Page 43 of Protect Me

“Vance,” she moans, but I hear the hesitation in my name. “You shouldn’t.”

“Of course I shouldn’t. But I want to. Need to. No matter what happens, you’re mine, Isabella. If you get knocked up. If you don’t. I’m not going anywhere. You aren’t going anywhere. I’ll always take care of you.” My voice strains as I thrust, deep, slow, and try to keep from coming. “Take me, all of me.”

“Yes, daddy,” she strangles out. It’s not snarky. It’s full of lust. Longing. I fucking love it. The word draws the come from the depths of my balls. I fill her tight little pussy. My tight little pussy.

With my cock still engulfed in her warmth, I hear a creak outside the door. I throw a hand over her mouth, silencing everything aside from that ominous sound.

I draw my hips back and pull out of her. I release her mouth as I reach for my gun on the nightstand and pull up my boxers. “If it comes down to me and you, choose you.”

“No,” she says. Not unexpectedly either. She reaches over and grabs the gun I gave her back at her shitty husband’s house. “I’m not losing you again.”

I grip her chin. “We knew this was coming. I just didn’t think it would be so soon. I don’t have nearly as many dogs in the fight as I’d like to have. If they want to take you back, and if I’m a goner, you know what you have to do.”

“I won’t,” she says, ripping her chin from my grasp. “We either both get out or neither of us do.”

“You’d die for me, Isabella?”

“Like you’d kill for me.”

I wipe a hand through my dark hair. “Let’s kill or be killed then.”

CHAPTER THIRTY

Isabella

Vance tosses his shirt to me, and I slip it on. I feel around for my panties, but I can’t find them. Fuck. Guess I’m facing my newfound enemy without wearing any underwear.

I rack the pistol and hold it at my side. My chin rises in defiance. I don’t want to be without Vance again, even if it means killing someone in my family. Or killing my own father.

I made the choice to run off with him, and it’s one of the few decisions I’ve made on my own. I won’t give that decision back to anyone else, including the man who raised me.

Footsteps plod from somewhere in the house. An ominous thunder rings out with every step. A bead of sweat drops down the back of my neck and buries itself in the shirt. Vance puts me behind him as he walks along the wall and inches toward the door. He’s shirtless, wearing nothing more than his boxers, and he looks deliciously terrifying.

Vance stops and turns toward me before he reaches the door. His hot palm caresses my cheek. Instead of comforting me, it sends a bolt of panic up my spine because it feels like goodbye.

“I love you, Isabella. If something happens to me, just know that I would do anything for you, including dying. I’d lay my life down in front of you so you can step over this steaming pile of shit we’re in without getting it on your feet.” He swallows. “And I’m sorry I couldn’t say it sooner.”

I set my jaw, refusing to accept his words like this. “Don’t say it because you’re certain we won’t make it out of this together.”

“I just need you to know.” He pulls me into him and gives me a hard kiss on the mouth. It’s like nothing I’ve ever felt. Is this what the kiss of death feels like? A final type of passion that can’t be mimicked or recreated without the near certainty of death?

But this kiss isn’t goodbye. I won’t accept that.

“I love you, Vance, but say it to me after tonight. When you aren’t facing the prospect of dying, please.” I let a tight smile cross my face. It’s meant to be comforting, but I’ve never been very good at that.

I put my hand on his chest and urge him forward. A low sigh leaves his lips before he turns toward the door, grips the handle, and rips it open.

I follow him down the dark hallway. Emptiness welcomes us on our path and pulls us toward the footsteps, which stop as soon as the sound of ours joins them. Whoever waits in the darkness knows we’re here now. Now it’s just a matter of coming face to face—the ominous moment when eyes meet eyes, barrels meet barrels, and everyone knows the intentions of the other.

A man grabs Vance, and they begin a battle of strength right in the small home’s living room. I step forward and raise the pistol to help him, but another set of large hands wrap around my waist and pull me into a hard chest.

A familiar chest.

The scent of cigar smoke wraps around me like the arms pinning me in place, and I can no longer breathe.

My father.

His hand snakes around my wrist and wrenches the pistol from my grasp. “Isabella, I’m so disappointed in you,” he says, squeezing harder.

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