Five Weeks (Seven Series #3)(111)

He raked his fingers through his stringy brown hair. “This… Whatever this is. It’s not right. I feel like I’m taking advantage of you. This isn’t how I wanted…”
I blinked a few times and covered my chest. My body felt glued to the wood and it was a Herculean effort to push myself up. I blinked in surprise as Jericho turned around, picking up my oversized white tank top and putting it on.
He folded up the Pink Floyd shirt and stood in front of me, tilting my chin up. “Sexybelle,” he whispered. His eyes studied the shape of my mouth, and then he handed me the shirt. “Put this on for me.”
“Why?”
A sexy grin slid up his face. “So I can take it off again.”
“No.”
His brows knitted. “Why don’t you want to wear this shirt?”
It wasn’t mine anymore.
He wasn’t mine.
His callused fingers stroked along my cheek and he dipped his head low, searching my eyes. “I love you, baby.”
The silence made me feel like the worst kind of villain. Now that all my carnal fire had been extinguished, my brain was starting to kick back into gear, and it always seemed to be in conflict with my heart.
He stroked my cheeks with his thumbs and admired me from the top of my head down to my thighs. “You’re the most beautiful song I’ve ever written.”
“You mean ridden?”
An irritated look flashed in his eyes. “You’re not one of those girls. I want to give you something, but I don’t know if you want it.”
His cheeks flushed, and he bit down on his lower lip. I’d never seen him look so… nervous.
“I don’t know how I feel, Jericho. Not after the other night.”
“What you saw at the house—that wasn’t what you think. I was—”
“I know. You don’t have to explain. She drugged you and it wasn’t your fault. I just got confused all over again. I don’t know how to explain it.”
“Maybe it’s time that you and your wolf start making agreements. I know what your animal wants, Isabelle. It’s you who keeps doubting. You had a good reason to run away from home; no one should treat their sister that way. You ran away from me all those years ago and had good reason; no one should treat a friend that way. But hell, I’m asking you not to run this time. I want to show you how you deserve to be treated.”
I swallowed thickly and looked away.
“My pack won’t treat you like that, Isabelle. I know why you’re scared.”
I brushed my hair away from my face. “Then you can’t ask me to do this. You can’t expect me to not be terrified of something I’ve never known before—afraid that I could trust you and…”
He cupped my cheeks and kissed me softly on the mouth. “I’m not pushing you, because I know it’ll make you run again. I’m not Hawk—I don’t have any dark secrets that I’m keeping from you. Maybe I have secrets, but they’re not the kind that will tear us apart, and I want to share them with you.”
“Yeah? What’s one of your secrets?” I asked in disbelief. Jericho had a dark past, but he wasn’t a dark person.
He leaned in tight. “That I’m going to hunt down the man who tried to drown you and end his life.”
“You’ll never find him. It was dark. Even Wheeler didn’t get a good look.”
“Yeah, he did.”
My brows popped up. “Say again?”
He tipped his head to the side. “Delgado sent a man to collect the goods from Reno and Wheeler. He made the fatal mistake of making a snide remark to Wheeler about how he should have just cut your throat and slaughtered you like a pig. Wheeler tracked him down, and I have his address burned into my memory.”
“You wouldn’t.”
But yes, he would. Never mess with a Shifter whose wolf thirsts for blood.
“You can’t do that, Jericho. They’ll put you in Breed jail for killing a human.”
He licked his lips, and darkness pulsed in his eyes. “As it turns out, he’s not human.”
I covered my face and shook my head. “This has just been a crazy month. I’m sitting naked on top of a dresser in a sleazy motel, having a deep conversation with a guy I’ve spent the last twenty years thinking was in a grave. All these old ghosts are coming back, my ex turned out to be a psychopathic maniac, I had thugs tracking me down, almost died in a hot tub, I’m eating soup out of a plastic container, and I walked in on you passed out with a naked woman. I know it wasn’t your fault; I’m just so confused. And it doesn’t help that I’m in heat!”
Jericho laughed sexily and smoothed out my hair so that it covered my breasts. “Have you ever told someone that you loved them?”