With Every Breath (Slow Burn #4) - Maya Banks Page 0,102
satisfaction blazed in his eyes.
“Proud of you, baby.”
He reinforced his words of praise by gathering her hands between them and squeezing them and then lacing their fingers together before lowering their joined hands to his lap.
“Before that moment, he’d vilified me and ripped me to shreds and then suddenly he did a complete one-eighty and defended me.”
“Yeah, I heard that,” Wade muttered.
She lowered her gaze to their linked hands, staring at something that seemed so ordinary and yet it was symbolic to her in a way she couldn’t fully explain.
She wasn’t alone.
She had someone to lean on.
She had someone she trusted.
She had someone she . . .
“He’s going to come after you, baby,” Wade said in a grim tone.
“Yeah, I know,” she quietly acknowledged. “But I’ll be ready this time.”
“No, we’ll be ready,” Wade said forcefully. “You will not face this bastard. Not now. Not ever. He shows his face, he’s a dead man. He’s already voiced his wish to disappear and be left in peace, and in doing so, he unwittingly played right into my hands. Because I plan to give him exactly what he asked for. No one will ever find his body. No one will ever know—or care—what happened to him. He will have simply disappeared like he already stated he planned to do.”
It wasn’t as though she hadn’t known of Wade’s intentions. It wasn’t the first time he’d stated his mission. But somehow hearing it now, when Thomas was free and within reach, Eliza was seized with absolute panic and paralyzing fear.
“I don’t want you to do this for me,” she said fiercely, desperation heavy in her voice. “Please don’t do this, Wade. I could never live with myself if you killed a man because of me. For me.”
Wade slowly brought their joined hands up and turned one of hers so it was pressed to his mouth. Then he looked at her, utter gravity etched in every part of his expression.
“You still don’t get it yet, do you Eliza? I fucking love you. You’re mine. There is nothing I wouldn’t do to ensure your safety and happiness and you’ll never be either as long as that bastard breathes.”
All the breath was squeezed painfully from her lungs, and it was physically impossible for her to draw in more air. She stared at him in complete bewilderment, shock splintering and ricocheting up and down her spine. Her lungs burned, her chest was on fire and tears burned like acid at the corners of her eyes.
“You love me?” she whispered in a nearly inaudible voice.
She finally managed to drag in a shuddering ragged breath. She was trembling so hard that her hands shook in Wade’s firm grasp.
He shook his head but his smile was achingly tender. “Do you honestly think I don’t? Do you doubt it? Baby, when this is over and done with and a threat no longer exists to you, you’re marrying me. I’m never letting you go. And I’ll love and protect you and do everything I can to make you happy until I draw my very last breath.”
The tears she’d tried so hard to suppress ran freely down her cheeks in endless streaks as she stared back at him in wonder. In awe. She was so overwhelmed that her throat knotted and closed. She couldn’t have spoken in that moment if her life depended on it.
He loved her. He’d given her the most precious words she’d ever been gifted with. She tried to speak. To say something, anything, but the knot only grew larger until she freed one of her hands from Wade’s hold and held it to the front of her throat, rubbing in an effort to alleviate the aching obstruction.
Hadn’t she battled with herself endlessly over her feelings for Wade? Questioned them. At times, nearly admitting it, as recently as just moments ago when she’d marveled at what she was to Wade. But before she had actually formed the word love Wade had spoken, taking the conversation in a different direction.
How long had it been there? Unrecognized, denied even, yet there all the same. Did it matter when or how long or even why? She couldn’t pinpoint an exact moment she’d fallen in love with Wade. Maybe the seed had been there from the start only to be fought, resented, even feared or perhaps she’d felt undeserving. She’d spent so much of her life believing that she was unworthy of being loved and as a result hadn’t ever allowed herself to love. Self-preservation.