Page 183 of At the Edge of Surrender

It was the same promise he kept making.

As if he might have been as afraid as I had been.

Emerald eyes were pinned on me as he nudged the door shut with his hip, and he never broke the connection as he carried me up the porch steps and to his door. He didn’t put me down as he worked the key into the lock, and somehow, he managed to maneuver around enough to get it open.

He carried me through, kicked it shut, and locked it behind us, quick to input the security system code to shut it off.

My arms held tight to his neck as he began to carry me upstairs.

Slowly.

Never looking away as he stared down at me in this adoration that nearly toppled my walls to the ground.

Our hearts were a thunder around us. A bashing that clattered between our souls.

This man who wasn’t supposed to be mine. One I shouldn’t want. But one I didn’t stand the chance of staving off this attraction right then.

The gravity that ripped and pulled between us.

A silent connection that blared at full volume.

When he got to the landing, he didn’t head for my room. He turned right and carried me into his where I’d fallen into the safety of him last night.

His bedroom was massive, taking up this whole upper wing of the house.

Masculinity dripped from the walls, the space every bit as dark as the man. Haunting paintings were framed on the walls, as distinct as the art that covered his flesh.

His bed faced out at the wall of windows that overlooked the back property. This afternoon, the heavy curtains were drawn open, giving a view of the forest that surrounded the stream that ran through in the distance.

Kane sat me down on the edge of his bed.

My pulse beat wildly as he dropped to his knees in front of me.

It didn’t matter that he was below me.

I could feel the bristling of his strength. The violent ferocity that blazed from his being and belted into me.

I could barely draw oxygen into my lungs with the pressure he exuded.

At the pain and devotion that was carved into the harsh lines of his unforgettable face.

“I won’t let anyone get to you, Emery. Whoever this fucker is, he won’t come near you.”

I wasn’t sure how I could trust him in this, but I did. I felt this overwhelming calm curl around me like a blanket.

“My crew is looking. Right now. And we won’t stop until we find him.” It was there again. That undercurrent to his admission that should have sent me running.

A violence that skated beneath it that promised peril and hazard.

That the instinct I had that he was dangerous—that they all were dangerous—wasn’t some idle, vague idea.

I should be afraid. Terrified for my niece.

Instead, I felt a security that I hadn’t in years.

That feeling of forever falling into a bottomless, harrowing abyss obliterated in his arms.

Kane’s expression deepened as he took both my hands in his. “What happened today, Emery…thought I was going to lose my mind when I got the call, terrified that I was about to lose what I finally found.”

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