Her gaze drops for a moment. “I get that you want that reassurance. But…it looks like we both underestimated him, so—”
I shake my head. “No. He’s mine.”
“Why don’t you find him first? Then we’ll take it from there.”
Her tone isn’t argumentative. In fact, she’s the coolest I’ve seen her since she’s been back. I’m not sure if that reassures or terrifies me.
I find myself nodding. She walks out and leaves me standing there, staring after her. Unable to deny the gut instinct telling me that there’s something more going on with her. Something I don’t know about.
PART TWO
BACKUP
Chapter Ten
Black Widow
Cairo, Four Years Ago
“Wake up, baby. We’re not landing for a bit, but if you want to check out the Atlas Mountains, now’s your chance.”
I keep my eyes closed, and I melt at the sound of Killian’s voice and the kisses he’s trailing over my bare shoulder. “Hmm. I’ll get up in a minute. Have I told you how much I love going on assignment in your private jet?”
He crawls on top of me and redirects his kisses down my spine. “Not since I caught you eyeing my plane’s tail fin like you wanted to hump it right before we boarded.”
“Shut up. I was just checking out the new paint detail.”
He laughs under his breath. “With your tits?”
“How is that even possible?”
“Well, you looked like you wanted to rub your tits all over it. I didn’t know whether to be turned on or pissed off.”
“Is that why you got me to rub my girls all over you instead?”
“Of course. Feel free to turn over and do it all over again,” he invites in a decidedly huskier voice.
I turn over, stare up at Killian Knight, and my heart twists viciously with the power of what his face, his smile, and his body do to me. But my heart twists for something else too. The shame that lives under my skin. The regret for things I can’t change. The certainty that my soul is damned forever.
But none of those condemning emotions stop my arms from sliding up and around his neck or prevent him from tugging the sheet from my body. His gaze drops to my chest, and I watch him swallow hard.
“Fuck, these tits.” He leans on his elbows and cups them in his large palms. Reverently, he squeezes, molds, and plumps them before he sucks one nipple into his mouth.
They’re not as big as they used to be when all I did was lunch and lounge, smile and squeeze myself into an effigy of what I thought I needed to be. The training I underwent in order to change my life has changed my body too. For the better, if Killian’s visceral reaction each time he strips me of my clothes is any indication.
My back arches off the bed as he grazes my hard nipple with his teeth, and my nails scour his naked back.
“Killian?” I moan.
“Hmm?”
“I’m going to miss the mountains.”
He raises his head a fraction, but his eyes stay glued to my breasts. “I’ll take you there one day soon. We’ll go by chopper, and I’ll show them to you up close and personal. I promise.”
His distraction is why he doesn’t see my conniving smile a moment before I buck him off me and slither out of bed.
“What the fuck?”