Page 48 of Equilibrium
I almost moaned with that first bite, all the ingredients meshing together, hitting my taste buds.
“So, in order to keep you happy, I just need to give you food and all of my problems will be solved?” He chuckled.
“Shut up,” I said around the burger, but what he didn’t see was the little smile that followed. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad.
This world was filledwith both saints and sinners, and we all knew which category I fell into. It wasn’t like I had much choice, considering the way my life rolled out. And I never wanted to be anything else but a sinner—at least I was an honest one—but for her, I wanted to be a saint.
A saint that could fuck her like a devil and then kiss those scars that made her who she was now.
Unfortunately, all the fucking and all the kissing would have to stop for the time being, because I refused to start this relationship based on more lies. I just needed more time to fix this whole mess and then I could tell her.
I could tell her about the demons sitting in the corner of my room every time the lights turned off, or the ones that stared at me every time I closed my eyes. I would tell her everything but only if she stayed.
Women were a passing entertainment for me, and while I admired them and the strength they possessed, I never saw myself with one of them for the rest of my life. Until her. Until this wildfire walked toward me from across that street, brave and reckless, looked me in the eye and almost brought me to my knees.
I had a feeling that she thought I was joking when I told her she was going to be my queen, but I wasn’t. In that moment, looking at her, feeling as if somebody could finally see me, I just knew—she was going to be mine in one way or another.
So here we were, me staring at her pouty pink lips while she chewed the last pieces of the burger I bought, humming a tune I have never heard before and occasionally flickering her eyes to me. Women like Ophelia rarely came without a shitload of baggage with them, but I was ready to fight. I was born to fight, and even if it took months or years to show her what she could have, I was going to do it.
But you don’t have years to show her, you idiot. You have a time limit now.
Fuck. I did have a time limit. But I didn’t want to force her to stay with me. I didn’t want to be just another person that took away her choice. If she didn’t want to stay, I had no idea how I was going to let her go. I never wanted to wake up without her body wrapped around mine and her hair tickling my face. This morning when I finally realized where I was, two things came to my mind.
I didn’t have any nightmares last night.
And, she was clinging to me like she didn’t want to let go. Even in her sleep she clung to me, and if that didn’t tell me that there was something from her side as well, I don’t know what would. I just needed more time to figure this shit out.
She needed more time to heal, and not just physically, but mentally. Seeing her battered and bruised, seeing her sad, it made the monster inside of me plot the demise of all those that ever hurt her. But I knew that she would have my balls for breakfast if I ever thought of treating her like some damsel in distress.
She wasn’t one.
“I’m done,” she announced with a smile on her face, crumbling the wrapper of the burger in her left hand. As soon as we got back home, I was going to call our doctor to have a look at her. She put on a brave front, but if anyone knew what faking it looked like, it was me. And while she was good at it, she couldn’t hide the torment sneaking behind those ocean eyes. No, she couldn’t hide it from me, not at all.
“Is there mustard on my face?”
I almost shook my head, lost in the thoughts of everything that was still standing between us. “What?”
“Well, you keep staring at me like there’s something on my fucking face.” She started wiping around her mouth, her thumb caressing the skin I wanted to touch. “So, is there?”
“No.” I chuckled. “No mustard or any other condiments that might have slipped while you inhaled that burger.”
“I was hungry, asshole.” Her face was serious, but the tone of her voice turned playful, which was something I now heard for the first time. If my calculations were correct, all this time, all these years, she’d been running away from one monster or another, only to land with the third one—the Albanians.
When they approached me and offered a generous sum of money, I couldn’t exactly refuse it. All I had to do was help out their girl to execute Kieran Nightingale, heir of Logan Nightingale. After what they did to us in Las Vegas, I almost accepted the offer without even taking the money. But then she showed up, and everything basically fell into the water.
What I wanted to know was, why she never came to Santa Monica? Why didn’t she look for me? After that day on the cliffs, I promised to help her and Ava. She knew who I was, that I was sure of. Then why? I hated that I had more questions than answers, and that never fucking happened. If Indigo and Atlas saw me now, they would be laughing their asses off. For the first time in my life, I had to learn how to be patient.
Because I knew, I just fucking knew that pushing her wouldn’t bring anything but more resistance.
Her skin glowed underneath the fairy lights hanging above our heads, while the wind played with her hair. There was something carnal in the way I was feeling, but I wasn’t going to question whatever this was.
Our previous president, Trey, who was almost like a father to me, told me something I would never forget.Once you find the one, boy, never let her go. It doesn’t matter what stands in your path, kill them all if you have to, but never let her go.
I laughed it off at that time, thinking that “the one” didn’t exist for me. How could she when all I ever knew in my life was violence and endless nightmares? But then she waltzed into my life, and it was like being doused in heavenly fire when her eyes first connected with mine.
I wanted to give her the whole world because she made mine better. Their whispers weren’t surrounding me whenever she was around. I could breathe, I could believe in a better future where not everything was so dark. I always had a label stuck to me. To some, I was a boy that grew up on the wrong side of the tracks. To others, I was the monster their darkest nightmares were filled with.
But when she looked at me, none of those things mattered, because she didn’t show fear and she didn’t show pity. I just hoped it would stay the same once I told her the truth.
