by Meghan March
“I don’t believe you.”
“I swear on—”
Slowly, coldly, I repeat, “I don’t care what you swear on. I don’t believe you.”
A flash of something flickers over Kane’s face. I could swear it’s pain, but I don’t care right now. It’s not even a fraction of the torment I’ve been living with the past month.
His jaw ticks as he watches me. “Temperance, please—”
I want to believe him. I want to believe him more than I want to take my next breath, but I can’t be stupid. I can’t be naive. I can’t trust him again so easily.
“You lied to me! Why should I believe a goddamn thing you say? I want proof. Proof of life. Proof that this isn’t just one more elaborate scheme to get me to trust you so you can make a half-million dollars by putting a bullet in the only family I have left.”
Kane’s expression goes blank, then he pulls out a phone and enters a passcode before dialing a number. He taps the command for the call to go to speaker as soon as it starts ringing.
I wait with the most excruciating hope as it rings four times. Just before I give up hope, he answers.
“What the fuck you need? I’m busy.”
“Rafe?” My voice shakes as I say my brother’s name.
“Saxon? What the fuck?” It’s my brother’s voice, his tone sharp, but my faith in believing what I see and hear is shattered.
“I made an executive decision. Your sister needs to know you’re okay.”
Rafe curses before he replies. “Tempe? That you?”
“Yes,” I whisper. I rack my brain to think of a question to ask him that no one else would know the answer to, but Rafe’s tone changes.
“I didn’t want you to find out this way. Saxon shouldn’t have—”
I interrupt him. “How old was I the first time I ate catfish?”
“What?”
“I need to know it’s really you. I don’t trust him.” I glance up at Kane. “I don’t fucking trust anyone anymore.”
“Fuck. I’m sorry, Tempe. So fucking sorry.”
Tears blur my vision, but I refuse to let them fall. “Catfish, Rafe. Answer the fucking question.”
“You hate catfish. You got something else you need to ask before you believe it’s me?”
A ray of hope cuts through the dark skies that have lined my world for a month.
“Where did you hide Daddy’s belt?” I whisper, still scared to trust, but able to let that brightness break through a little more each second.
“I burned it with gas from the extra tank for the boat. Well, I tried, but the metal wouldn’t melt, so I gave the buckle to you, and you made something out of it after you learned to solder.”
I release a ragged breath.
My brother is alive. My entire body starts to shake as my knees give way and I hit the floor. Kane tries to pull me back up, but I bat his hands away.
“You’re alive.” My voice breaks and tears rush down my face. My sobs turn to heaves. “Why the hell would you let me think you were dead? How could you do that to me?”
Kane drops to his knees beside me, but I wrap both arms around my middle, holding myself together as though I fear I’ll shatter any moment.
“I swear we didn’t have a choice,” Rafe says. “We had to keep you safe. It was the only way we knew they’d believe it.”
“Who? Who had to believe it? What are you talking about?”
Kane answers before Rafe can. “The traffickers. We needed them to think Ransom and I were both dead. We had to take the pressure off so we could eliminate them and keep you safe.”
My brain works overtime to comprehend what I’m hearing, piecing together their logic, but it still rips me to shreds when I think of how I’ve been drowning in grief for weeks.
“It was the only way,” Rafe says. “I would never put you through this if it wasn’t the only way. You know that.”
Rationally, I know my brother wouldn’t intentionally cause me pain, but I’m not completely rational yet.
“I could’ve acted. I’m a good actress.”
“I’m so sorry, Tempe. I fucked up.” Rafe sounds just as destroyed as I feel. “I should never have taken the job. Never. I’ll never forgive myself for hurting you.”
“Where are you?” I whisper. When Rafe doesn’t answer, I whip my head toward Kane. “Really? More secrets?”
“It’s safer this way,” my brother says.
“No. No more fucking secrets. I’m done with them. Done with all of it. I deserve to know.”
“Tell her, Ransom.” Kane joins the conversation again.
After a pause, Rafe answers. “I’m hunting down the last threat. Then we can live free and easy again.”
My blood, which was finally simmering rather than boiling, goes ice cold.
“You’re hunting a human trafficker who wanted you dead?” I jerk my chin toward Kane. “Why didn’t you go? You’re the killer for hire.”
Kane’s lips flatten, but Rafe is the one to reply.
“It’s my mess, Tempe. Saxon helped more than I deserved. I started this, and now it’s time for me to end it.”
“Please tell me this isn’t some kind of suicide mission. Please tell me you’re coming back to me. I can’t get you back only to lose you again. Don’t do that to me. Not now.” My voice cracks and another wave of tears trails down my cheeks. I wipe them away, but I can’t help being an emotional basket case right now. I’m entitled after this roller coaster of a month.
“I’m coming back. I swear it on Mama’s grave.”
The ice in my veins warms a few degrees.
“You better mean that, because if anything happens to you, I swear I’ll find you, bring you back to life, and then kill you myself for putting me through hell. You understand me, Rafe Ransom?”
My brother chuckles into the phone. “It’s a deal. I gotta go, Tempe. I’ll be hugging you in person soon. I’m so fucking sorry for all of this. I’ll make it up to you. Don’t be too hard on Saxon. He saved my ass. I’d be dead for real if he hadn’t thought this whole plan up. Love you, girl.”
He ends the call with my echoing I love you hanging in the air.
I push off my feet and stumble toward a wall. Kane’s large form comes toward me, and I wave him off. I’m not ready to deal with him yet.
“I wanted to tell you . . . but this was the only way.”
“Bullshit!” I explode. “It wasn’t the only way.” I drag my gaze up to meet his.
Kane opens his mouth to speak and then closes it again.
“You lied to me. You made me think . . .” I don’t even want to say it again. “How could you do that to me? I’ve been one step up from a corpse for a goddamned month because you couldn’t trust me enough to tell me anything.”
“Temperance—” He steps toward me, and I hold up a hand to keep him back.
“All you had to do was tell me.”
His fists clench at his sides as another stream of tears sneaks down my cheeks.
“It had to look real.”
“Well, fucking great. I’m so glad it looked real for you. And guess what? This is real too. How much I fucking hate you for this is real! How dare you?” I’m shrieking and I don’t care at all. I’ve been through hell, and I told myself I was to blame for every single moment of it. “You made me think I betrayed my brother and got him killed!”
Kane squeezes his eyes shut and dips his chin before drawing in a breath and staring me down. “You can hate me for the rest of your life, and I’d still do it all the same again.”
I suck in a breath. “You fucking—”
He interrupts me with a roar. “Because now, you get to live! That is the only fucking reason I did any of it. For you. Because I love you.”
17
Temperance
The rough brick scrapes my back through my T-shirt as Kane’s booming voice echoes in the cavernous building. He closes the distance between us before I have a chance to process his words.
; Not just words . . . it’s a declaration that carries more power than an atomic bomb. It levels me, burning away all the anger and grief that have ravaged me for every waking minute of every day since I woke up thinking both he and Rafe were dead.
Kane’s palm presses against the wall beside my head as he stares down at me, his nostrils flaring and the vein in his temple throbbing.
“I’m sorry. So fucking sorry. I’d rather take a bullet than watch you cry another goddamned tear.” He reaches out, and rather than slap his hands away like I would have done only moments ago, I let him catch my tears on his thumbs and cup my face. “Please don’t cry.”
“You love me?”
His palm cradles my cheek as he studies my face. “Since the first time I watched you pick up a welding torch and I saw the real you. Not the show you put on for the world.” His eyes shut for a moment before his gaze bores into mine again. “I told myself I could let you go because it’d be safer than trying to keep you with me. That once this whole thing was over and it was safe, I’d leave the choice of what happened next up to you.”
If I thought my emotions were chaotic before, they’re nothing compared to the uprising being staged in my brain by the thunderous beat of my heart.
“You were going to let me go?”
He looks away before replying. “I didn’t think there was any possible way you wouldn’t hate me when this was over. I told myself I’d say good-bye and fade into the shadows, and let you have the life you were meant to have.”
“Without you,” I whisper.
“Yes.”
Kane was right when he said that love and hate are two sides of the same coin. Because even though minutes ago I wanted to kill him, now I can’t imagine what he’s describing—not having him with me.
I’ve already lived through that, and it nearly killed me.
His blue eyes burn with emotion. “You have to know . . . there isn’t a goddamned thing I wouldn’t do to keep you safe. You can hate me if you need to, but that will never change the fact that I love you.”
I let his words soothe the torn pieces of my soul, and breathe in his scent. As much as I want to curl up against him and be thankful he’s back, I need him to promise me something before I can begin to trust him again.
Kane and I lock eyes. “I can’t live with the secrets anymore. I won’t. If you can’t promise me you’ll never lie to me again, I will walk away from you right now and never look back.”
18
Kane
I had a choice, and I made it. I’ll live with the consequences because they were worth it to ensure her safety. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do to keep Temperance safe, and I’ll never apologize for that. For hurting her, absolutely. I’ll never forget the tortured look in her eyes. It’ll haunt me for the rest of my life.
I don’t deserve her forgiveness, but I want it.
I don’t deserve her at all. But that doesn’t stop me from wanting her more than I want my next breath.
Now, I’m so fucking close to having everything I never knew I always wanted and needed in my life, and all I have to do is promise to never lie to her again. I’d rather cut off my own arm than ever see again the kind of pain on her face as when she walked into this warehouse.
I vow to myself right then that I will find a way to protect her without ever putting her through that kind of pain again. I fucked up. I made the wrong decision. I shouldn’t have kept it from her. At the time, it seemed like the safest choice, but after a month without her, I know it was the wrong one.
For the last four weeks, I’ve lived in a hell of my own making. One where I knew she existed, but I couldn’t see her or touch her. One where I couldn’t dare break my silence because there were too many threats against her.
I begged Mount—something I would have sworn I would never do—to protect her like he would protect his own wife. I offered him anything.
It was only after I had his guarantee of her safety that I left town to start hunting down my targets, one by one. Every time I pulled the trigger, I knew I was one step closer to this moment. The moment when I could come back to her.
I told myself even if she hated me and sent me away, I would let her live her life and fade into the background.
But I would never forget this woman who changed everything.
From Mexico to Canada, I eliminated man after man, until the only one who was left was the head of the trafficking operation. The one they called Lagarto. Lizard.
Ransom called dibs on the man who put the price on his head, and I agreed. The motherfucker was wily as shit, leading us both down dead ends to try to find him. Ransom and I agreed I would come back to New Orleans and track him down from here so I could be closer to Temperance if he tried to make a move on her now that his crew was all mysteriously missing. Not a single one of those bodies will ever be found.
He had to know we were coming for him, and we won’t stop until we put a bullet in his head.
That was yesterday.
I’ve been here less than twenty-four hours, and I already had to stop myself from approaching Temperance a handful of times. All I could do is watch as she squared her shoulders and went on with a life that didn’t include me.
It was a new kind of a hell. One I’d never before experienced. And now she wants me to promise I’ll never lie to her, or she walks away.
My answer requires no thought.
“I promise. No more secrets. If I’m trying to protect you, I’ll do it another way.”
I can feel the tension dissipate as her body relaxes against me.
“Thank God,” she whispers.
Before I can reply, Temperance wraps one hand around the back of my head and yanks my lips down to hers.
My only thought mirrors her words.
Thank God.
19
Temperance
Kane locks one arm around my back and cradles my chin, tilting my head to take the kiss deeper.
Yes. This is what I need. Him.
Maybe to reassure myself that he’s really alive.
Maybe to burn away the remains of the pain I felt from losing him.
Maybe because I love him, and living without him was the most hopeless feeling I’ve ever faced.
Whatever the reason, I need it desperately.
Madly.
Violently.
Kane’s hand shifts to my ass, and I dig my nails into his shoulder, moaning into the kiss.
“I missed you so fucking much.” He growls against my mouth as I wrap my leg around his hip and press myself against the growing bulge in his jeans.
“I missed you too.”
He pulls back an inch, his blue eyes blazing. “Even when you hated me?”
“Even then, I still would’ve traded everything I have for one more day with you.”
“Thank fuck.” His fingers tunnel into my hair, gripping, and I revel in the bite of pain because it reminds me that we’re both alive.
I wrap my other leg around him and shimmy up his body until we’re pressed together everywhere that matters.
Crushing my mouth to his, I try to tell him everything without words. That I need him in the most basic way imaginable. That I missed the taste of his kiss. The hard muscles of his body. His capable hands. The careful, yet effortless way he handles me, giving me what I want and need.
He’s the only man who has ever evoked such strong emotions in me. With him, I feel all the extremes. There’s nothing average about what we have.
I should have known from the first night when I couldn’t walk out of that room, even though he was a complete stranger, that this—us—would change my entire life.
Sometimes your body recognizes things before your mind. I don’t know why it took me so long to see it, but now, I’m getting out of my head. I’m following my instincts, and my instincts tell me that regardless of everything that has happened, Kane is mine.
I buck my hips against him, and Kane’s grip tightens. He backs me up to a section of the
stainless-steel workbench I’d scrubbed clean the last time I worked here.
As soon as my ass connects with the flat surface, I release my grip on his neck to yank at the hem of his T-shirt. Kane helps me with one hand until the fabric no longer stands in my way.
I’m not letting anything stand in my way anymore when it comes to Kane, not myself or him.
This is happening. We are happening.
My instincts from before were right—what makes me happy is standing right in front of me.
I marvel at him like I’ve never seen him before. His heavily muscled shoulders, covered in ink that wraps down his arms. The beautiful wings and heart that spread across his chest.
This man, this work of art, loves me.
The realization is still shocking, but I hold it close. I’m never letting the memory of him saying it for the first time fade.
My fingers trail down his hot skin until I reach the button of his worn jeans, but he distracts me by tugging at the T-shirt I’m wearing and pulling it up and over my head.
“Need to see you. Need to feel you. Fucking missed you so goddamn much.” Kane’s voice is raw, and I feel his need in every brush of his fingertips over my skin.
His fingers find the clasp of my bra and free me from it. When he moves in, I press my chest to his, needing the contact. Soaking up his heat.
“I missed you so much.” My words are just as raw as his.
“Never again, princess. Never. Again.”
His vow unleashes a new torrent of need inside me.
“Hurry. Please.”
His gaze snaps to mine. “Only if I get to savor you next time.”
“Deal.”
It’s like someone fired a starting pistol. We both launch into action, tearing at each other’s clothes until I’m naked on the workbench. But I can barely feel the cool metal against my ass because my body is burning like a fever.
As soon as he kicks off his shoes and jeans, he nudges his heavy cock against my slick entrance. “I love you, Temperance. No matter what happens, I will never stop loving you.”