare by the tiny strap of her floral sundress that had slipped off her shoulder. "I spend most of the time in the bank. And I, ah, I don't feel comfortable walking around here at night alone. I mean... nothing against Armenia. I wouldn't do it much at home either. It's just..."
"You want to be safe," I supplied.
"Exactly."
"But you're staying here with someone..."
"My uncle and aunt, yes. But my uncle... he works a lot. My aunt, well, I don't know what she does. But she's not home often either. So I end up coming home and talking to the staff. They tell me all these great places to go, but I just... haven't been."