Page 88 of Too Lethal to Love

Alive.

Tears streaked down her cheeks as she drank in every living, breathing detail of the beautiful, lethal man she loved.

He slid over the desk as if he couldn’t waste precious seconds walking around it. Instead of pulling her to him, he gently cupped her cheeks and held her as if he’d never let her go. What she felt in her heart—fear, relief, respect, love—shone in his gaze.

“My God, Beth.” His lips brushed her temple. “That was incredible. Are you hurt?”

She tucked her injured arm under her breasts and gripped one of the biceps she loved so much with her good hand. “Yes, but I’ll be okay. I killed my stalker. He was Chavez’s brother and Henry Richardson?—”

He held up his hand to silence her. A moment later, he smiled. “Nic reported all hostiles are down, including the other Chavez. The FBI just arrived. The team is helping them sort the mess out.”

“Thank heavens.” All the emotions she’d struggled with the past two years—fear, tension, anger, despair—along with the freedom to love gathered behind her eyes. The onslaught pushed more tears over her lashes. “Can we go home and celebrate Christmas now? I have so much I want to tell you and so much to?—”

A shot peeled from behind her. Kane’s hand flew to the side of his head. She screamed his name as his eyes rolled back in their sockets. Another deafening shot from the same direction rent the air. She launched herself at Kane and dropped them to the ground.

“Oh, God.” More pleas streamed from her lips in torrents as she rolled off him. Blood peppered his face. She heard Chris shout over her screams. Heard a woman’s voice over the pounding of her heart, but Kane didn’t open his eyes. Sobbing harder, she clamped one handover the blood and cupped his cheek with the other as her nightmare hurtled to reality.

More people rushed into the room, but she didn’t look away from the blood seeping through her fingers. Battling the panic seizing her rib cage and the organ beating erratically inside it, she begged the rational part of her brain to assure her it was only a flesh wound. The rational part was nowhere to be found.

No, she couldn’t do this again. Danny had been hard enough, but God, the thought of losing Kane ripped a hole in the heart he’d healed. “Please. Don’t die. You’re supposed to be invincible.” She pressed her palm harder to his wound.

Chris pried her hands away from Kane’s head.

She heard his words, but they didn’t register over her pleas. “Wake up, dammit, so I can yell at you about not wearing your freaking helmet.”

Someone tried to pull her away. She held tight to the man she loved and dropped her lips to his. “You are not number four. Do you hear me, cowboy? Not. Number. Four.”

The side of Kane’s head burned like he’d hugged a blowtorch, but he slogged through the fire toward the sound of Beth’s voice. Each desperate plea, each rise to her hysterical demand that he not be number four, brought him closer until his mouth stirred against hers.

“I hear ya, sugarplum.”

“Kane.” She bolted upright. Relief and a dozen other emotions he felt in his own heart shook her so hard her lips fought to form another word. She sniffed back tears as more flowed. “Thank God. I was so afraid you’d?—”

He gripped her cheeks in his hands. “Don’t even say it.” He never wanted to hear her say number four again. “A flesh wound may hurt like hell, but not even a nuclear missile could take me away from you.”

Nothing would. Not a curse. Not his fears. Not any enemy the world might throw at them.

She swatted him lightly on the chest. “It could if you’re not wearing your helmet, asshole.”

His heart sang at her snark. Man, she was tough. And she was all his. “I only took it off because I thought you were the one hanging from the ceiling back there.” He wrapped his hand around her neck and pulled her to him. “Christ, Beth, I thought I’d lost you.” He’d also thought he’d understood the meaning of “no regrets.” Apparently, it took taking a bullet too close to his brain and the woman of his dreams begging him not to die to make him understand the true meaning. As he held her to his chest and absorbed every inch of the incredible woman he’d almost lost, he vowed never to forget this lesson. “No more wasting time, Beth. Got it? You’re mine and I’m yours.”

“Dios Mio. Will you two just get a room?”

Beth lifted her head and swung it to the woman sandwiched between Nic and Linc. She pointed to the feminine-looking Chavez. “You must be my stalker’s twin.”

“I’m Valentina, the weak female, locked safely away from my family’s enemies.” She snorted. “That didn’t work out so well for Mama.” She cocked her head to a beefy body on the floor. “I saved your boyfriend’s ass from my cousin’s second bullet. He’s always been a crappy first shot, but for some reason, he gets the hang of it with the next one.”

Beth peered at Steroids. The bullet hole in his forehead matched the one she’d delivered to her stalker. “He’s yourcousin?”

Valentina shrugged. “Wasmy cousin a few timesremoved. That didn’t make him any less of a douchebag than my brothers.”

Nic snickered. “Are you sure we have to turn her in to the FBI? I like her.”

Of course, Nic liked the exotic sprite with a badass attitude.

Kane accepted a towel Chris pressed into his hand and sat up. “Thank you, Valentina.”

Beth helped ease him to a sitting position. “Yes. Thank you. You have no idea how much we appreciate what you did.”

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