Page 40 of Rebel Hawke

“You’re not what?”

Wren shoves a hand over her hair, loosening some of the tendrils from the tight ponytail holding it back. “I’m not used to this.”

I raise a brow at her. “Used towhat?”

She spreads her hands wide. “This, being kidnapped from work and brought to some secure location by a man who apparently wants to pummel me with his cock.”

I bark out a laugh that carries through the high ceilings and close the distance between us so quickly that she can’t retreat any further, tugging her up against me with an arm around herwaist. “Why do you make that sound bad? I promise you, Wren, it isn’t.”

She lets out a little huff of a laugh and smiles, placing her hands against my chest. “It’s not. I’m just…a little overwhelmed.”

“By what?”

Trepidation and longing mix in her gaze. “You.”

“There’s nothing to be intimidated about, babe. You know me.”

“No, I don’t.” She shakes her head. “I haven’t seen you in over twenty years. I know the eight-year-old boy who used to pull my hair and tease me.”

I tilt her chin up. “I’m still that eight-year-old boy somewhere deep inside, and believe me, I’m definitely going to tease you and pull your fucking hair.”

She laughs, the sound so carefree, despite the intensity of the moment. “You are definitely not the same boy, Atlas. That boy wasn’t so”—she scans me from the top of my head all the way down—“muscly and tattooed and cocky.”

A smirk pulls at my lips. “Are those such terrible things?”

“No. You wear it well…more than well. Fuck.” She squeezes her eyes closed and drops her forehead against my chest. “I sound like an idiot.”

I laugh and bury my face in her hair. “No, you don’t. Your babbling is fucking adorable.”

“I’m just not used to this kind of attention.”

My back stiffens, and I wrap my hand around her ponytail and use it to tug her head back, to force her to look up at me. “What do you mean?”

She doesn’t answer, but she doesn’t have to.

I can read between the lines and see the truth in the uncertainty in her gaze.

Fucking hell.

“Wren—”

“Most men only see the scars.” She shakes her head as much as she can with my grip on it. “They don’t—”

I silence her with a kiss before she can let out the words that are going to drag both of our minds into a place that isn’t going to get us anywhere but me fucking pissed off and her questioning everything she should be enjoying.

She leans into me, accepting the kiss and returning it in kind.

Whatever reservations she has, they seem to melt away when I can distract her from thinking about them.

I pull my mouth from hers. “You are the most stunning woman I’ve ever seen in my entire fucking life, Wren. Those men are idiots. I’m an idiot, too, but in different ways.”

She grins. “Oh, I already know that.”

“Do you?”

I give her hair a sharp tug, and she laughs. Releasing my grip on the ponytail, I step back and drop my shoulder, tossing her up onto it. A little yelp slips out, but before she can protest any further, I’m already striding across the living room toward the staircase that leads up to my bedroom.

Her laughter continues to fill the open lofted space. “Where are you taking me?”

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