Page 43 of Bear In A Bookstore
“Jesus, Kora, I’m—”
“Do you know the oddest thing?” She picked at her skirt. “He didn’t know who I was. He didn’t target me because my book had made millions in the movies. No, he chose my house completely at random. Picked me from a hundred other beach houses on that strip. It could have been anyone, but it was me. His girlfriend was later arrested as an accomplice. Apparently, she’d been waiting in the car and fled once the cops came. My security footage nailed her car.”
Desi leaned in and took her hand. He couldn’t not touch her a second longer. His chest ached even as rage pumped through him. The trauma she’d gone through. Christ, he wished he could say he didn’t know, but on some level, he did know. He’d seen his share in war and there was connection in that.
“At least you were both okay. Right? He didn’t hurt either of you?”
She scoffed. “No. I mean, Geoff wasn’t even there.” She blinked. “As soon as he realized what was going on, he ran. Jumped out a second story window and left me to fend for myself.”
“He . . . fled?” What the actual fuck.
“Ran away. Opened a window and bailed. He waited half an hour before he called police because he needed a drink to calm himself down first.”
Desi pulled a slow breath through his nose.
“A man who was supposed to love and care for you left you alone and vulnerable at the most terrifying moment of your life?”
“Yep.”
He took her other hand, squeezed them in his to make her understand. “He wasn’t a man, Kora. A real man would never leave you unprotected. Never. That bullshit ends with him, understand? I’ll never leave you to fend for yourself.”
Tears rolled down her face. She wiped furiously at them. “But . . . you’renotmy man.”
“That could change, Kora. Right now.”
She took a sobbing breath and opened the truck door and slid out into the pouring rain. Desi hurried to follow her, catching her before she got to the porch.
“Don’t you get it?” She yelled over the pummeling downpour. “I’m scared all the time, Desi! I’m scared of everything. I can’t have you or anyone because what if . . . what if you die and leave me alone? What if someone hurts you? What if you have an accident? There are so many things that can go wrong.”
He knew all too well that time doesn’t wait, and tomorrow is never promised.
“Sweetheart, there is no guarantee that any of those things won’t happen. But that’s what love is. It’s taking the risk anyway.”
“You don’t understand.”
“Yes, I do, and I know that to get through really tough shit, sometimes you have to fight a different way.”
He cupped her face in his hands, blinking rain from his lashes. Thunder cracked above them, rain digging shallow ruts in the ground around their feet. He kissed her tenderly, slowly exploring her wet lips and wishing with everything inside him that he could make her understand. She’d dreamt about his scar, said she had visions and dreams about them. Life was trying to show her the way.
To him.
“I’ll wait, Kora. However long it takes. Whatever I need to do to help you each step of the way, I’ll do it.”
“It’s not fair to you.”
Pulling back from him, she turned and hurried up the porch, input the code to her door, and went inside. Pausing, she looked back at him. Maybe waiting to see if he’d follow, maybe subtly inviting him in. But he sensed she needed space, so he waited until he saw the red light beep on the keypad by the door to know she’d locked it before getting into his truck.
God, she’d given him a lot of information to unpack and process. What she’d been through, hell, he wished he could rewind time and take it on himself. And the man who’d left her? His bear roared, vibrating his flesh. He’d love to meet the guy for a man-to-bear conversation.
There’s nothing he wouldn’t do to make things better for her. Desi gripped the wheel. There was nothing he could do for her if she didn’t let him.
He had to wait until she came to him.
Chapter Fifteen
Koralookedupfromher pillow as her phone chimed with a text. With a groan, she buried her face in the covers and ignored it.
It was almost noon, and she was still in bed. She hadn’t slept well after the shitshow the gala had turned into and spent the entire next day trying to bury herself in work, but her mind and body weren’t having it. She’d left the bookstore after only a couple of hours and went home, spent another restless night on the couch and didn’t have the energy to get up now.
