Page 103 of This Wild Heart

His eyes flared, and his gaze locked in on my room. “Why?”

I sighed. “We have a shared drive from training camp pictures, and … I just had one from last year pop up. I’m sure he got the notification too.”

The phone was still ringing, and it made my insides rattle dangerously. Partially because the look on Parker’s face was terrifying.

“And that hurts you?” he asked quietly. “That gives you those explosions?”

“No,” I answered after a beat. “It’s not him, it’s … me. It’s what I did to end up there. What I didn’t do. I’m not blaming myself for his problems, but I still have some accountability in how my own life turns out. How I ended up here, and … I hate thinking about it. Ihateit.”

The admission hung between us, and I desperately wanted to pull it back. Wanted to make it disappear. Admitting your own pride was a particularly bitter thing to say out loud, but he’d set his aside so many times. He’d said the ugly things, the hard things, and not only was he still standing, he was one of the strongest people I knew.

“I hate it,” I said again. “I amnota weak person, and the fact that I stayed with him makes me feel that way, and I don’t know how to make that feeling go away. Everyone will try to tell me it’s fine and they understand and I didn’t do anything wrong, but that doesn’t make it stop.” I stepped closer, allowing my forehead to rest briefly on his chest. “How do I make it go away?”

Parker’s hands ghosted up the line of my back, and I melted briefly into his touch. Then he carefully set me back so he could look down into my face.

His expression was fierce. “I know a good place to start.”

He brushed past me, his crisp, clean scent making my head spin, and for a second, all I could do was stare dumbly at his back as he disappeared.

I blinked. Then rushed after him, grabbing blindly at his shirt to tug him backward. “Hold on, what are you doing?”

It was like trying to slow down a freaking truck with my bare hands. If there was room on the floor, I would’ve taken his ass down so fast.

My phone was in his hand, and the screen illuminated as the ringtone started.

Max Bridges calling.

Parker’s gaze was incendiary, and I couldn’t look away. “Do you trust me?” he asked.

“With my life,” I told him. There was no hesitation, not a single part of me that begged me to slow down or think about how I answered that.

His eyes gleamed, lips hooking up on the side as he brought the phone to his ear.

“Bridges,” he answered pleasantly. “It’s Parker.”

There was a beat of silence on the other end of the phone, then the sound of Max’s spluttering came through. I was standing close enough to Parker that I could hear everything.

“Where’s Anya? I called her, not you.”

Parker’s gaze stayed locked on mine. He never flinched, never wavered. I hardly dared blink. Definitely couldn’t breathe. And my heart, it was lodged smack in the center of my throat.

“Yeah, see, I have a problem with that,” Parker said smoothly. Max started saying something, but Parker interrupted. “Even more, Anya has a problem with that, and even though she doesn’t need me to, that’s the point when I step in. So I’ll just say this once, and I’ll keep my words small so you understand.”

“You fucking?—”

“Oh no, we’re not doing that,” Parker interrupted. “Play nice, Max, and I will too. I don’t really like that you’re calling her.”

“I’m not trying to get her back, you prick. I’m just trying to talk to her.”

I had to clench my teeth at the flare of rage so hot that it felt like it was melting my bones. Parker saw it in my face, a slight narrowing of his eyes. “I’m glad to hear that.” He tilted his chin, the heavy-lidded look in his eye tightening my nipples, and I licked at my suddenly dry lips. “Because you can’t have her back,” he stated. “First and most importantly, because she doesn’t want you, and second, I don’t particularly like sharing things that are mine.”

It was outrageous. Archaic. The overt, chest-thumping display of possession had never appealed to me in my entire life, but hell if I couldn’t feel everyounceof feminism leave my body when he said it.

With the race of my pulse thundering in my ears, I couldn’t hear what Max said.

Parker’s expression hardened, his voice dropping to a low growl. “Stop calling my wife. If I see your name on her phone again, you and I will have a problem. Believe me, you don’t want that. Now … you go enjoy your night because I fucking promise, I’ll be enjoying mine.”

He hung up, and the phone fell onto the nightstand with a loud clatter.

---