Total pages in book: 118
Estimated words: 108709 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 544(@200wpm)___ 435(@250wpm)___ 362(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 108709 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 544(@200wpm)___ 435(@250wpm)___ 362(@300wpm)
“Not as badly as you are.”
He nods and takes a deep breath. “I’m sorry,” he says a moment later, anguish thick in his tone. “Seeing you hanging from those chains. I let you down, Aria. I should have protected you better. You never should have been brought into this shit, and that’s on me. I should have kept you far from the city. I knew they would come looking for me, but it never occurred to me how much danger I was putting you in. I never thought—”
“Just like how you tell me what happened with Ash wasn’t my fault, this wasn’t yours,” I tell him. “What happened in that restaurant basement, it sucked for both of us, but I don’t want you holding on to guilt for that and beating yourself up over it. I’m okay, and you’re okay. That’s all that matters to me. You’re what matters to me.”
“Aria, I—”
“Riley,” I say, cutting him off, only to watch as his brows furrow and he gives me a curious stare. “I think I’d be okay with you calling me Riley again. I remember everything now. All my memories have been flooding back in, and I don’t . . . I don’t feel as connected to Aria Ashford anymore. She was a placeholder, and now that I know who I am, I want that back.”
He watches me for a moment, a softness in his eyes. “Okay,” he says a moment later. “Riley it is.”
A stupid smile stretches across my lips, and I push up higher on the bed, dropping a kiss to his lips before settling back into his arms, more content than ever before. “Thank you,” I whisper.
“Menace,” he says a moment later, that heaviness creeping back into his tone. “I can’t keep doing this to you. What kind of life is this? Always on the run. Being stolen off the street at gunpoint and tortured in basements. You deserve better than this.”
I shake my head, knowing exactly what he’s doing. It’s not the first time he’s considered sending me back to the life I had built, but while he thinks he might know what’s better for me, he fails to realize just how critical it is to my health to be right by his side.
“I’m not going back to that life, Stone,” I say, sitting up on the bed and holding his stare, making sure he truly hears me. “This right here? This is where I’m meant to be. You are my home, and I’m not walking away from that again. I’d rather have this wild life on the run than any other life I could possibly have on my own. I want to be here. I want to belong to you. You keep saying that you’re too selfish to ever let me go, but have you ever considered that I’m too selfish to even let you try?” I crawl across the bed, the mattress creaking under the shift in my weight as I set myself over him, my lips only a breath away. “I wouldn’t give you up for anything, Stone Blackthorne.”
A low groan rumbles through his chest, and he reaches up, curling his hand around the back of my neck before pulling me down to him, his lips locking onto mine and kissing me deeply. Hunger ripples through me, and I moan into his mouth, needing his touch more than I need the air I breathe.
Stone reaches across the bed and takes my waist, straddling me over his hips until I feel his thick cock grinding against my core, and I suck in a breath as I hastily pull back, breaking our kiss. “We can’t,” I rush out, shaking my head, all too aware of his injuries. “You need to rest.”
“No, Menace. What I need is to be buried inside you,” he murmurs, reaching up and brushing my hair off my face, his soft gaze roaming over my face. “What I need is to be consumed by you. I need to feel you, Riley.”
My tongue rolls over my bottom lip, and without another moment of hesitation, I lean back down toward him, dropping my lips onto his and letting him have exactly what he wants, not daring to hold back. If he wants to be consumed by me, that’s exactly what I’ll give him.
My lips move over his, and I take it slow as my hips gently grind against him.
This is different. It’s not like the hot, tension-filled fuckfest on the floor of the farmhouse. This is slow, sensual, and somehow so much more.
Desire burns through me, and I sit up on his hips as I reach for the buttons of the old plaid button-down that’s like a dress on me. I hold his heavy stare as I slowly pop one button at a time.
My chest heaves as the plaid shirt falls from my shoulders. His fingers brush my waist, taking in the bruises before trailing over the old burn scars.