Page 69 of Wife Number One

Hawk stopped and stared at me, and then down at my grip on his fingers.

I let go of him quickly, like his skin had burned me.

“What do you need, Kara?” he asked more softly than I’d ever heard him before.

I didn’t know anything other than I didn’t want to be alone in this tiny room with a dead body cold on a table.

But my lips wouldn’t form those words.

Hawk didn’t seem to need them. “I’ll stay here, then. Right here. Just behind you.”

A tear fell from my eye, and then more, silent streams creating waterfalls down my cheeks that burned across my skin. I tried to suck in air, but it was so cold it hurt my lungs, which only increased the panic inside me. I tried to breathe faster, sucking in shallow gasps that did little to relieve the ache inside my chest. The trembling increased, shaking me from head to toe until my teeth chattered and my muscles hurt. My heart ached, and a low, keening wail started up somewhere deep inside me, a noise I hadn’t made since the day Josiah had taken Hayley Jade away from me.

“No,” I cried, slumping forward. “Nooo!”

The second was more of a scream of agony.

I was so cold everything hurt. It seeped through my skin like icy needles of pain.

“Make it stop,” I moaned pitifully. “Make it stop!”

Warm arms came around me, and I lashed out, hitting at him, scratching and pushing him away. “No!”

There was only the briefest of hesitation in his embrace, and then he tightened it, turning me around so we were chest to chest, my face buried in the warm, clean material of his hoodie that also held the vague leather scent of his jacket.

“Stop,” he said quietly into my ear, his voice low and deep as his grip on me tightened to a point that would have been painful if I hadn’t been falling apart. “Just stop fighting me, Kara.”

His heat chased away the cold. His words soothed the ragged edges torn open inside me.

I stood in his arms, him holding me up.

Holding me together.

Time passed, but neither of us spoke again. My tears slowly subsided, and the incessant shaking reverted into trembles. My breathing evened out, matching his slow, deep breaths that filled my lungs with a scent I now associated solely with him.

In his arms, I could breathe.

He let go before I wanted him to.

I slowly lifted my gaze to meet his and opened my mouth.

He cut me off with a sharp shake of his head. “If you hate me for touching you, I don’t fucking care. You needed me.”

I nodded quietly. “I know.”

He groaned like my words had hurt him. Embarrassment coursed through me. His hoodie was soaked with my tears and probably my snot. My face was likely red and blotchy. I was a weak mess and I knew it.

Josiah would have been disgusted with me. It didn’t surprise me that Hawk was too.

I bet Amber didn’t cry all over him.

I bit my lip. “I’m so sorry.”

He shook his head. “Don’t say that.”

“But I am.”

“Your sister was murdered, Kara. Fucking hell. If you didn’t cry, I’d be questioning if you were the one who did it.”

---