Page 8 of Arrogant Bastard

August twenty-fifth. My birthday. Maybe karma designed it that way so I’ll never forget. But I have a feeling had we met on any other day of the year, that date too would be seared in my memory just as vividly. Just like the days that followed have been.

The guns trembles wildly, and I’m scared I’m going to drop it. My left hand leaves the tree so I can cup my right hand to keep the weapon steady. “Well, you can’t have it. Whatever it is. So do yourself a favor. Turn around and disappear back to wherever you came from.”

“Oh, sweetheart. You know as well as I do that I can’t do that.” There’s a hint of pity in his voice, maybe even regret. But the remaining ninety-nine percent is all cold, steel-hard determination.

A disturbing sensation jerks inside me. Dread? Anticipation? I reject both. “Why not?”

He doesn’t answer. I don’t push him because I don’t really want to know.

“How the hell did you find me?”

He takes another step, and he’s close enough for me to catch the naked resolve gleaming in his eyes. “With great difficulty. But know this, baby. I never stopped looking.”

“I really wish you had.”

A hint of movement as he shakes his head. “No, you don’t. If you did, the safety would be off that gun and I’d be taking my last breath at your feet.”

Dammit. “I’m hoping you see sense and walk away before I’m forced to use it.”

“And I’m hoping you get rid of it so I can take you in my arms and kiss the hell out of you. You have no fucking idea how much I’ve missed tasting those lips, baby. Hell, I’ll even allow you to shoot me if you promise to kiss me first.”

This time a gasp releases itself from my throat. “You can’t be serious—”

“Oh, I am, sweetheart. Deadly. Fucking. Serious.” The raw edge in his tone delivers the inescapable message my brain has been refusing to accept.

Killian Knight is here for me. And neither my gun nor my words are going to sway him from his purpose.

So I take the only option left to me. The one I discarded a couple of minutes ago.

I turn and run.

Predictably, he catches me within five seconds. Predictably, I fight with everything I have. But within one breath and the next, he disarms me, and I’m trapped, my back to his front, against him.

From shoulder to thigh, our bodies are imprinted against each other.

God. His body. His smell. The feel of his steady exhalations against my nape. The electrifying reality of his body against mine is too much to bear. I’m dying.

So I struggle harder. Arms claw. Legs tangle. All in a silent battle because my screams will attract attention I don’t want. I need to get rid of him without drawing attention to myself.

Once a spy, always a spy.

“Stop. I’m much stronger than you. I don’t want to hurt you,” he breathes in my ear.

“Then leave me the hell alone!” I hiss back.

He sighs. “Faith—”

“Jesus. Don’t call me that!” My reaction to the name is visceral. I can’t stand the reminder of the woman I once was. Wife, devoted churchgoer, chairperson of the Little Leaders Fundraising Club. Sundresses and blinding smiles and bouncy chestnut curls and all things nice.

Dying, dying, dying.

The arm clamped around my waist binds me tighter. “I’ve come for you, Faith.”

I can’t stop my trembling or the dangerous rush of forbidden excitement that comes with it. I simply cannot feel like this. “No.”

“Yes.” He whips us both around and presses my body into the nearest tree. The sensation of his hard, muscle-packed body against me sends every atom of my being into fiery free fall. Memories rush to the fore of us like this—in combat training, dancing to the rhythm of a salsa beat in Mexico, and fucking…God, how I loved him taking me like this—and I want to do the unthinkable and weep.

Killian Knight is everything I should’ve run away from the day he walked into my life. Everything I should’ve gotten on my knees and prayed to be delivered from. His brother called him the devil long before I met him. I shouldn’t have laughed at what I thought was gross exaggeration. I should’ve crossed myself and said a few more Hail Marys.

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