Page 11 of His Savage Vow
Okay, I let that remark slide for now.
“But this is a different kind of business,Constance. Nothing you learned in a college course will prepare you for my world. It will eat an innocent woman like you alive.”
“Then teach me how to bite back,” she snaps as her cheeks redden while her eyes bore into mine.
There it is.
Her fire.
Her fury.
Her raw, beautiful need for vengeance.
And for a second, just one brief moment, I almost reach out and touch her. I restrain myself with more effort than I like to admit. Because if I touch her, I won’t stop. And I need to stay in control.
Instead, I step back, creating some distance between us, and remind myself that this is about justice, and not idiotic desires for a woman I can’t have.
“Meet me in the basement at nine in the morning,” I say.
“What’s in the basement?” she asks.
“The armory. We’ll start your training there. Maybe you’ll work off some of your anger at me in the process.”
She nods once and turns to leave. Just before she walks out, she says, “You should have listened to him,” as if she has to get the last word in, to stab me in the heart one last time.
I stand there, staring at the door, wondering when exactly I started losing control of this situation.
It’s becoming clear that Constance doesn’t want to sit back and watch while I find vengeance for her father’s death.
No, she wants to become a weapon in her own right.
Going around behind my desk, I lower myself back into my chair, staring at the papers she flung across it.
And for the first time tonight, I finally holster my gun.
Because the only person in this house who scares me right now is the reckless woman I just agreed to train.
After Constance leaves my office, I try to go to bed, but I can’t sleep a wink.
Not because of the leak. In my line of work, an occasional betrayal is just the cost of doing business. It’s not even because of the men I might have to kill in the coming days.
I don’t sleep because ofher.
Constance Monroe walked into my house like a storm cloud filled with rumbling fury. Her grief is a weapon, and she knows exactly how to use it. And still, I let her speak to me the way no one else in this city would dare. I let her question me. I let her stay out of guilt.
Was it my failure eating at me worse than before she arrived? Was it the way she looked at me, unafraid, even eager for revenge? Was it the way my robe fell off her shoulder revealing a line of skin that I wanted to taste? I can still see her pale skin and long, dark hair trailing down her back, and the way her hazel eyes catch the light when she glares at me as clearly as if she were standing in front of me.
Wanting her feels like another failure, and I don’t have room for one more.
Those are the thoughts that keep me awake as I give up on sleep and return to my desk, sending out emails and orders from my laptop. I barely notice how much I’ve drunk until I pick up the whiskey decanter from the bar and pour the last dregs into my glass.
Even though the ache behind my eyes worsens, I sit in my office until sunrise, thinking about every word she said.
Because she’s right.
We failed her father.
I failed him.
