His eyes go wide. “It’s your favorite. I thought you might need that right now.”
“You think he’s dead,” I accuse, and my heart is shattering in a million pieces right now. “Oh God, is he dead?”
The front door opens and I whirl around toward the sound, holding my breath, certain Kit is about to walk into the room and tell me Kane is dead. And I don’t think I can survive it. I know I can’t. I can’t do this.
I can’t do this.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Kit steps into view, his jaw set hard, his expression harder.
The floor seems to spin beneath my feet, the room with it, and I can barely breathe. Several familiar men follow Kit, and I hang onto hope, searching for Kane in the mix. One man, two. Three. No Kane.
I don’t know how I ever left him. How I let time with Kane slip away from me. Why I let Pocher, and my badge, get between us. I pushed him away and now I’ve lost him.
Until—wait.
Wait, it can’t be.
But he’s here.
Kane steps into view.
I blink again, and yes. Kane is here.
Suddenly, all those emotions I’ve been battling explode inside me, an eruption of so many feelings. I drink him in with the visual inspection of someone desperate for confirmation, for proof that what they’re seeing is real.
He’s wearing someone else’s sweats and a T-shirt. His skin is angry and blistered, his thick, dark hair in disarray, but even now, even in his present condition, he is Kane Mendez, a man who owns the room, even commands it, just by being present.
There are so many thoughts in my head, fueling more of those emotions until I no longer have the capacity to hold them in. Adrenaline surges through me and I race toward Kane, but I don’t throw my arms around him. I push against him, punch at him. “You asshole,” I hiss. “You didn’t call. You left me here worried and you, Kane, asked me to marry you. You don’t get to die before the damn wedding. Do you understand me?” I try to hit him again.
He catches my wrists and pulls me to him, his dark eyes boring into me. “Lilah,” he says softly, his voice sandpaper rough before he’s cupping my head and kissing the hell out of me. And I don’t care who’s watching. Anger and pain become need and desperation. I kiss the hell out of him, too, and he tastes of salt and dark passion. He tastes like the man I love and can’t lose.
His lips part from mine and he leans down, his mouth against my ear, and says, “I love you, too.”
The proclamation suggests that me punching him and yelling at him was my way of telling him I love him. God, this man understands me more than I do myself sometimes.
Kane closes his hands around mine and motions toward the stairs, where our bedroom is, and I nod my approval.
We’re already walking up the stairs when he rather stiffly, I notice, glances over his shoulder, and spurts off orders to his team in Spanish.
We enter the bedroom and he shuts the door, and I lean against it, blocking the rest of the world from coming in right now. I need this alone time with Kane.
The minute he turns to face me, I press my hand to his face, against his angry skin. “You need a hot bath.”
“That sounds damn good. You have no idea how cold that water was when we went down.”
Just the idea of him in the icy ocean on a snowy night drives home how close he came to dying. “I’ll start the water,” I say, stepping around him and hurrying into the bathroom.
I crank on the water and pour some of my bubble bath in it, which might not be Kane’s style, but nobody can take a bath without bubbles. I turn around to find him leaning on the doorframe, watching me, exhaustion and a hint of pain radiating from him. “You’re hurting.” I hurry toward him. “Are you injured?”
“We landed pretty fucking hard. I feel it.”
“Right. Of course, you do. I’ll get you some Advil.” I rush around him and across the bedroom, into Purgatory where I keep my stock of Advil. I return with a bottle of water from our mini-fridge in the bedroom and the pills. He hasn’t moved.
I step in front of him and hand him the Advil. He accepts it and the water and downs the pills. “Lilah Love. Mother hen. Who would have ever thought it?” he asks.
I take the water from him and set it on a small table against the wall. “I’m different with you.” My mind flashes back to the night I was raped, to me in the shower, blood all over me, and him—Kane—how he handled things. And I condemned him for it. “And you took care of me when—that night.” It’s not something we talk about, and I cut my gaze, ensure the water isn’t too high. Once I know it’s still not where it needs to be, I turn back to him, catching the hem of his shirt. “Let’s get you into the water.” I slide the shirt upward, and he catches it.
“Like I took care of you that night, Lilah?” he challenges, and of course he does. I left him over that night. I left him because he did what he had to do to save my badge. And I was wrong.
“Yes,” I say, without hesitation. “You took care of me. Take your shirt off.”
He looks like he might argue, but he must decide he doesn’t have it in him. He pulls his shirt up and over his head, groaning in the midst of cursing in Spanish.
“Yeah. I’m feeling it,” he says, tossing the shirt away. He stares down at me before he cups my neck and tilts my face to his. “All I could think about when I was in that water was you, Lilah.”
“You knew I’d be pissed if you died, right?” I tease.
“Extremely pissed,” he confirms.
Now I laugh, but it’s not really humorous at all. He could have died. He almost did die. That reality is beneath the surface of our conversation, and we’re both burying it there, at least for now. I tug at his pants. “Undress. You need to be in the hot water.”
He kicks off the sneakers he’s wearing, which are no more his than the clothes are. “Kit brought me clothes,” he replies as if I’ve commented. “He came through for us today, Lilah.”
For us, I think. I’m now more comfortable with “us” than I thought possible.
“He could have communicated better,” I argue, “but I probably won’t kill him since you got home safe.”
He laughs but doesn’t comment. Instead, he strips away what’s left of his clothes, and stiffly climbs into the tub, groaning as he stretches out. “I’ll get you a whiskey,” I say, and before he can reply I’m in the bedroom at the bar, and I can feel myself barely holding it together. I have a flash of my mother in her movie role as Marilyn Monroe, of her beauty and poise. I’m blessed that I can never forget her voice or her smile. I can always watch one of her movies. It’s not enough and I don’t even have that with Kane.
If I lose him, he’s gone.
I’m glad I didn’t kill Pocher tonight. I would have done it hard and fast. That’s too good for him. He needs to suffer.
CHAPTER EIGHT