Total pages in book: 58
Estimated words: 56232 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 281(@200wpm)___ 225(@250wpm)___ 187(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 56232 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 281(@200wpm)___ 225(@250wpm)___ 187(@300wpm)
When Colt Walker, a dangerously attractive stranger, gave me his number, I never expected to use it. But in a moment of desperation, I lied about being stalked, not realizing the consequences. Now, his protectiveness is overwhelming, his flirty texts igniting a fire within me.
I’m in over my head. Colt is older, experienced, and exudes an authority I can’t resist. As someone who’s never been with a man, the thought of being with him is both exhilarating and frightening.
Just when I think I can maintain the facade, my past resurfaces, threatening to expose my deception. Colt is right there, promising to protect me at all costs. “I’ll never let anything happen to you. Ever.”
But the truth has a way of coming out. When Colt discovers my lie, will he forgive me, or will it shatter the fragile bond between us?
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
PROLOGUE
Colt
“So this was never about me,” Lexi says, breaking my heart right down the middle. It’s funny—not ha ha, but ironic—because I never had a heart before I met her. “Was it, Colt? Don’t close up on me now.”
She stands at the end of the bed, still looking smoking hot in her lingerie, her curvy body burning with a mixture of lust and rage. Her eyes, one blue and one green, glare at me, but I can see the softness in there, past the shield she keeps up for the rest of the world.
“Well?” she snaps. “You owe me an answer. You know you do.”
I lean back. My head feels like bullets are going off in it, and my heart is thudding. I can hear Shadow whining on the other side of the bedroom door. He’s been so much softer since our angel, Lexi, came into our lives.
“It’s not what you think,” I tell her.
She waves the photo. It’s old and looks worn with time. Lexi’s mismatched eyes glisten. When I stand up to comfort her, she moves around to the other side of the bed, wanting to keep as much space between us as possible.
“You said I was the first woman you ever…”
“You are,” I growl, though neither of us has actually said it. We’re both too closed off for that. Just look at what it took finally to get us together.
“Yet all this time, you were thinking of her.”
She throws the photo onto the bed and turns away, storming from the room. Even now, the hungry beast in me admires her curvy body, her perfect shapeliness. It triggers me deeply and makes me want to grab her, grind against her, and own her again.
I shut down that part of my mind and go after her. In the hallway, she turns, her one-blue-one-green eyes still beautiful despite her mood. “I mean it, Colt. I know I’ve made mistakes. I know I haven’t always told the truth, but just leave me alone!”
She starts picking up her clothes from the floor, where we left them last night during our steaminess. We couldn’t keep our hands off each other. Everything felt perfect then. Everything felt like it was taking its proper shape.
Yet now, it’s all falling apart. It’s not as if I’ve ever been in a situation like this. I don’t know how to handle relationships. I don’t know how to heal rifts like this.
“Lexi—”
“No, Colt. Just… no.”
I think of the first kiss, the gunshots, the lies, the pain, the betrayals, everything that led here. I think of the heat and the closeness and discovering that, just maybe, I don’t have to be such a cold bastard all the time.
All of it rushes through my mind as everything falls apart.
CHAPTER 1
JUST OVER A WEEK EARLIER
Lexi
“Lexy and Lexi,” Ruby says, smiling at me as I rock my niece in my arms. There’s this sort of desperate quality in Ruby’s smile sometimes, like she wants me to be as happy as her ever since she and Luca came out the other side of the mayhem that brought them together.
I do my best to return it—big ear-to-ear grin. I don’t want to ruin her first month with her baby by being a downer. “She’s so pretty,” I say, rocking her gently.
Ruby gave birth a couple of weeks ago, but she still looks like she’s glowing as she sits in the light of her large kitchen window. It makes her cheeks and her hair glisten.
“She takes after her aunt,” Ruby says.
I roll my eyes. “Relax, kid. I’ve never been called pretty and never want to be.”
“Oh, really? What would you prefer?”
Annoyingly, an image of Colt flashes across my thoughts. It’s absolutely insane. I met him once ten months ago. It was before Luca did the right thing and got rid of an evil man who was hurting people. I was going to charge into his frat house with a screwdriver to… What was I going to accomplish, exactly?
Colt appeared from nowhere, this towering stranger with a fierce glint in his eyes and a no-bullshit attitude. He stopped me from making a mistake and woke something up in me. I wish it’d go back to sleep.
“Lexi?” Ruby says, when I zone out, something I’ve been doing too often.
“Maybe capable,” I shrug. “I don’t know.”
When Lexy starts crying, I hand her back to her mom. Ruby begins breastfeeding, a content smile spreading across her face, so much love and happiness bubbling up inside her. This is why I have to be strict about keeping my concerns buried deep down. I refuse to ruin this.
“I’m so happy for you,” I tell her. “You deserve this, Ruby. All of it.”
“We both deserve to be happy,” Ruby says, talking to me but looking down at her little bundle.
“I am happy,” I say stubbornly. “I’ve got a new job. I’m going to get my own place soon. Life’s looking up.”