Page 28 of Her Keeper
He touched a gentle finger to my nose. “Because, Penny Lane, when I wasn’t looking, I fell in love with you. And it turns out I don’t want to have to face this life without you.”
My heart did that swelling/breaking thing again, but I ignored it for the moment. “What about your father?”
He reached up and kissed me softly. “My father,” he whispered, “is going to learn that he doesn’t get to take away something that I love. I told you I wasn’t going to let anyone hurt you. And that includes him.”
12
MICHAEL
Penny rolled over, pressed her face into my neck, and kissed me softly. “Tell me something true,” she whispered.
I’d been awake for some time, but had fought the urge to wake her up myself. I wanted her to rest after the day she’d had yesterday. Ididn’twant her to wake up and remember the mess we were currently in. Better to be sleeping, I’d though, where she could at least forget about the real world and the men who were after her.
Men who belonged to my family and answered to my father.
But the morning light streaming through the window had been falling across her face, and i guessed that had been enough to bring her out of her dreams and into the present.
“Something true, eh?” I whispered, pressing a kiss to her forehead.
“Mmhmm,” she moaned, still half asleep and even more agreeable than usual.
I pulled her closer, enjoying the heavy warmth of her body against mine and wishing we could stay here forever. I’d never spent the night in the house, which we’d bought as a safe house and then never had to use, but there was something about it that made me feel like we were a million miles away from our New York and all the drama in that city. I could hear birds chirping outside and kids already playing on the street—reveling, I assumed, in the fact that the sun was coming up after a day of storms.
For right now, those storms seemed like they belonged in another world. And I wanted them to stay there.
“Something true...” I said, pretending like I was going to have to think hard to figure that one out.”
Penny reached out and poked me firmly in the ribs at the delay tactic, and I squirmed away from her. Maybe she wasn’t as sleepy as I’d thought she was. She pulled me back and laid her head on my chest once again, snuggling in until she was comfortable.
“Stop trying to think of a lie. The game is Something True,” she noted, her voice now slightly cranky.
“Okay, okay,” I chuckled. I let myself relax under her and feel every place where her skin touched mine, soft and velvety and beautiful, like the world outside had never touched it. I wanted to hold her forever like this. Tuck her up inside my pocket and keep her close. Keep her safe. Every cell in my body was screaming out that this girl needed protection and that I was the only man to do it.
I would kill anyone who tried to take her away from me.
But I didn’t think that was the kind of truth she was looking for. Besides, I thought I’d made that particular point clear last night when I pinned her to the wall and showed her that she belonged to me.
Something a little lighter, then.
“This is the first time I’ve ever slept in this house, and I’m thinking I might like it even better than sleeping in the city.”
She reared up and stared at me, her hair even curlier than usual and her face ruddy with morning. “You like this better than your brownstone?”
I nodded. “I like the peace of it. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t have used it for Something True.”
The corner of her mouth twitched and she laid back down.
And now, I thought, it was her turn.
“Tell me something true.”
“I’m scared,” she said without any hesitation. “But I know you’re going to keep me safe.”
I wrapped my arms around her, feeling her words like an arrow right to my heart, and pulled her on top of me, torn neatly in two by what she’d said. I hated that she was scared. Hated that I’d put her in this position and that everything had gone sideways on us so quickly.
I hated that she even had to think about needing protection.
But she was right about me keeping her safe.
