Page 24 of Gunner

His heart. My heart. How many hearts has he stopped? How many people lost loved ones because of him? He doesn’t just have the aura of a dangerous man. He has the scent of a killer. I know what those men look like. How they’re different from others.

That aside, I can’t hate this man. He reminds me, in a way, of my father or his men.

You’d think that there wouldn’t be a woman on earth who could love a man like my father, but my mother truly did. She married him knowing who he was. She wasn’t forced. She chose him and his life of her own free will.

I can’t help myself. I pull up the sheet and bring my hand to Gunner’s forehead again. There are scars on his face that I didn’t see before. I wasn’t close enough. One along his hairline at his forehead. A smaller one by his left ear. A few along hisjawline, probably hidden by the way he tilts his face when he’s awake. One larger, raised one that I find in his hair when I run my hand through the soft, long strands in the center where it’s not shaved.

I trace the ink along the shaved skull.

It feels too intimate. Again, so wrong.

I tuck my hands in my lap to stop myself from touching him. If the situation was reversed, I wouldn’t like being out and having his hands on me without my consent.

Nothing he’s done was with your consent. You don’t seem to have a problem with that.

I focus on his lips. I imagine him awake, healed, healthy. Crushing them to mine. Picking me up and throwing me down on that bed he’s in right now. Covering me with his huge, scarred body. Thrusting my hands above my head. Pinning me down. My legs around his waist, grinding against him. His big hand stroking my skin, tearing off my panties, finding me soaked for him. Me, at his mercy, but then, he’d flip me over so I’m on top. He’d let me explore his body. Kiss his scars. Show him that I’m not afraid or disgusted. Heal the other broken parts of him.

God, I’ve been far too lonely if I’m fantasizing about my stalker.

I’m disgusted with myself, but when I fix my eyes on Gunner’s face, my heart turns into a bleeding mess again. Did he really not want to sully me? That would be so fucking sad. It makes me want to comfort him. Has anyone ever done that? It’s hard to imagine that anyone ever could have, or that he’d welcome it now. Are brutal men so different from others? He’s still a person. He still has feelings.

Debatable. He could be any kind of psycho or sociopath.

Maybe. But are bad men only bad because they haven’t been loved and don’t know kindness?

Keep going with that line of thought. Sinking to new lows here too. Setting new records for stupidity.

I don’t believe that this man would ever hurt me.

Idiot.

I’m not, though. I’ve looked into the eyes of men whose job it is to kill. Some do it because they love it. I was kidnapped by a man who wanted to possess me at any cost. He was beautiful on the outside, but a true monster on the inside. There was nothing in his eyes. They were absolutely, chillingly dead.

Gunner doesn’t have eyes like that.

He’s hiding something. He wears color contacts.

I wish my brain would fuck off. Maybe he just likes blue instead of brown.

I believe he has feelings. When was the last time his happiness eclipsed his inner torment?

I curl into a ball in the chair. Either way, I’m going to send him on his way when he wakes up. I’ll take him to whatever doctor the club no doubt has on their payroll. I watch him until my eyes get grainy. I know I’m exhausted. I just need to close them, so they stop burning. Just for a second.

***

When my eyes crack open again, it’s bright in the room.

I jerk upright in the chair, immediately slamming a hand over my mouth to make sure I wasn’t drooling. I have an olive skin tone, which makes it pretty hard to see a blush on me, but I feel my face get hot.

I rub at my crooked neck, turning it this way and that, just so I don’t have to meet Gunner’s eyes.

He’s awake and I have zero doubt he was watching me, probably the way I was watching him earlier. No. Not that way. He never would have touched me, not even to brush my hair out of my face.

I grab my phone and check the time. Just after eight.

“How are you awake already? The dose of painkiller was enough to knock out a small horse.”

“That’s your first mistake.” His throat sounds rough. I can’t imagine how shitty he feels. Getting shot has to suck, and on top of that, he was already ill. “I’m rather a large horse.”

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