Touch of Hate Read Online J.L. Beck, Cassandra Hallman

Categories Genre: Alpha Male, Contemporary, Dark, Forbidden, Mafia, Romance Tags Authors: ,
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Total pages in book: 132
Estimated words: 125465 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 627(@200wpm)___ 502(@250wpm)___ 418(@300wpm)
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Her breath catches, and my heart catches with it.

Only to relax, soothed, when she nods her acceptance.

28

REN

Is it really waking up early if you never went to sleep?

I don’t think I’ve ever anticipated something this much in my entire life.

I should’ve known I’d never get my brain to quiet down long enough for sleep to find me. I’m far too pumped, running on adrenaline and excitement.

It’s enough to hold my angel while she sleeps, though it’s been clear she’s troubled for hours. Every so often, she stirs, sometimes groaning softly as if she’s having a nightmare. All it took was my whispered reassurance of her safety to settle her down again.

I promise. You won’t have any nightmares once this is over.

No matter where life takes us, I’ll make it good for her. She will never regret following her heart to where it led. To my arms, where she has always belonged. The fighting I did with myself, the struggle to hold her at a safe distance, was all a pointless waste of time.

We were meant for each other.

The digital clock on the nightstand counts down the minutes until finally, closing in on four o’clock, there’s no putting off the inevitable any longer. We’re only a handful of miles from the compound, but I’d still rather move out as early as possible to have darkness on our side.

Catching them off guard will give us the best advantage.

Brushing my lips over Scarlet’s ear, I whisper, “Wake up, angel. It’s time to get moving.”

She makes a sleepy noise, groaning softly while stretching like a kitten. “I didn’t know I even fell asleep.”

“You did. You even snored.” I grin. “It’s almost four now.”

One more kiss against her temple before I unwind my arms from around her warm, soft body. What I wouldn’t give to stay in bed, to slowly wake her with my touch, my kiss, until we both end up passing out from exhaustion.

No, not yet. Soon.

River’s counting on me to do this.

I can’t let him down. No matter how enticing the sight of Scarlet’s body is beneath a thin sheet draped suggestively over her bare ass.

The thought of how he’d react if he knew I was wavering even for a second gets me up and out of bed. I go to the bathroom for a quick washup before vacating the room for her. She’s already dressed and has gotten everything in order, the suitcase waiting by the door.

It’s strange the way my heart swells at something so ordinary. Nothing about her wanting to be efficient is inherently special, but I can’t shake the memory of the way she reacted when I suggested needing her today.

She’s afraid. I know it.

She doesn’t have to be—she has me to protect her, and I’d rather lose my life than risk hers. I suppose it’s a human reaction, no matter how it picks at the back of my mind. What do I have to do to gain her complete trust?

I can’t let this shit get in the way. Not now. Focus is the name of the game.

The image of a broken, bleeding, weeping Christian on the floor while I straddled his chest fills my mind.

“Please. No more. I gave you everything you asked for.”

He did—at least that evening when we had our first visit in years. He gave me all the information I needed to make this trip a success.

He could’ve given me more back in the day, though. That was always the problem. Back then, I needed mercy. Understanding. Patience. I was a child in the hands of sadists who convinced themselves they were doing God’s work. There was nothing holy about it.

Desire unfurls in my core, but it isn’t the ever-present desire for the woman now emerging from the bathroom. This time it’s darker. Seething. Hungry.

“Everything ready?” she asks before shoving her feet into her sneakers.

I grunt in affirmation, too deeply entranced by the siren song of sweet revenge. I need it. I deserve to destroy and eliminate every last one of the evil fuckers who took my childhood, my parents, and the years that should’ve been full of happiness and wonder but that were instead full of fear, pain, and distrust.

How long did it take before I could sleep without a light on?

“Your tears are worthless.”

Christian shouted through the locked door to the closet, where he’d shoved me when I wouldn’t comply with one demand or another. The cold, cramped closet where I spent so many hours.

“God doesn’t hear you because he doesn’t hear liars who defy their elders.”

I wonder if God heard him screech when River cut his balls off. I can only smile at the reminder.

A deep breath brings me back to the present, where I wheel the bag down the hall and into the elevator. I doubt anything but a skeleton crew is on duty at this time of the morning, except in the casino on the ground floor.


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