Total pages in book: 46
Estimated words: 43367 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 217(@200wpm)___ 173(@250wpm)___ 145(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 43367 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 217(@200wpm)___ 173(@250wpm)___ 145(@300wpm)
The curtain lifts with a full-out gust of wind, and I shiver with the idea that it’s somehow responding to my thoughts. It’s insanity, but then who would even think men could travel in the wind in the first place? How connected to us, through them, is it?
Whatever the case, it’s freaking me out.
I set my computer on the table beside the chair and push to my feet, my sheer white gown settling just above my knees. I intend to shut the door, just slam it, lock it, and be done with it, but Creed is in my mind again so very strongly.
I pull the curtain back and suck in a breath at what I find. He’s sitting on my patio, in a chair, his head low, his shoulders tense. As if he’s holding up the world with no one there to help him. And yet, he ended up here.
On what equals my doorstep.
There’s no way I’m shutting the door now, not with him outside and me inside.
Chapter Twelve
For a moment that stretches into a full minute, I just watch Creed, his head down, his dark hair draping his face, and I can feel his torment, his pain mixed with a swell of womanly need in me that is so beyond understanding I don’t even try. And besides, maybe it’s not so beyond understanding anyway. Maybe he’s just the first man that really speaks to me on such a deep and complete level.
All I know is that he came to me tonight not because he wants me, at least not solely, but rather, because he needs me. He’s alone in this world, battling enemies on all fronts—the perception of him, the fear and judgment attached to who he has become, as well as whatever horrible things he sees with every mission he undertakes.
One of those enemies could be my father, who I’ve spent weeks fearing locked him away.
The man who may well have green-lit creating him.
My relief is that Creed is here and free, not in captivity, but for all I know, he was tricked, he was imprisoned, and he has escaped. Or what if a mission went wrong, and someone is dead?
This very idea drives my urgency to find out what is happening. I don’t bother with a robe. We both know where we’re headed, and I have no intention of sending him a message that I am afraid of that path or him. Illogically perhaps, which defies the woman of science that I am, I am not.
I step outside, and I know he knows I’m here, but he doesn’t look up. Of course, he knows. He’s Creed, after all, almighty in his skills, and Lord knows I’ve heard stories, so many stories these past few weeks, that if believed, would make him more legend than man.
My bare feet carry me over the damp stone that lingers from the storm, and I close the space between us, no hesitation in me as I settle on my knees in front of him, my hands boldly pressing to his knees. The touch is more intimate than the act, and for just a moment, my breath catches in my throat. And still he hasn’t looked at me. “Creed,” I whisper, a plea in my voice for him to look at me. “What happened?”
His gaze lifts and his stare is as dark as I imagine hell might be, darker yet, without the fire. His chiseled jaw sharper than a blade, his voice sandpaper rough, anguished. “I shouldn’t be here.”
“Why?” I ask, but it’s too simple a question for what is obviously a decision filled with conflict for all kinds of reasons, all of which I reject. “If I want you to be here, and I do, and you want to be here, too, why shouldn’t you be here?”
“There are so many ways I might hurt you. You have to know that.”
“But you won’t,” I say, my voice firm with the certainty burying deep inside me and taking root this very moment. “That’s what defines us all. What we can do, what we actually do, what we won’t do. Did something happen?”
“That’s a loaded question, don’t you think?”
He means the serum, I think, and all that followed his “vaccine” that was no vaccine at all. I don’t believe anyone thought it was anything but an experiment.
I push to my feet, using his powerful thighs as my launchpad. “Come inside,” I say firmly, my hand capturing his hand, my fingers lacing with his. I swear that connection tingles a path up my arm and across my chest and yet somehow, I still manage to feel it deep in the pit of my belly.
He just looks at me, but his eyes tell a story, one laden with guilt and armed with nothing but a trillion reasons to leave. Exactly why when he stands, towering over me, I don’t know his intention—be it to stay or go—but the wind whistles and hums, and in its depths, as insane as it might seem, I feel him.