Page 62 of Lawless in Leather

Raina didn’t say anything for a moment. Her arms tightened around him. “I’m sorry. That sucks. You must have been pretty mad at her.”

It felt like she’d just pitched a fastball straight through his defenses. No one close to him had ever said that to him. Recognized that, tangled up with the grief, there was a healthy dose of Why the hell did you have to go and fuck this up? The therapist he’d seen a few times had. And now Raina. Damn.

“Yeah, I was. Mad that I couldn’t help her. But you can spend a long time being mad about things that will never change. So I had to let her go.”

“And have you?”

She didn’t sound mad or offended. She sounded curious.

He nodded. “She’s gone. I loved her. Part of me will always love her. But she’s gone and I’m still here. And she’d kick my butt if I spent the rest of my life moping.”

Raina laughed. “I think I would have liked her.”

“I think she would have liked you.” He sighed. “I’m over her. But sometimes I get a little…”

“Overprotective?” Raina said. She rolled herself over and pushed up so that she was looking down at him.

“Yeah. Lucas says I want to save the world.”

“You already did that part in the army, didn’t you?”

“I like to think I helped make things better but that’s a hard thing to know. War isn’t that simple.”

“Nothing’s that simple. So you want to save the world. Slay the dragons and keep the princesses safe?”

“Something like that.”

She smiled. “Well, as much as I like a good knight, I have to tell you, I’m not a princess. I don’t need to be locked up in a tower. I won’t be locked up in a tower.”

“I don’t need to lock you up.”

Her face went pensive. “Not literally. That would be weird. And really creepy and I’d have to call the cops on your ass. But there are things I want to do in my life. And some of them aren’t the safest things on earth. I want to learn to ski and maybe bungee-jump and some other stuff that I never got to do when I was dancing because I couldn’t afford to injure myself. I don’t live my life within the lines. Not all the time.”

He sucked in a breath. “I know that.”

“Yeah, but can you live with it? Because my choices are mine. No one else gets to choose for me. Or control what I do. So if you already know that the answer is no, we should cut our losses. Before anyone gets hurt.”

It might already be too late for that. But saying that would probably just scare her off.

“And if I don’t know?”

“Then I need to know if you can try to be okay with it. Otherwise, it’s that cutting-our-losses thing again. I know this is early. And maybe we’ll do this for a few weeks or months and get sick of the sight of each other but like I said, I’ve made bad choices before. You might be a knight—even a slightly rusty one—but that doesn’t mean you’re not a bad choice. Not if you want to change who I am or what I do.” She put her hand on his chest. Right on the scar that cut across under his right pec where he’d been sliced open by a flying piece of glass in an explosion. “You’ve got scars. I do, too. Maybe we’re both sliced up into puzzle pieces. But that doesn’t mean we’re the right fit, no matter how well we do this”—she waved her hand at his body and hers—“together.”

“I know,” he said. “You’re right.”

“But?” she said.

“But I’d like to see if we could fit. See what happens. I promise to try not to be a douche and try to wrap you up in bubble wrap.”

She laughed “Bubble wrap? Isn’t it usually cotton wool?”

“You’re not the cotton wool type. Bubble wrap. Fun. Addictive. Like you.”

That earned him an eye-roll. “Are you trying to charm me?”

“I’m trying to picture you wrapped in bubble wrap. Maybe you could meet me at the door like that next time.”

“Sounds sweaty.”

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