Total pages in book: 137
Estimated words: 138683 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 693(@200wpm)___ 555(@250wpm)___ 462(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 138683 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 693(@200wpm)___ 555(@250wpm)___ 462(@300wpm)
One who would never spark a flame or incite a riot of wings in my belly.
But tonight, I couldn’t fall into that safe haven. Couldn’t settle into the fantasy when I could feel the torment of Milo, who roamed the cabin as if he were lost.
Today had been brutal.
Beautifully brutal.
It had opened my eyes wide to what he was going through. The fight he was up against, and what he was fighting for.
He’d been quiet on the ride home.
Quieter still once we’d gotten here.
He’d been the same way after last week’s visit, but I didn’t think there was a way to understand the full magnitude of what it meant until I’d witnessed it for myself.
The joy.
The love.
The hurt.
The pain.
The harsh hatred from his ex-mother-in-law that’d had me biting my tongue so hard I’d actually made myself bleed.
But the urge to get in her face and demand she look at the damage she was causing had been close to overwhelming.
How she wasn’t only hurting Milo, but her grandchildren, too.
But going all fiery friend on her ass wouldn’t help things.
It’d only make it worse.
I doubted there was anything I could say that would make her change her mind.
The second we’d gotten home, Milo had headed directly outside and begun to work on the treehouse.
I hadn’t followed him because I’d known he needed space.
Time alone to process.
To mourn.
And I solemnly swore that I’d made a real, valiant attempt at not sneaking peeks.
But I’d worried about him.
Truly.
Not that it’d helped the sticky situation when he had to go and peel the shirt from his body when he’d gotten hot and sweaty.
Hot was the keyword here.
Like, how on all things holy could one man be so spicy?
One glance and I caught fire.
It was like the man had become written code in every fantasy that had ever sprouted in my mind. Had become every hero in every book. Every image of what I ultimately wanted.
But tonight?
It’d been more than just the attraction that burned between us.
It was riddled with the harsh desperation that had surrounded his being while he’d worked on the treehouse.
As if his mind had strayed to faraway places while determination had strengthened his movements. He’d stayed out there until long after the sun had set, and my name had been a bare grunt of goodnight as he’d passed through the house to take a shower an hour ago.
I’d retreated to my room, but now, I could feel him moving around the cabin.
That energy potent and provocative.
My care for him too much.
When I couldn’t handle it any longer, I slipped out of bed, keeping my movements quiet as I moved to the door, quieter still as I cracked it open and tiptoed out like some kind of creepy stalker.
I slipped out to the squared archway, and I hung on to the edge of it as I peered out.
My breaths turned shallow.
The only lights on in the cabin glowed from beneath the top cabinets in the kitchen. It was just enough to illuminate the severity of his profile from where he stood at the kitchen sink, though he wasn’t doing anything except staring out the window.
He’d showered, his black hair damp and rumpled, and he wore a fresh white tee that hugged the massive width of his shoulders.
Muscles bulged from his back and arms.
Heck, his entire body was this hulking, monstrous thing.
Every inch of him bristled with strength.
The man was pure, masculine poetry.
A shock to my senses.
Bottled mayhem.
Beautiful Beast.
My lips burned with the memory he’d imprinted there this afternoon when he’d kissed me, and my insides quaked with the way it’d felt to be his for a moment, even when being his was nothing but a farce.
And I guessed it was the reason I felt frozen where I stood. Because I didn’t know how to hide it any longer. What I really felt for him. I hated that it’d come to feel like some kind of dirty secret.
“What are you doin’ over there, Little Dove?”
A buzz slipped down my spine at the sound of his grumbly voice, with the fact that he felt me from across the room.
I stuffed the attraction down because this shouldn’t be about my crush. Slipping out from behind my hiding place, I wrung my hands and whispered, “I wanted to make sure you were okay.”
He shifted a fraction to look at me.
It sent a ripple of his intensity vibrating through the dense air. I almost stumbled into it, but I kept moving closer.
The way his eyes devoured me from across the space was enough to set me aflame.
In an instant, I was burning up.
“It must be becoming apparent that I’m not in the best frame of mind on Sunday evenings.”
I rounded the end of the island and came to stand directly across from him just as he turned to face me. He crossed those massive arms over his chest as he leaned against the countertop.