Page 68 of Ryder
He smirked, but he was looking at her again instead of me.
“I’m not claiming her. At least, not right now, anyway, but I’m not ruling it out, either.”
“She not into it?”
He shrugged a shoulder. “She came here a prisoner, so at this point, I don’t think she’s sure what she wants.”
“Besides your dick?”
“Watch it, asshole.” He jabbed a finger in my direction. “That’s not your business, just like you said.”
I glanced at the women again, letting a sly smirk cross my face.
“I mean, doesn’t it bother you though, that I apparently hit on her first?”
He lunged out of his seat, his fingers closing around my throat.
“You got a fucking death wish, dickhead?”
I didn’t move or try to loosen his grip, still smirking at him.
“Nah… just helping you work out how you feel, Pres. You know she’s your old lady. You just need to make it official.”
He shoved me away as he sat back down, and I cleared my throat against the phantom feeling of his fingers still wrapped around it.
“Listen asshole, stay out of shit you don’t understand, okay? Now… about the lady inyourbed.”
“She’s mine,”I muttered instantly, a wave of confusion following the words. I knew she was, but it still shocked me that I felt that way.
“Uh huh… so you can trust a woman who’s ridden more unwilling cocks than you’ve had hot dinners?”
It was my turn to curse and lunge at him, but he just sat back and chuckled smugly.
“Yeah, you’re right.This is fun.”
Prick. I sat back down. “I don’t understand it, but I know she’s mine, and I’ve think I’ve known that since I realised what she’d done to me.”
“That’s even more messed up than anything I just said,” he pointed out, grimacing at the coffee I’d made for him.
“What is this shit? Did you even add the fucking coffee?”
I forgot that he preferred to drink pure sludge, so I pointed at the kitchen.
“You know where everything is, if you want to drink tar.”
He grunted, getting up and going to make another drink, and I took that time to calm myself down, and think about exactly what was going on here.
The woman in my bed had been brutalised by a cruel, evil man, and the only reason we were there to rescue her at all was because we were trying to take her prisoner ourselves. Because I’d wanted retribution, for what she’d done to me.
Had the mafia guy’s attack on her undone what happened to me? No, but did it change what I thought about that? Yes, of course. It’s one thing to be used for sex, without it actually doing you any harm, the way I was. It’s quite another to be awake, aware, and screaming for help, while someone violates your body, and tortures you.
Everything else had become unimportant, because now I had a woman to take care of, and the main thing was… I really wanted to. I wanted to be the one who coaxed her through every stage of her sorrow, and grief, and pain. I wanted to be the one she saw as a light at the end of the tunnel she was currently trapped in. I wanted to be the one she was pleased to wake up beside for the rest of her life. I wanted her to be my partner in my life.I wanted her to be mine.
By the time Reacher sat down, with a tar-coloured cup of sludge, I fixed him with a firm glare.
“I’m claiming her.”
He groaned, shaking his head slowly at me.
