Total pages in book: 193
Estimated words: 184001 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 920(@200wpm)___ 736(@250wpm)___ 613(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 184001 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 920(@200wpm)___ 736(@250wpm)___ 613(@300wpm)
Guiltily, I guess I still find myself comparing him to Seth sometimes, which only adds to my confusion. Seth was steadfast in his feelings for me, never wavering once. Zeke runs hot and cold and leaves me feeling less secure.
I’d sworn at least a million times in the weeks since the falls that I was done with him, but the moment he looks my way I’m stuck in place wondering if today will be the day he tells me again how he wants to kneel for me like I’m his princess and he’s my knight.
But he never does.
It’s like he gave me a taste of what could be before snatching it all away.
In Zeke’s defense, he did warn me that he wasn’t ready, and silly me, I still hoped for more.
“On the contrary,” I say as I struggle to rise and dust myself off. “I haven’t stopped fantasizing about seriously maiming you since you forced me out here to practice.”
“And yet you still haven’t been able to land a single punch.” I swing on him, and he easily blocks it. “Just as I thought. Pathetic.”
“This is abuse. You’re mean.”
“I’m not your boyfriend right now. I’m your trainer. Now try to hit me.”
I swing on command, once again forgetting to keep my guard up, and Khalil decks me with his gloved hand right between the eyes. The blow is hard enough to send me sprawling out into the grass.
We do this for ten more minutes before I threaten to send my other boyfriend to beat him up. Khalil tosses back his head and laughs as if it is the funniest thing in the world.
“Thoooooorin!” I shout.
It only takes a few seconds before Thorin appears at the door. His gaze is alert even though his rumpled clothing makes it obvious that I woke him from a nap. “What’s up?”
“Oh, nothing. Khalil just told me that he can easily beat you with his eyes closed and one hand tied behind his back.”
A few feet away, I hear a quiet snort, but I’m not brave enough to look Zeke’s way. He clearly has no qualms about looking because I haven’t stopped feeling his eyes on me since Khalil dragged me out here and Zeke followed without a word.
“Really?” Khalil scoffs. “You’re going to sic Thorin on me? That won’t work. I taught him everything he knows.”
“Maybe not everything,” Thorin denies with a roll of his shoulders to show off his power. “I’ve picked up a few things on my own.”
When Khalil narrows his gaze like he wants him to prove it, I grin like I’d just won a prize.
Men are so easy.
“Get him,” I command with a finger pointed at a glowering Khalil. “Show no mercy.”
Thorin hesitates, but we both see the moment he capitulates to my demand. He removes his shirt, and Khalil rolls his eyes before he removes his gloves. I think that maybe he’s refusing until they both square off with narrowed gazes and a calculating look in their eyes that says they know this will be no easy match.
Flouncing over to the porch where Zeke is lazily lounging on the steps as if he doesn’t have a care in the word, I keep my distance—as much as the stairs will allow—and pop a squat a couple of steps below him.
It’s not until the first punch is thrown by Thorin, which Khalil narrowly dodges, that Zeke speaks. “You’re good. You know that?”
I peer over my shoulder with an innocent expression perfected by years of pretending I was someone I wasn’t in order to sell out stadiums. “I don’t know what you mean.”
Zeke nods toward Thorin and Khalil. “You got them to fight so you can get out of training.”
“Maybe.” I shrug. “Can’t prove it.”
He chuckles and then leans forward, bringing his face closer to mine. “I don’t have to, princess.” Reaching out, he fingers a curl. “Or maybe I don’t want to.”
Feeling like he’d reached a flaming hand inside my chest and used it to squeeze my heart, I turn my head away, forcing him to let go of my hair. “You didn’t eat this morning.”
“I ate.”
“But not what I made.”
“You know why I can’t, Aurelia.”
I scoff. “No… I don’t know why.”
I can feel his gaze burning into the side of my face, but I don’t take the bait. Instead, I watch Khalil throw a vicious jab into Thorin’s side before throwing him off of him.
“It feels…intimate.”
“And we’re not intimate? Are you serious? You finger banged me over a waterfall and then spit a lot of game that I was stupid enough to fall for. You’ve been inside me. And yes, I know it wasn’t you you, but it was your dick. You saw me naked. You spanked me with a switch. You…”
“I what?” he challenges when I fall silent.
“Seth ate my ass,” I confess just to be a bitch. Zeke’s eyes flare and then they lower like he’s wishing it had been him. Seeing this, I shake my head and chuckle dryly. “You’re also full of shit.”