Splinters of You (Retired Sinners MC #1) - Anne Malcom Page 0,98
for locking eyes was as immoveable as the man himself.
But I knew I could be wrong about so many things.
About him, yeah, that was expected.
And then about my reaction to hearing those words. I was so sure I was jaded, broken, and utterly too smart to have any kind of traditional or cliché reaction to a man saying those words to me.
It just turned out maybe I needed to hear those words from someone infinitely more broken than me. Because I was having the totally traditional, cliché, weak at the knees, heart in my throat, kind of reaction.
“I don’t want to,” he continued, saving me, or the moment, from getting too sappy. He let out a rough sigh. I didn’t think such a thing was possible, but everything he did was rough, so it made sense that even breathing was ragged and gruff for him. His eyes finally found mine now. Angry, not tender. Not reverent. “I don’t want to fuckin’ love you, Magnolia. I didn’t want to find you anything to be but a hot piece of ass who’d eventually find her way out of my woods and out of my life.” His eyes softened now. Only a little. A smidge. It could very well be a trick of the light, or at the very least, my own mind trying to trick me into thinking this hard man could turn soft for me.
“But you didn’t,” he murmured. “You surprised me. In many ways. Annoyed the shit out of me in most other ways. But mostly, you scared me. More than anything else in this fuckin’ world. Which, considerin’ my background, is sayin’ something. I’ve lived a life that almost anyone would be scared shitless of. I’ve seen men die. Watched them beg for death because of what was being done to them. Sometimes, what I was doin’ to them. I’ve been close enough to death too many times to fit on two hands. Been locked up. Done things that could’ve had me behind bars for the rest of my life. I’ve known fear. Fear is a taste on my tongue I learned to get used to until it faded like I thought I might not be afraid of anything. Not ’cause I was brave, but ’cause I didn’t give a fuck about anything. Until you. I cared about you so much, you gave me somethin’ to lose.”
The cliché feeling quickly disappeared when the empty, expectant silence swallowed it up. Love was not patient, kind, or selfless. I felt the greed of it. The hunger. I had to say it back. Let it, let him, suck me dry.
But my mouth wouldn’t open. My heart filled up my throat. Panic curdled my stomach.
I didn’t want that.
The responsibility of it.
Of him.
“I don’t think you really know me enough to love me,” I said, edging away from the conversation and him. I picked up the plates, in a gesture unheard of from me, and walked toward the kitchen.
He followed me, I craned my head to watch him and his raised brow; it was almost a playful gesture.
It rattled me. Almost as much as the whole “I love you” thing.
Almost.
The plates landed in the sink with a clunk.
“I’ve seen you almost die. I’ve seen you very fuckin’ alive.” His fingers ghosted over my hip. One finger, that’s it all it took to make me all but melt.
“I’ve seen you pissed off, since that’s your default. I’ve seen you tired. Hurt. Soft. Happy, as far as you can go, at least. I’ve seen how you handle killin’ a man. How you handle livin’ with yourself. I would say I know you.”
It wasn’t the most I’d heard him say in terms of volume, but it sure as shit was in subject matter. The words and the meaning behind them were dense. So heavy, they sank right to the bottom of me, like a kid down a well, never to be seen again, but the bones would always be there, the screams echoing off the walls long after they were gone.
I opened my mouth to argue but he wasn’t done.
“I know you sing in the shower, and that you’re not a good singer, but fuck if I would be okay with hearin’ that every mornin’, night, part of the day when you decide to take one, since you don’t like schedules and seem to love my shower.”
I folded my arms. “I don’t have one.” I didn’t like that I sounded a little bit like a whiny child.