Page 39 of Warped

Chapter Eighteen

V

I didn’t know why X saying he loved me felt like he’d hit me in the chest. I should have been happy, shouldn’t I? The man I’d cared so much for turning up alive after all this time, putting his life on the line for me, and then telling me he loved me. So why the hell did I feel like he’d just told me I needed to jump out of an airplane without a parachute?

I could feel him between my legs, my thighs sticky from his cum, my pussy tender and swollen from us fucking. Because that was all this was ever supposed to be—two people in difficult situations getting a little pleasure from each other.

But love?

I didn’t want to examine my own feelings toward him, terrified of what I would learn. How had I felt when I’d believed him to be dead? Heartbroken, yes, but also furious and determined. I’d used my anger to quash down the loss I’d felt at what I’d believed to have been his death. I’d not let myself think of him, or the time we’d spent together, just put it down as yet another source of pain in my life. I’d experienced so much loss, and instead of letting it break me, I’d used it to harden me, to build me up.

I’d thought X was the same way. He had been the same way—the hard exterior created to defend himself against the torture this world was able to work upon us. He’d been hard and tough, like me, but it seemed him losing his memory meant he’d forgotten that. He’d forgotten all the pain he’d experienced—even the years of torture he’d endured at the hands of his adoptive parents—and forgetting had allowed him to feel a little more.

Feeling wasn’t good.

Feeling got people hurt.

I cleaned myself up and got dressed. It was stupid, but I was nervous to face him again. I thought I’d see hurt on his face, and I didn’t know how to make it go away. Could I tell him I loved him, too? Did I love him? I wasn’t sure I knew how to feel that anymore. I didn’t even tell my sister I loved her. In fact, the way she’d treated me recently, I wasn’t sure I could feel love for her, more a kind of responsible loyalty. Until today, anyway. Today I’d abandoned her and destroyed what responsibility I might have felt for her.

I hadn’t thought it possible for her to have hated me any more than she already did, but I guessed that wasn’t the case.

A knock came at the bathroom door, making me jump.

“You okay in there, Vee?” His voice, so masculine, was enough to make my stomach flutter.

“I’m fine. I’m just getting dressed.”

“You don’t need to hide.”

“I’m not,” I snapped. “I’m coming.”

I had been hiding, but I didn’t appreciate him calling me out on it.

I opened the door to find him leaning against the wall opposite. He’d put his pants back on, but remained shirtless. I couldn’t help but appreciate the lines of his pectorals and abs, still defined, despite the hospital stay. His head was tilted slightly to one side as he regarded me with the blue eyes I’d first fallen for. He watched me with a kind of amused curiosity, and I felt my face heat.

“I’m sorry I freaked you out,” he said. “I’d just assumed …”

“You know what they say about assuming something,” I replied, but I was teasing him back now. I wanted to move off the subject. “Hey, I didn’t get the chance to say thank you, and to tell you I’m sorry about your friend.”

He frowned slightly, his lips pressing together. “Thanks. He wasn’t a friend, exactly, more of a business associate, but I don’t know what I would have done if he hadn’t spotted my picture in the paper and come to break me out of the hospital.”

“Your picture was in the paper?”

“Yeah. I hadn’t wanted it to be. A reporter came into my room and took a photograph of me when I was barely conscious. They said they were trying to find someone who knew me, though I think that was just an excuse to get a story. Considering who I am, I guess I was lucky Harvey was the one who came for me. It could have been a lot worse.”

“Not for him,” I said without thinking.

“No, I guess not.”

“Sorry.”

He reached out and caught me by the front of my shirt and pulled me toward him. His mouth found mine and he kissed me, slow and deep, sending fresh shivers of desire coursing through my body, before he let me go.

“Don’t ever be sorry.”

I gave a small smile. I was sorry for more in my life than I’d ever thought possible.

“Do you think Tony is going to figure out who Harvey is and come looking for us here?” I asked.

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