Heartbeats (Innocent Series Book 5)

by Kendall Duke

  Afterward, we slept. I curled up beside him, cradled in those strong arms, and I don’t know how long we were asleep. I didn’t wake for hours, the room a permanent twilight around us that gave nothing away but the time we’d spent making love, the scent of it in everything, coating our bodies and the sheets. I dreamed about nothing and everything, a star-filled void illuminated by shards of hopeful light, an ocean of sound and energy, and love. Everything felt like love.

  I wasn’t the first to say it, the second time. “I love you,” he whispered, and I realized he’d been awake for a while, watching me.

  “I love you,” I said, rolling towards him. “Forever. This is it, for me.”

  He studied me for a while, thinking. “That’s a big decision,” he finally said, but I just nodded.

  “I’m not afraid of big decisions,” I told him, and reached out to touch his cheek. “Are you?”

  “Not any more,” he whispered, and kissed me again.

  And this time when we made love, it felt like my dream: like infinity, like hope and power and everything. Everything there could be, rendered into the tiny finite moments, the seconds when he kissed me. That was living. This was life.

  And always would be.

  ~~~

  Epilogue

  Jacob

  “Baby?” I ran back to the dressing room, waving to Chase as I burst in; I wanted to see her so badly I didn’t care if I looked foolish. Emily smiled at me and walked out, giving us a minute, which was good, because we’d never been apart this long and I felt a little crazy. “Kayla—” I couldn’t keep the need out of my voice as I knelt next to her and drew her into my arms, burying my face in her hair. She was covered in sweat and glitter, just like that night—the night I fell in love with her.

  “Hey sugar,” she whispered in that husky, southern voice I loved so much. She’d been with the rest of the guys—excepting Dean, the new guy, who was training with me on the job—the entire time, but I hadn’t been able to stop tracking her GPS location. I felt adrift; Kayla was everything to me. I didn’t care that I wasn’t technically her bodyguard any more—this was about a lot more, and I hadn’t been able to relinquish control of her security protocols for longer than an hour or so for almost six months. I just… I loved her so much.

  This was a big step. I’d been out, training Dean on a new client, for almost three days—seventy hours, to be exact. More than enough. I wasn’t sure I could do it again, but I was glad that I had. The business was in demand now; we’d have to train more people soon for lower profile jobs, and that required my attention. In spite of the fact that Kayla and I together would have a hell of a portfolio, my guys depended on this business and I wanted it to succeed. We were good at it. And we liked helping people.

  Now I could concentrate on getting married, and not worry about the rest. “I love you so much,” I said, pulling back to look at her face.

  “Good,” she said in that incredibly sassy way she had. “I deserve it.” I laughed out loud as she grinned at me, then wrapped her arms around my neck. “Jacob… I’m glad the job went well.”

  “Yeah, it was a piece of cake. Dean’s good, he’ll run that unit like a pro.”

  “He is a pro,” she reminded me, cocking an eyebrow. “All of the guys are pros.”

  “Sure,” I said, then narrowed my eyes. “Kayla…”

  “And all of them can do a very good job of watching anyone, any person that might need a little extra help.” In spite of her tone, she looked a little nervous, a little…

  “Kayla?” I studied her, and she bit her lip. “Did something happen?”

  “No,” she said immediately.

  “Are you nervous about the wedding?” I kissed her cheeks. “Baby, I’m sure it’ll be fine, if that’s what you’re worried about—”

  “No, the wedding is going to be fabulous,” she said softly, watching me closely. “I’m just… You take your work very seriously.”

  “Mmm.”

  “And you take us very seriously.”

  “Mmmm.” I managed not to grit my teeth as she gave me another mischievous smile, then looked nervous again.

  “And I want you to know that whoever is with me will do an amazing job. And you don’t need to put your business on hold and stay with me every second of every day.”

  “Okay,” I said, confused. “Are you trying to tell me you need some space?”

  “No! No, baby, I’m sorry, I just…” She thought for a second, her beautiful hair shaking over a shoulder as she considered. “I’m worried you’re about to go all cyborg on me.”

  “What?” I frowned at her.

  “You’re very security oriented,” she said, and bit her lip again. Kayla took a deep breath, and I couldn’t place the expression in her eyes. “And you love very deeply, with everything you have.”

  “Yes.” I did.

  “And when it isn’t just me that you’re guarding, I’m worried that you’re going to go a little… Robocop. Minus the tragedies, and maybe with an X rated ending but not for the same reason at all.”

  “I’m not going to go crazy unless you make me keep guessing what you’re talking about,” I told her, still frowning, then looked into her eyes. “Wait a minute… When it isn’t just you? What are you..?”

  And then Kayla smiled, not with mischief, not with the teasing glance that struck me in my heart and brought me to my knees, not even the gentle adoration that we shared for one another… Not just the happiness from the moment when I’d proposed, but—joy. Sheer, unadulterated joy.

  “Oh my god,” I said, tears coming to my eyes. She nodded, and then I held her, I had to be closer, to pull her into my arms, to tell her how much I loved her. So much. And we sat like that on the floor of her dressing room, laughing and crying and feeling that joy, that hope and happiness, until someone knocked on the door and I knew it was time to mobilize. I pulled her up and held her hand, and we walked out together, the way we would for the rest of our lives, Kayla and I and our child.

  “You’re right though,” I said as we turned the corner, Riley motioning us to move ahead while he cleared the six.

  “About what?”

  “I’m never leaving your side again. You thought the compound was bad, you just wait—” She slapped my arm and I grinned down at her as she listed the reasons I had to be logical, to let her live her life and do what she needed to do, things were different than when she’d hired me, and besides, look at all these new guys, there were like thirty giant dudes on the team who could— “Yeah, no,” I said. “You can pee alone, but that’s it.”

  I was kidding. Kind of.

  Kayla was the strongest, smartest person I’d ever met, ever would meet, and I loved her more than I loved my own life.

  I trusted her. With everything, including my child and the life of the woman I adored, with my own beating heart.

  But I still liked teasing her.

  “Sorry Miss,” I said as she shrieked with delighted irritation. “That’s just the way it’s going to be.” Her beautiful, husky laughter echoed all around us, filling the corridor and spilling out into the night, into the future, the beautiful future we shared, and I let that feeling of joy overtake me as we moved together, out into the world.

  The End

  Kendall Duke’s Innocent Series

  Follow the links and don’t forget to leave a review! I hope you enjoy reading these sweet little books as much as I enjoyed writing them. I’ve included an excerpt from The Virgin and the Hero at the end of this book—check it out and if you like it, follow the link to enjoy the rest of the book on Amazon’s Kindle Unlimited.

  The Virgin and the Hero: A First Time Military Romance

  From the Flames: A First Time Steamy Romance

  The Rookie and the Virgin: A First Time Romance

  Heartbeats: A First Time Military Romance

  The Virgin and the Convict: An Alpha Bad Boy First Time Romance

  Her First Ride: A First Time Cowboy Romance

/>   The Surfer and the Virgin: An Alpha Bady Boy First Time Romance

  The Kissing Game: A Rock Star First Time Romance

  Other books by Kendall Duke:

  The Bodyguard Anthology: An Erotic Russian Alpha Romance Books 1-4

  From The Hero and the Virgin…

  Jordan

  I was starving.

  Cold. Way past hungry. And headed for exhaustion.

  Marcus at the diner remembered me from way back, and he always gave me an extra cup of coffee, even on days when I couldn’t afford more than my regular meal. The mill had me whipped but I was determined to get in some more over-time if it killed me; I was still $400 short of my brother’s hospital bill, and I’d be damned if one more shift was the difference between him getting the help he needed, and not. I could barely see but I pulled my pick-up into the diner’s parking lot and was grateful they stayed open twenty-four seven. I needed to eat something before I went home and fell into bed to work another 18 hour shift.

  The diner opened years before I was born, but Marcus hadn’t bought it from the old owner until I was seventeen, right before I joined the Marines. I remembered when he was just a server himself, still learning how to work the register and terrified of the deep fryer. That was a long time ago now, it felt like, although it’d only been ten years. Ten very, very long years.

  I parked the truck and made my way through the door, listening to the little bell ring over my head and scanning the room automatically. I couldn’t help it; the training never left you. There were three guys sitting at the big round table in the corner being louder than the hour necessitated, but they were young, probably around twenty, and obviously a little drunk. There was another old vet at the counter; we’d served in different wars, obviously, me being at least two decades younger, but we understood one another very well and nodded without speaking. Marcus was in the back; I could hear him rattling around the pots and pans. I sat down at the counter and waited.

  And waited.

  I am a patient man. I have a bad temper, yes, and I’m not known for saying much, particularly anything very clever, but the one virtue anyone would agree I’ve always had, even before the military, is patience. I’ve always been able to wait. And wait. And wait.

  But I was fucking tired. And cold, and hungry. Very hungry.

  Without speaking, I stood up and looked through the plate rack back to the kitchen. Sure enough, there was Marcus, but he looked a little frazzled, as if he’d bitten off a big bite of something that he couldn’t quite swallow. And while he was standing still, looking frazzled, someone else was rattling around in the kitchen making all that racket.

  Great. A new server.

  I sighed and sat back down. Marcus got new people to work the graveyard shift all the time, and they never failed to fail. It was a difficult shift that didn’t promise a lot of tips, just a lot of harassment from the riff-raff that came in drunk or were too taciturn to be polite, like the other vet at the counter and me. I didn’t know his name—didn’t even know his regiment—but we’d been sitting at this counter every once in a while after a late shift for at least a year, since I got back from my second tour. He gave me a knowing look and then returned to his coffee. There was a new twinkle in his eye, though, that gave me pause, and when I finally saw the kitchen door swing open I immediately understood why.

  I didn’t believe in love at first sight—didn’t believe in anything, any more. But when I saw that girl for the first time I knew something was happening to me—love, a heart attack, or maybe God finally had pity on me for all the things that had gone wrong in my life and sent down an angel just to say hello, I don’t know. But something was happening, something big.

  She was only five feet tall, I was sure, and had freckles the color of cinnamon spread out across a dainty nose. Giant brown eyes and copper waves of hair, lips a shade of red I’d seen far too many times in my life but these… These were living, bright and bold. And her shape… She was wearing a uniform that clearly belonged to someone else, as it was a little too big and fell down around her shoulder, revealing a turquoise bra strap that sent my stomach down to my knees. She needed that bra, because her breasts were pushing at the sack of that uniform even though the rest of her was tiny, and her hips were so round I could see them swinging, shifting the whole thing left and right. I tried to stop staring, but I couldn’t. And when she walked right up to me, picked up her pen and looked me straight in the eye, it took almost all of my will to speak words like a normal human and not just sling her over my shoulder and walk out the door.

  “Hi!” She had a voice with a laugh tucked inside of it, as if everything amused her. “What can I get you?”

  I ripped my eyes away from her face and stared down at the menu for a long minute before I was able to answer her question. I thought she might leave, but she didn’t, and when I looked back up she was calmly waiting, that smile still dancing on her full lips. I felt the scrutiny of her eyes but tried to concentrate on my order. “Cup of coffee, black. Whatever soup’s on special. Two sides of bacon.”

  “Okay,” she said, and walked back through the kitchen door, her hips doing a dance of their own across the floor.

  The old vet next to me took a sip of his coffee and the silence between us filled with the unspoken conversation we didn’t need to have. That girl was like a slice of sunshine. A beautiful, sparkling note striking through the blackness.

  But men like us lived in the dark.

  I didn’t need the kind of trouble my heart already wanted to get me in—my cock was first to follow her, of course, standing at attention beneath the counter in a way it just hadn’t since I got back, but I had a funny feeling in my chest, too. I made my decision without having to think about it, though. I would eat my meal, enjoy the view, and leave. Nothing could pull me out of the shadows, and I’d be damned if I dragged someone—anyone, but especially something as beautiful as her—into the dark with me. I had enough on my conscience.

  The old vet knew all that, without either of us having to say it.

  All the same, I could swear he disapproved.

  And fate, it seemed, had similar ideas.

  The rest of Jordan and Jessica’s story is available on Amazon!