Tongue (Ruthless Kings MC #8) - K.L. Savage Page 0,16

guess I have my own strengths, but I haven’t figured them out yet. My insecurities are too strong.

I’m cruel when I need to be, but that’s all I am, and discovering Daphne makes me want to figure out if there is more of me. There has to be, right? I can’t be an empty vessel, and if it’s all I am, then I guess I’ll be living a life away from Daphne. I’ll have to settle for watching her from a distance for the rest of my life.

I won’t be happy about it, but I’m starting to think happiness is something learned, and if my history has proven anything to me, it’s I’m incapable of being taught.

Passing freshly black-painted parking meters, I round the corner of a local barbershop. Hey, maybe they can cut my hair if that’s what Daphne is into. I’ll become whoever she needs me to be, but will she do the same for me?

I tilt my head up and turn my body at the last second to miss running into a guy around my age smoking a joint. “Hey, fucking watching it, guy,” he dares to snap at me.

Right as I’m about to place my gun against his temple and blow his brains out, I catch Daphne up ahead, turning around, and I dip into the alley to hide.

“Fucking freak,” the guy sniffles, scratching his nose with his fingers. His hollow orbs don’t give me another glance, but he has no idea how close I am to shooting him in the chest for disrespecting and challenging me like he did. And he had done it in front of Daphne?

This fucker just made my kill list.

I count to thirty and peek around the edge of the alley and see the fashionable green purse bouncing on her hip as she walks down the sidewalk. Pushing off the wall, I slide my hands in my pockets and follow.

I’m far enough away where I’m not suspicious. I stare at her back, watching her hips sway, and she’s wearing those leggings again. I like them. They hug her ass just right, and all I want to do is watch my fingers sink into the flesh, then my teeth, and then—

“Ow.” I rub my forehead and scowl at the fucking pole I just ran into. “You have no idea who you’re messing with.” I point my finger at it just as an old lady dressed in a purple dress walks by, her chihuahua prancing in a matching sweater. She gasps, placing her laced-gloved hand against her chest and giving me a wide berth. “No, not you, ma’am. The pole.” I chuckle, rubbing the spot on my head.

She hurries away, her little yapper of a dog barking at me. I sneer at the tiny rat, and he whimpers, prancing away on his paws.

Stupid fucking dog. Stupid fucking pole.

Damn it, Daphne!

Panic has me running down the sidewalk when I don’t see her. She’s gone. All I see are trees lining the sidewalk. The roads are clean, unlike the Vegas strip, and there is a blue mailbox on the corner without posters of naked women taped to it. Something out of the corner of my eye has me turning in the other direction.

There she is.

Daphne is climbing the concrete steps to a duplex across the street. I dodge behind a red car when she tenses. Her brown hair blows as the desert wind kicks up a bit of sand, and the grains hiss against the buildings. A circle of sand swirls along the road before laying still as the breeze comes to a halt.

She feels me.

Oh, I feel you too, Daphne.

I watch her through the windows of the car I’m using as a shield, and she disappears inside, closing the door behind her. I’m nowhere near done following her. I can’t rest until I know she’s safe in her bed.

And maybe a little after too. I want to watch her for a little bit. I know how it sounds, but I want to watch her breathe. Knowing someone so beautiful exists is a rarity. She’s like seeing a comet for the first time or a double rainbow, and I have to stare for as long as possible because seeing something so extraordinary only comes around once in a lifetime.

Taking a quick breath, I run across the street and climb up the steps of her duplex. I jiggle the knob in hopes, by some chance, it is unlocked, but it isn’t. That’s fine. I triple check