Page 6 of The Rogue's Princess

I would never take advantage of a vulnerable woman, but even looking at Matt’s daughter lustfully feels beyond disrespectful. My body disagrees, however, and I can’t seem to get it under control. My erection is still throbbing with desire.

It’s confusing just how much my heart is at war with my head.

Even so, there is no stopping the protective feeling that rises in my chest. The need to take her in my arms and warm her chilled bones, feed her, then kiss all her tears away before tucking her in my bed is all-encompassing.

I want to protect her from everything and everyone.

I have no doubt in my mind that Mila is in trouble, and with anyone else, I would’ve kept my distance. I have been retired from the fighting scene for nearly five years, but for Mila, I wantto rage and punish whoever put that sadness and fear in those pretty eyes.

Mine!

“Let’s get you out of here,” I say, slipping my arms under her knees. She gasps, and her eyes widen in shock when I lift her into my arms, but I am not about to let her walk out of here barefoot again.

“Where are we going?” she asks, her wide brown eyes regarding me curiously as I carry her out.

“Somewhere safe.”

Chapter Three

Mila

Gunner hasn’t changed a bit in ten years. He’s just as gorgeous as I remember; the scar that runs the length of his face only adds to his appeal.

Most of my friends back in middle school had crushes on actors or some guy from a boy band, gushing at how cute so and so looked. They would cut out the faces of their favorite celebrity crush from magazines and glue them into their notebooks. Some of them even had massive posters of their favorite bands on their bedroom walls.

Not me, though.

I had a crush on one of my father’s fighters.

It was all innocent, really.

My father was a trainer who’d worked with some of the city’s most promising up and coming fighters in a variety of disciplines. Gunner had been one of them, a boxer and my father’s favorite.

He’d been an angry, twenty-something-year-old boy with a buzz cut, who my father had affectionately called “kiddo,” and he'd looked like he had a vendetta against the whole world. Gunner had trained like he fought the devil himself, and that stuck with me. My father had often praised his dedication and raw talent. My ten-year-old mind had looked at him with such hero worship that my father often teased me about it.

I can’t remember most of my father’s former trainees, but Gunner is a special case. The memory of how angry my father had gotten after learning that his best fighter had been jumped in an apparent mugging is still engraved in my brain. While everyone else had been worried, I remember thinking how badass Gunner looked with that cut on his face.

No, there is just no forgetting Gunner.

What are the chances that I would run into the man so many years later, right when I need someone the most?

That it would be him?

When I ran from my home tonight, I never would have predicted that I’d find myself straddling his bike, letting him take me to his home like one might a stray cat. I would find it comical if I wasn’t trying to keep my cool around the one man who seems to hold so much power over me despite having been apart for so many years.

Gunner feels like my safe place. The only person from my past whose memories don’t hurt me. And with my mother gone, he’s my only link to my late father. Perhaps it’s the love I know my dad had for him that makes me feel so safe in Gunner’s presence.

“Are you comfortable?” Gunner’s deep voice snaps me out of my thoughts. “The bike can be an uncomfortable experience if you’ve never been on one before.”

I look up and my eyes lock on his perfect blue ones, and I am taken aback once again by the fact that he looks the same. Albeit a little older, but he still carries the same cold, blank expression he did back then, and while most people might find it off-putting, it comforts me. It’s consistent and familiar, unlike the rest of my life.

My fingers itch with the need to reach out and touch his scar, to assure myself that I am not dreaming. That I am in fact with the first, and quite honestly, the only man I have ever liked aside from my dad.

Back then, my crush had been innocent, but it solidified in my young mind what I wanted. Even as I grew older, none of the boys ever lived up to the image of Gunner I had built up in my head. None of them had a buzz cut or a badass scar on their face. Their blue eyes did not pierce into my soul.

None of them looked like Gunner or acted like him.

Snap out of it, Mila!

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