Page 47 of The Promise Of Rain
I looked back over my shoulder.“I do.”I nodded.“I mean it very much.I fought hard for my peace and I’m not about to hand it over because you suddenly had a crisis of conscience for walking out on your girlfriend after she was attacked.”
“You have every right to be angry,” he cajoled.
Spinning around on my heel, I faced him with my fist clenched tight at my side and screamed, “I don’t want to be angry!”
Between one breath and the next, my foot slid out from under me on the icy pathway.
The cookies went flying for the second time in thirty minutes.They’d be nothing but crumbs if I ever got them to Ansel and his ladies.
Arms flailing, weight pitching backwards, and tired of fighting for every scrap of sweetness, I surrendered to gravity.
I never hit the ground.
Deacon swept me up in his arms and held me against his wide chest.My feet dangled above the ground as his hand flew up to cup the back of my head and turn my face to his.
Dark eyes, flashing with desire and fractured by fear and pain and so much loss stared intently into mine.
Panting with adrenaline, I grasped onto his shoulders and allowed myself, for just a moment, to feel him wrapped around me.Even through the layers of our winter coats, there was no denying the perfection of his body pressed against mine.
There was no denying his strength.What would it be like to trust in him?To be able to lean on him?
I bit back the sob threatening to escape.
Being in his arms again brought back every dream fate ground to dust.
Once upon a time, we’d been 99% perfect.
But that 1% killed us.
There are girls they marry and girls they fuck.
“Jenny,” he rasped, his arms tight bands of steel around me.
“I don’t want to be angry, Deacon,” I whispered.
Clinging to his shoulders, I pressed my forehead hard to his, as if I could fuse our bodies together for all time and keep him.
His big hand holding my head tightened.
“I don’t want to fight to prove myself or change anybody’s mind.I just want to live in peace and run my bakery.”
He fisted my hair and tugged my head back just far enough to meet my eyes.“You’re not going to fight anymore.I’ll fight for you,” he replied, his deep voice gruff.
His words sucked the marrow from my bones, and I sagged in his arms.
My head fell to rest on his shoulder as my hands slipped to his biceps.
His chest rose and fell as his hands splayed over my back and pressed me closer.
“Baby,” he whispered, his mouth dropping to my temple.
It was tempting, so tempting, to stay there in his arms.
But he didn’t fight for me when I needed him most.
He wouldn’t listen, and I could barely speak up for myself.
Those facts, cold and stark and indisputable, gave me the strength to gently push him away.
