Page 71 of When He Fights
Her eyes widened.Her lips hung open in shock.Surprise.
Horror?
“I could tell you that he was evil.That he’d bombed a hospital.That he’d killed innocents.That he was planning to kill more, and if he’d gotten out, if he’d detonated one final explosion, more than a dozen lives would have ended that day.”A swallow.“I could tell you that he’d sliced me with his knife.Shot me in the back.That we were down to hand-to-hand combat and that every second counted.Life or death.I could tell you all of that, and it would be true, but here is something that is true, too.”A ragged exhale.“I didn’t hesitate.I killed him with my bare hands.I survived.I did whatever was necessary, and it’s not the first time I’ve had to kill.Not the last, either.My government sent me on missions because sometimes, you do work off the books in order to protect the greater good.Sometimes, you take a fucking sledgehammer, and you send him out because that is what has to be done.You see, that’s what I am.Brute force in its most savage and basic form.”
“Kane…”
“You really think I’m going to let Logan Catalano go back in a cage?”The question that he shouldn’t have asked, but they had to stop pretending.The longer they pretended, the more stupid hope he had.But there shouldn’t be hope, not for him.Because she would not want forever with him.She’d had enough of monsters.“Do you really think that I’ll ever risk him getting out and coming after you again?”
He shouldn’t touch her.He shouldn’t.
But he did.
He crept back toward the bed.His hand extended.And he touched her on her side.Through the soft shirt.His hand hovered over the scar that would always mark her.“He should have been dead that night.I let him live because of you.”
“I asked you to stop.”
No, she’dbeggedhim to stop.“You said I wasn’t a killer.”
Her hand covered his as it pressed to her side.“You’re not.Fighting in self-defense doesn’t make you a killer.Fighting so that you can stay alive doesn’t make you a monster.”
“I stopped that night with Logan not because you begged me, but because I didn’t want you to see the truth of what I was.I liked it too much when you looked at me and you said you were falling in love with me.I knew you didn’t love me, of course.Not really.”
She blinked.After a beat, her hand fell away from his.“Of course.”Her voice had gone wooden.
“But I liked it.I liked the way I felt when I stared into your eyes.You looked at me, and…no one had ever quite looked at me the way you did.”You’re still not telling her the full truth.You’re not telling her…
You stopped because you hoped that, deep down, she might really love you one day.That it might be possible.That it might be real.
But if she’d seen him kill, that hope would have died.
The hopewasdying because… “I’m not going to stop, Ana.Logan has to be eliminated.He’s coming after me.He’s coming after Gray.He’s coming after you.”Can’t happen.“I will kill him, and, when I do, you will see me for exactly what I am.”
“Saving someone doesn’t make you a monster!”
Ah, but she hadn’t seen him kill yet, had she?
“I knew I shouldn’t have fucked you,” Kane said.All along, he’d known it would be better to never cross that final line.But he’d wanted her too badly.A bit of heaven to hold close all the days when he would be in hell.
Ana flinched.“Fucked.”A nod.“That’s what it was.Fucking.”Another nod.
The best fucking of my life.“Sometimes, you want something so much that your control breaks.Then you damn the consequences and take what you want.”He was still touching her.His fingers lightly caressing the scar that he hated.
He backed away.Again.“My control is close to breaking with you.”Barely holding on by a weak thread.
“Kane…”
“It’sdangerous,don’t you see that?”Didn’t she understand?“To give a man what he wants so much, but to make him know that he can’t ever really have—” Kane stopped.“You’ll see me for what I am.Because Iwillkill Logan.Those shots fired in the house could have gone through me.They could have hit you.Even as I shoved you to the floor, all I could think was that I was moving too slowly.That I was too late.You were going to die, and if you’d died in my arms…” His hands fisted.“Do you think I would have made his death quick?Or do you think I would have taken my time beating the hell out of him until every bone in his body was broken?”
A faint squeak emerged from Ana.
Nothing else.Just the breathless, squeaky sound of shock.Kane knew he’d stunned her.Hadn’t that been the point?To make Ana afraid…of him.To make her realize that she had to pull back.That she needed to stay the hell away from him.
Fucking rose petals were all around her.Was that some dumbass joke from Gray?
Honeymoon suite, Kane’s ass.He’d never have a honeymoon with Ana.Never have a life with her.Never have the closely kept secret dream of a family with her.
But I will love her until I die.
