Page 130 of Forever Never
There was work to be done. Preparations to be made. Battle plans to be drawn. Because he wasn’t going to let anything scare her, hurt her again. No matter what the cost.
She was sound asleep on her stomach, one hand tucked into his armpit as if she was afraid he’d disappear.
In turn, his palm was splayed over one firm ass cheek, anchoring her to his side.
Her hair spilled out over her bare back onto the ivory pillows like a river of fire.
The wave of possession that crested inside him nearly took him under. Everything was different now. He had work to do. Work that required him to do the impossible—walk away from naked, sleeping Remi.
Which took superhuman effort. Telling himself her safety was more important than his need to hold her for the rest of his goddamn life, Brick quietly climbed out of bed and went in search of his clothes. His underwear were MIA, but he found his jeans and shirt.
After one hit of old, cold coffee and one of mouthwash, he crept back into the room.
“Remi? Baby?” he whispered, stroking his hand over her hair and down her back. Silk on silk.
“Mmm,” she muttered into the pillow.
His lips curved. At least some things remained the same. This new Remi wasn’t a morning person either. He had so many memories of her slinking down the stairs at her parents’, hair disheveled, grunting good morning.
Unable to help himself, he pressed a kiss to her shoulder blade and, when she still didn’t wake, he nipped at her skin.
“Mmm. Brick.”
He’d go to any length to make sure his name was the only one she muttered in her sleep for the rest of her life.
“I have to run an errand,” he said in her ear.
She grunted what sounded like a mournful whine.
“Be here when I get back,” he ordered.
“Mmph,” was her only response.
He indulged himself and brushed that long curtain of hair off her back so he could kiss her neck. “Go back to sleep, baby doll.”
He fussed over the sheets and blanket for another minute before dragging himself out of the cottage and locking the door behind him.
He locked the gate, too, and hunched his shoulders against the wind that whipped off the lake. The low-hanging clouds, an off-gray color, melded with frozen waters. But in his gut, a coal burned bright and hot. Hate for a man he’d never met. Rage for the careless disregard of something so precious. The idea of living in a world without her was unthinkable.
* * *
It was a dehydrated,thoroughly wrung-out Brick who burst into his boss’s office ten minutes later.
“Well, good morning to you,” Chief Ford said, glancing up from a stack of reports and eyeing his rumpled appearance.
“Got a minute?” he asked.
“Isn’t this your day off?”
“It is. But there’s a problem.”
“Sit,” she said, gesturing toward the chair in front of her desk.
He closed the door behind him, removed his hat, and sat.
“This must be serious,” she observed.
He crossed an ankle over his knee and tried not to look like a man who had just fucked the boss’s daughter. “I’ve got reason to believe someone on the island is in trouble. Serious trouble.”
