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“It’s okay.” She glances down at the sidewalk and fidgets with the tie on the front of her shirt. “You’d be making a mistake either way. My dad is arranging a marriage for me as we speak.”

“What? What does that mean?”

“They found a suitor for me. This Leon guy, I guess. He’s in Germany right now.” She shakes her head. “As soon as he gets out of college, we’ll be married.”

Millions of questions popped into my head, but I didn’t ask any of them. Instead, I kept staring at the way her breasts moved with each breath. I kept studying the way her lips parted as she spoke, the way she glanced up at me with curiosity and fire.

“So, you have no obligations currently, right?” My tone is low as I speak.

She shakes her head back and forth slightly, biting back a smirk. “Are you going to ask me out… because that’s kind of weird, right? We’ve got the age thing, and I’ve been promised to another man in,” she glanced down at her watch, “less than two years.”

“Well, looks like we have two years then. I’ll pick you up at eight.” I turned away toward the shop, my head full of inappropriate fantasies. Some sexual, others more domestic like making dinner together on a Friday night or spending the evening snuggled up on the couch. Maybe normal people think like this all the time, but I didn’t. I never bothered with dating, and I certainly never fantasized about a woman like this. I never saw the point, not when I took care of everything on my own.

“You don’t know where to pick me up from.” She smiled wide, showing off her perfectly white teeth. “I’ll meet you at the diner. We can decide then if this is weird or not.” Giggling, she turned away.

We had pie that night and every day after. Sometimes, we’d share a slice of apple. Other times, it was strawberry. No matter where we were or what we were doing, we always had a slice with us. Hell, we ate so much pie we started talking about opening our own shop.

I blow out a heavy breath. It was seven hundred and thirty-seven days of pie. Seven hundred and thirty-seven days of falling in love with a girl I knew I couldn’t have. Seven hundred and thirty-seven days of me being a complete fucking idiot.

The bell above the door draws our attention to the front of the shop where a tall man in jeans and a crisp, white button-down steps inside. My stomach tightens and my fists clench. I’ve only seen the guy in photos online, never in person. He looks like a fucking tool. The kind of guy you’d see giving stock updates on the news or greeting you at the bank.

His dark eyes fix onmy girl. The woman I’ve grown to love. The woman that’s broken me down and exposed parts of me I didn’t know existed. The woman I’ve laughed with, cried with, and held. The woman I’ve spent two years protecting dreams with.

“What the hell are you doing in here?” He’s only just graduated college and came here a week ago. Since then, he and Evie have barely communicated. I don’t know what gives him the right to barge in here like he owns her.

Every internal alarm goes off at once.I’m going to hurt him.

Evie glances toward me, her gaze begging me to stop, but I’m too unhinged. I’ve never held a woman with so much regard, and never needed anything so badly.

Stepping forward, I stare toward the man, my hand resting on the butt of my pistol still tucked into my jeans. “Get out.”

Evie steps between us, her gaze lifted to mine. “Stop it.”

“What’s going on Evie?” The man stares at me as he speaks, a shit-eating grin on his face that I’m desperate to wipe off. “You know this guy?”

Know this guy?Yeah, she fucking knows me!

“I’m just getting a consultation on some ink.” She swallows hard and turns back toward the man she barely knows. The man I should fucking kill right here and now. “I was just leaving.”

I’m not sure why it bothers me so much that she doesn’t acknowledge me in front of this man her father chose for her, but it does. It infuriates me.I’ve been here. I know her, the real her. I’ve taken care of her.

He hooks his hand on her waist and glares toward me. “She doesn’t need any tattoos. I don’t like them. They’re dirty looking.”

Ya know, call tattoos dirty,whatever,but don’t fucking do it with your hand on my girl!

I fist his shirt into my hand and back his skinny frame against the wall. His big talk bullshit is muted as Evie tugs at my arm, begging me to stop.

“Leave him alone, Sawyer! Come on!”

I land one punch, then another.

His eye swells and turns red as blood drops from his nose.

Fuck!

Evie stares toward me with a narrowed expression I can only equate as fear. “What are you doing? Oh my God!” She rushes to the man’s side, holding him in her arms as thoughhe’sthe one she cares about. As thoughhe’sthe one that’s got her back.

“I’m protecting you!” I growl. “You don’t want him.”

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