She looked up at me and pleaded for something I wasn’t sure I could give. “I can’t.”
I wiped her tears. “One day, you’re gonna have to.”
“You don’t understand.” Anguish ripped at her features.
A hundred thoughts and emotions went through my brain rapid-fire but only one stuck. The one I knew to be true. “Life is for the livin’.” I stroked her cheek. “And you’re still alive.”
FOR ONE SHOCKED MOMENT SHE didn’t react. Then her arms were around my neck and her lips were on mine. Desperate and rough, she came at me.
My brain shut down, my muscles tensed and I stood there.
Then my hands slammed against her back, I picked her up and I drove my tongue into her mouth. I took what I’d been craving for two torturous days.
Her legs wrapped around my waist and she kissed me so hard, my knees almost buckled. I carried her into the guest room before my brain could kick in and tell me all the reasons why this was a bad fucking idea.
I kicked the door shut then laid her on the bed and came down on top of her. Barely breaking the kiss, I pulled her running tights off and threw them on the floor. I crawled up her body like a starved man and dragged my tongue over every inch in my path. Feathering soft kisses along the pink scar on her thigh, I grabbed the back of her other leg and put it over my shoulder. I licked the flesh of her inner thigh and went for my target. Halfway to her waiting pussy, I froze.
The sun streaming in through the windows fell across her body like a spotlight. Time stopped and dust swirled lazily in the sunbeam, mocking me. I stared at the unmistakable five inch scar just below her bikini line.
And I lost my fucking shit.
I pushed her leg off my shoulder and stood. “Somethin’ you wanna tell me?” I accused.
Confusion clouded her face and she sat up. “Like?” Her arms crossed protectively in front of her.
I was a fucking fool. I thought I knew this girl. I thought I could be myself around her. I thought I knew who the fuck I was giving my heart to. But in that moment, I couldn’t have felt more betrayed if Randy fucking Carter had come back from the grave and fucked her in front of me. “You had a kid with him?”
She scrambled backward.
“Answer me.”
She stumbled off the bed and grabbed her pants.
My fists clenched and my teeth ground together. “You think I wasn’t gonna notice? You were just gonna hide that shit from me? After everythin’ we’ve been through?” It was Leigh, all over again.
“It’s none of your business.”
Un-fucking-believable. “What’s none of my business? That you’re a mother or that you had a hysterectomy? ’Cause those are the only two reasons I can think of for a scar like that.” I spit the last word out.
“Screw you.” Her voice shook.
“You already did that, darlin’. Fucked me real good, I’ll give you that.” Jesus fuck, how could I have been so blind? She’d been lying to me this whole time.
She went for the door but I was quicker. I reached around her and slammed it shut. “I’m not done.” She was gonna come the fuck clean whether she wanted to or not.
“I’m not discussing this with you.” Her whole body trembled but I didn’t care.
“Really,” I bit out, spinning her around. “Then what are we gonna discuss? How I barebacked you and you had every opportunity then to bring up you not bein’ able to get pregnant? ’Cause you didn’t mention it. And most women would’ve. So, I’m placin’ my money on reason number one a twenty-three-year-old has a low transverse incision scar.”
She abruptly turned but not before I saw the utter grief in her eyes.
I forced my voice to go low and matter-of-fact. “Where’s the baby, Nicole?”
She didn’t move. She didn’t breathe. Every ounce of oxygen in the room got sucked into a silent tension so fucking thick, I thought I’d snap.
Just as I opened my mouth to ask again, her shoulders shook with a silent sob.
“He took her,” she barely managed.
Of all the fucking bullshit I thought would come out of her mouth, those three words weren’t even on my radar. “Who took her?”
“Stone.”
A fraction of a second. That was how long it took to register. A nanosecond. A nanosecond I wanted back. An ignorance I wished to hell I still had because I knew what would come next.
I sucked in breath but it didn’t help. My muscles rigid, my teeth grinding, I wanted to throttle her for lying to me and kill Stone. Motherfucking hell, I was going to help her. I was going to find her kid and I was going to do whatever I had to in order to make that happen. She fucking lied to me and I wasn’t walking away. God-fucking-damn it. Like I wasn’t the angriest I’d ever been, I spoke without a trace of emotion. “When did he take her?”