Page 34 of Liar & Champion
“I think that you’re ridiculous. You kiss perfectly.”
“But you pushed up my shirt and then ran away. Was it my chest? I think it’s okay.”
His face was blank. “It’s not okay. You’re perfect. Everything about you is perfect. There is no flaw physical or performative that you need to overcome. I know that feelings aren’t rational. I suppose that you can be terrified and feel rejected at the same time. I’m sorry for the part I played in both of those.”
I stared at him and he stared back at me. For some reason, I wanted to cry. I must be mixing my meds wrong, or need more saltwater. “I’m sorry that you’re sorry. It’s not your problem, except that I made me your problem. I shouldn’t have told him your address, but I didn’t know what else to do. Now you’re stuck with my mess of emotions, but come to think of it, you did ask for moody and emotional. That’s all right then.” I beamed at him sunnily, but it took him some time for the ice to melt and him to smile back.
“It’s not all right at all. Neither one of us should be coerced into hiding in the woods without a hammock, but here we are.Let’s go fishing. If you fish better than you kiss, those fish have no chance.”
He carefully took my hand and we walked together towards our cabin, like we had all the time in the world, like we could fish every afternoon and kiss by the fire every night. It was a good lie. My favorite yet. For a little while, I’d let myself believe it.
Chapter Twelve
CHAMPION
She was too sweet.
Literally. It was one thing for her to have trauma, but to not realize that her breasts were perfect? It wasn’t possible for a woman that stunning to be that unaware, ergo, she was practicing deception,and was very possibly interested in what she could get from my mother and a marriage with me. Gold digger? I’d say grave digger, because if she tried to get anything out of my mother, her lawyers would bury Sunshine. Still, it made me feel like it might be okay marrying someone who had enough self-preservation to be tempted by money and position. I’d make sure that she was set up well enough, not well enough if she actually had to meet the Crocodile because nothing was worth that. Still, she’d be financially secure, and I’d spend the next six months doing what I was really excited about. Dupre. I was going to kill him.
She wasn’t lying about him, or being nervous about kissing me. Every time she pulled away from a kiss she looked shocked all over again that it hadn’t hurt. She needed some serious pleasantness after dealing with years running from that psychopath. That’s probably what the root of her sudden change of heart about marriage was based on: fear. I could respect that.Women didn’t have it easy, at least not unless they were my mother. What if sweet little Sunshine was like my mother?
I took a deep breath. Then I’d enjoy her body for six months. Her perfect body. And I’d keep her safe. That was my most pressing motivation. I was also doubting her virginity. Real virgins didn’t throw it around like that, they kept it quiet like a shameful secret. They wore gold crosses and didn’t do ollies on a skateboard in a mini skirt. That was a relief. Dupre was going to hate me for teaching her pleasure that he could never give her. Did he take her virginity? In that case, it hadn’t really counted. Made me sick to think about. It was none of my business, but it would be once we were legally bound. I wasn’t going to take anything away from her, and hopefully she was pecuniary enough to take the settlement and not make a fuss after the six months was over. I didn’t want her heart. That would be a disaster. At the end of the six months, I’d be walking away, and she’d be six months older, wiser, and more financially and physically secure. Win, win.
Could I go through with it? My heart had palpitations of the thought of getting married to anyone, but Sunshine was making it one of her conditions, otherwise she was going to disappear and I’d never have the opportunity to beat the ego out of Dupre. Or snuggle a bit of sunshine every night.
There was nothing worse than feeling like a monster when you’d worked your whole life to not be your parents. I could hurt people. I could break people. I could rip them apart with my bare hands if I wanted, and I often wanted, but I could also protect them. That part of my personality was what I’d cultivated, and seeing Kitten shivering and terrified after she’d hit me with barely enough force for me notice it and give her the space she needed, it was like a slap in the face with a twenty-ounce bottle of whiskey, the good bottles that wouldn’t break no matter what you used them for. She’d really been scared.
Was she truly religious? I didn’t know, but I had a great deal of respect for people’s personal moral code. The world could use more people with things that they wouldn’t do. Restraint, self-control, those were the things that kept humanity from turning into their base monsters. I personally didn’t have any strong feelings about intimacy one way or another. I’d seen sex addiction destroy lives for the addict and their victims, I lived in Las Vegas after all, but my sex drive was not the thing that would destroy me and make me ruin others. Kitten had a different story. Not that I knew it, other than dealing with a stalker for years. That would wear on a person.
She lived with her aunt and hadn’t mentioned her parents, except for her dad, in the past tense. Religion was a good way to connect to people who had gone before. Belief and morality helped give life purpose and meaning. I wouldn’t ever take that away from someone, whatever my personal feelings and beliefs were.
When she’d kissed me like that in the shower, I’d wanted more, forgetting about everything else in the process. I’d never been so lost in a woman before. She felt so good and right in my arms, resting her head on my shoulder, kissing me so soft and satin. I couldn’t let that happen again. I couldn’t forget that there was more to her than the present moment and my desires.
I needed a woman for six months, and she needed somewhere to hide while I figured out how to destroy the Dupre threat. That meant that we would get married until the conclusion, and then go back to life as usual, only hopefully better, because I wouldn’t have my mother wrapping red tape around my life, and Kitten wouldn’t have a stalker breathing down her neck. The plan felt cold-blooded, though, particularly with how warm and sweet Kitten was, so bouncy and filled with cheerful enthusiasm for anything, be it self-defense class, or a fugitive life hiding in the woods.
The next two weeks fell into a pleasant if slightly peculiar pattern. Kitten was apparently the world’s greatest wood carver, and had decided that in exchange for me teaching her fishing, she was going to teach me to carve. We weren’t just carving anything, no, my first project was a wedding ring for her, and of course, she’d carve one for me. When I pointed out that the one for me would be much prettier than the one for her, because I had no idea what I was doing, she smiled that irresistible smile and said, “But it will be made by your hands, which are the prettiest hands I’ve ever seen.” She was such a sweet talker.
I was carving her a ring, because we were getting married as soon as my arm felt better. I should have been more panicked, but spending my days fishing, wood carving, and doing martial arts forms was incredibly helpful in keeping my mind calm. Then there was Kitten, who curled up in my arms every night to show me how to carve. She felt better than good, righteous, making me feel like there was something good about me just from her rubbing off on me. Maybe she was sincere, maybe it was her goodness, her superior morality soaking into me. I looked forward to our after-dinner campfire even if kissing was off the table.
That first night after the shower, she tried, but I wasn’t sure that I wouldn’t get lost in her again, and I couldn’t afford scaring her away. The idea of her disappearing and hoping that Dupre didn’t find her was unfathomable. Other than the random short anecdotes, we didn’t talk a lot about the past, just soaked in the moment, like there was no future, just the present, and it was a gift. Everything with her felt good and right, even when she did nothing at all. She was magic.
On our twelfth night by the fire, she tried the wedding band on my finger. “You have very sturdy fingers. Most fingers have more taper, but yours are solid like tree-trunks.”
“Which is why a wooden band is so right for me.”
She flashed me a smile. “Will you wear it in front of your mother? It will probably takes years off her life.”
“She would be so ecstatic to hear that I married you, she wouldn’t care what it was made out of. Besides which, your work is very fine.”
She wrinkled her adorable nose. “This is the basic shape. I’m going to do the rest in secret while you’re off doing grocery runs or fishing so you’re really dazzled when it’s revealed.”
“That’s not fair. I don’t know if your ring will be done.” I’d called in a favor while I was down at the small store to get some groceries. It wasn’t every jeweler who could make something out of wood.
She kissed my cheek. “It will be perfect. Wooden rings don’t last very long, probably not an entire six months, so being created by you is as good at it could get.”
“Mm.” Because she was so above money. I didn’t need a hopeless romantic on my hands, but I wasn’t going to argue if she liked to pretend. “If it was a real ring for a real wedding, what would you want?”
She raised her eyebrows and studied me. “Something unique, something simple that didn’t get caught on stuff when I’m boarding or climbing, and of course diamonds.” She grinned at me and her blue eyes twinkled.
