Total pages in book: 218
Estimated words: 215412 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1077(@200wpm)___ 862(@250wpm)___ 718(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 215412 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1077(@200wpm)___ 862(@250wpm)___ 718(@300wpm)
I’ve known her for all of two days. She needs time. I’ll give her that.
But when she’s ready, I’ll be the one waiting at the cliff’s edge to catch her.
I balance the sketchbook on my thigh, pencil gliding fast and rough across the page. My eyes ache, but sleep isn’t an option. Not with my head where it is. Not with the ghosts crawling up the walls.
Dove went to bed hours ago.
The lamp beside the couch casts a warm puddle of light that doesn’t touch the corners of the room. I keep my head down and my hands moving.
Shapes, lines, graphite… The image forming tonight is a woman with feathered wings stitched shut and her mouth open like she’s screaming, but no sound comes out.
Real subtle, Wolf.
My thoughts keep drifting to places I can’t let them go. Back to the river. Back to the doctor. Back to the woman sleeping upstairs. I grit my teeth and keep drawing.
Sometime around the Witching Hour, the floorboards creak above me.
I pause.
Another creak.
Footsteps.
I set aside the sketchbook and crane my neck toward the sound.
Dove appears on the stairs, floating down them and into the light like a nocturnal hallucination. Same pajama pants and camisole she wore to bed yesterday. That backpack of hers didn’t hold much.
I make a mental note to take her shopping.
Long blue hair falls around her slender arms. Wavy, bright, freshly washed. She looks like a silk trap, all soft and sweet. The kind of soft that makes a man stupid. The kind that makes a man sin.
She doesn’t make a sound as she steps into the room. Her eyes don’t leave mine as she closes the distance slowly, deliberately. She’s made up her mind about something, and I’m the decision.
Without speaking, she slides one leg over me and sinks onto my lap, straddling my hips.
I freeze, hands hovering midair, heart in my throat.
Her thighs clamp around mine. She smells like sleep and feminine soap.
And I’m hard. An instant, full-on chub that she knowingly, painfully traps between our bodies.
“What are you doing?” I ask, voice rough.
Not a twitch in her expression as she reaches for my waistband and starts unbuttoning my pants.
“Wait.” I grip her wrist, trying to catch her gaze.
“Stop talking.” Eyes on her hands, she yanks down my zipper.
This isn’t right. But holy anti-God in fishnets, it feels right.
My breath shortens. I don’t know where to put my hands. I keep them frozen at her sides.
She’s going through something. We haven’t even had a real conversation. She’s hurting. This isn’t how this should go.
“You don’t have to do this,” I whisper. “If this is about something else, something you’re trying not to feel—”
She covers my mouth with her hand, her breath as steady as her gaze.
Then she leans back and yanks off her shirt.
My throat goes dry, and my insides turn molten.
Her nipples are pierced. Of course, they fucking are. Two tiny hoops glint in the pink buds of the prettiest tits I’ve ever seen.
How the hell did I miss those through her top?
Because I was being a gentleman. Because I wasn’t looking. I didn’t let myself.
“Dove.” I choke. “We need to stop.”
“I’m not some simpering virgin.”
“I am. Not the simpering part. The other part.”
She blinks. “You’re a virgin?”
“Shocking, right?”
“Well, yeah.” Her eyebrows climb together. “Jesus. You’ve really only been in civilization for six months?”
“I haven’t lied to you.”
“I thought… I don’t know. A guy with your looks and confidence would’ve banged every woman in Sitka by now.”
“I haven’t. By choice. Mostly.”
“Okay. I can work with that.” She shifts down my thighs, dragging my pants lower.
I can’t move. Can’t breathe. I can only stare.
Her tiny waist dips into curvy hips that make my hands ache to grab her there. And her tits… Lord, take me now. They’re perfect. High and full and so prettily pierced. She’s art. Raw and exquisite and more stunning than anything I could draw.
And I’m an idiot with trembling hands and no idea where to start.
As I reach up to trace the line of her collarbone, she grabs the hem of my shirt and lifts fast.
I forget.
I forget until I see her eyes go wide.
Until the cold air hits my chest. My scars.
“No.” I flinch away, scrambling to shove down my shirt. “Don’t look at me.”
She stills.
I push her off me. Or maybe she slides off on her own. It’s an ugly blur as I curl up, elbows on my knees, hands clutching my shirt tight against me.
Fuck, I’m breathing hard.
Too hard.
“Wolf.” Her voice sounds broken open.
“Don’t,” I snap.
She pulls her camisole back over her head, the movement so slow as if she’s afraid I’ll spook. Then she settles at the far end of the couch, her posture stiff and defensive.
I feel like I’m bleeding inside.
“I wasn’t trying to hurt you.” She picks at the hem of her shirt, eyes on her hands.