Page 114 of Forged in the Fire
Calm for the first time since she’d come here.
A cascade of brunette locks streaked with golds and reds strewn over my pillow.
Only a simmer of that explosive energy emitted from her soft, sensuous flesh.
One side of her face was barely visible where she was curled on her side, that delicious body barely covered by the thin sheet that was only pulled up low on her waist.
Woman wearing a lacy camisole. A riot sent to rock my mind and to decimate my senses.
She was a test.
She had to be.
One that seemed futile and impossible to pass as I kicked off my boots and peeled myself out of my jeans and tee.
I needed to plant my ass on the couch. Or better yet, at one of the empty rooms at the clubhouse.
But no.
I crawled in beside her like a thief intending on stealing what he could never afford.
Heat radiated from her soft skin, and I swore I could feel her spirit crawling the walls of the room.
I forced myself to keep to my side. Eyes on the ceiling.
Should have known they were going to drift.
I shifted my head so I was staring at her through the shadows.
Stared at the distinct lines of her face. Watched her eyes flutter beneath her lids.
I reached out and traced my fingertips down her cheek. Voice the scrape of a murmur. “I won’t let anyone hurt you. I won’t fail you like I failed everyone else.”
TWENTY-ONE
SILAS
TWELVE YEARS OLD
“Stop bein’such a little pussy and do it. It’s about time you learned to be a little more like your old man.”
Silas’s father looked across at him from where he sat in the driver’s seat of his beat-up pickup truck. Grinning that disgusting smile that drove into Silas like rusted nails.
He hated it.
He hated what his stomach felt like as he sat on the passenger side, one hand hanging onto the door handle like it might be able to stop him from having to unlatch it.
His molars ground so hard it was giving him a headache as he warred with what to do.
His momma would be so disappointed in him if she knew what his dad was putting him up to. He knew it was wrong all the way down to his bones.
“I don’t want to,” he finally mustered up the courage to say.
His dad laughed a boisterous sound like he thought it was hysterical before the back of his hand came out and cracked at the side of Silas’s mouth.
Silas flinched hard with the impact. A splutter of pain and the taste of blood.
He shouldn’t have been caught off guard. He should have known exactly what would be coming for him if he disobeyed his father.
