Page 40 of Rufus

He put every bit of what he felt for Molly into the fierceness of that kiss. The hunger. The lingering desperation. The punishment.

And the love.

They were both breathing hard by the time he rested his forehead against hers. “This feels very real to me, Molly,” he murmured.

She gave a shuddering sigh. “Unfortunately, what my mother did, and is possibly still doing, is also very real.”

Rufus’s frustration with this situation grew every time Molly lumped herself and how people might feel about her in with a woman who had obviously never felt any love or affection for anyone but herself.

So much had been revealed today, so many painful truths, but it had to be obvious to anyone, even those at the heart of this tragedy, that Molly was just another victim of Serena Jenkins’s selfish actions. If they didn’t, then Rufus would ensure they did.

He knew Molly, damn it. Intimately as well as emotionally. She simply wasn’t capable of the same cruelties as Serena Jenkins.

“Molly, I—” The vibration of his cell phone, alerting him to another incoming call, interrupted him.

He saw by the caller ID that it was Linus calling him again.

Which, considering he had spoken to his cousin only a few minutes ago, meant that Linus must have found something more that he urgently needed Rufus to know.

He slowly released Molly. “I want your promise that you’ll stay and see this through,” he pressed before he would accept the call. “That no matter what else we learn today, you will remember the things I’ve said to you.”

“I—”

“Promise me, Molly,” he bit out.

Her gaze dropped from his. “Okay.”

Rufus wished he could say more, but he really needed to take this call from Linus. “Yes?” he prompted his cousin briskly, but his gaze remained firmly fixed on Molly.

Because, as he’d already warned her, he would not be letting her out of his sight again for the foreseeable future.

* * *

From Rufus’s increasing tension as he listened, Molly guessed that this call was also from his cousin.

Possibly with the address of where Serena Jenkins was staying?

If that was the case, would Rufus leave now to go to wherever that was?

Would he expect Molly to go with him?

Did Molly want to see Serena Jenkins again?

Three redundant questions, she realized, when Rufus had told her that he wasn’t leaving her side for the foreseeable future. If he had the address of where Serena Jenkins was staying, then he would want to go straight there and expect Molly to go with him.

Molly, who was still half afraid to believe in the feelings Rufus said he had for her.

The other half wanted to sing and dance before throwing herself into his arms and telling him how completely and utterly in love with him she was.

How could she ever be otherwise when her lips still tingled from his kisses and her body ached with the arousal she always felt whenever they were together?

When even the thought of leaving him, of never seeing Rufus again, had been tearing her apart.

Rufus’s behavior, since he learned the truth of who she was followed by his warning he wouldn’t be letting her out of his sight again—along with the threat of a spanking for ever daring to think about leaving him at all—gave her hope that he really did feel some of that same deep emotion for her.

“I want you to check the background and friends and acquaintances of all the new employees we’ve taken on in the last two years,” Rufus now barked into his cell phone. “But concentrate specifically on the ones who have worked at that particular building and Mia’s animal shelter, and then look for any connection between one of them and either Sarah Harper or Serena Jenkins. Yes, we have a traitor in our midst. No, I want to deal with him or her myself.” He abruptly ended the call before turning to Molly. “We need to leave.”

She flinched. “Linus told you where Serena Jenkins is staying,” she stated rather than questioned, already knowing that had to be the reason Linus had called.

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