Total pages in book: 55
Estimated words: 54899 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 274(@200wpm)___ 220(@250wpm)___ 183(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 54899 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 274(@200wpm)___ 220(@250wpm)___ 183(@300wpm)
But my gaze is locked on him. I yearn for his touch. The invisible chasm that yawns between us is unbearable.
I force myself to remain frozen in place. I won’t reach for him.
He’ll only hurt me again.
I can’t bear any more pain. He ripped down the walls around my heart, and now it’s raw and aching.
I’ve never been more vulnerable.
I’ve never been more alone.
Brandon walks out of the room, each step heavy with finality.
I know he’ll do what’s necessary to save me, but I’m not sure if I’ll ever see him again.
16
KAROLINA
“I’m sorry, Karolina.” Logan apologizes for the third time since Brandon left the estate.
We’ve been sitting in tense silence for over an hour. I’ve been pretending to read a book I selected from the collection in the study, but the history of Yorkshire as it was written in the late nineteenth century doesn’t hold my attention.
“He’s a good guy.” Logan tries again.
“He’s a liar. He stalked me. He manipulated me.”
I can never let myself forget it.
Logan winces. “Okay, that wasn’t cool. He shouldn’t have pretended to be your professor without telling you he’s also Bones. I know he wanted to tell you before your classes started. He got scared. The only thing that’s ever scared him is the prospect of losing you.”
I flinch. “He’s the one who chose to hide away from me. He could’ve told me he survived the gunshot wound. He didn’t have to become an assassin and then create a whole new identity to be with me. I loved him as he was,” I finish with quiet agony.
Logan eyes me warily. “I can’t tell you he’s that same boy you knew in foster care. He’s had to make hard choices. We both did.”
That gets my attention.
I can’t bear any more lies from Brandon, but Logan seems prepared to offer me the truth.
“You know him from the ring?” I ask. “That’s what he told me.”
“Yes. That’s where we met. But I was always better with tech than with my fists. We were both recruited by the pakhan for different reasons.”
My brow furrows. “What’s a pakhan?”
“The head of the Bratva in Chicago. We worked for him. At least, we did for about a year. Then Ragnar—Brandon—went freelance. The boss, Sokolov, was pissed, but Brandon made sure to eliminate the men he sent to punish him for desertion. It didn’t take long for the boss to accept that he’d lost his most skilled enforcer. It wasn’t worth losing more of his people to go after Ragnarök.”
I cringe at the alias, and Logan hurries on. “I owe him everything. He got out, and he helped me escape. He had my back. He protected me from Sokolov’s wrath when I chose to leave his organization, too. I’m a free agent because of Brandon.”
“He said he did it all for me,” I say bitterly. “All that blood money. I don’t want it. He’s made me complicit. Just like when he killed Rich for me.”
Logan shakes his head. “You did nothing wrong. And in my eyes, Brandon didn’t, either. You can’t understand what it was like for us back then. He doesn’t want you to understand it. He wanted to shield you from that, but I fucked it all up with my big mouth.”
“He did plenty to fuck it up all by himself.”
“Can you ever forgive him? It’ll kill him if you can’t. He’d rather die than live without you.”
I rake a hand through my hair. “It’s not about forgiveness. It’s about trust. How can I love him when I don’t trust him? I can’t make myself vulnerable to him again.”
“I get it,” Logan says. “But Brandon would never betray you. He was so determined to be a good enough man for you that he created a whole new face and name. I told him it was crazy, and I said you would accept him if it’s meant to be. I can see now how good you are for him. How good you are together. He’s a different person with you. He’s alive.”
“You don’t know what it means to me that he’s not dead, that I didn’t kill him. But that’s not enough to heal the damage he’s caused.”
“That’s not what I meant. He survived the gunshot wound, but he’s been a dead man walking ever since I’ve known him. The only times he showed any human emotion were in the hours after he talked to you online. But that was just a shadow of how he is now. I’ve never seen him like this. He loves you.”
Longing shudders through me with visceral force. I wish I could surrender to it.
“You don’t know what I’ve been through. He does. He knows how hard it is for me to trust. He did betray me. More deeply than I ever could’ve imagined.”
Logan’s head cants to the side as he studies me. “You didn’t strike me as a coward.”