Total pages in book: 38
Estimated words: 35372 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 177(@200wpm)___ 141(@250wpm)___ 118(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 35372 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 177(@200wpm)___ 141(@250wpm)___ 118(@300wpm)
Then he reaches up and pulls off that little half-helmet he rides in, the skull cap that doesn't protect anything but his pride, and his hair is a disaster. Flattened on one side, standing up on the other, dark blond and every direction at once.
I walk down the steps barefoot, the flat stepping stones cold beneath my toes.
I don't say anything.
Neither does he.
I cross the gravel and I don't feel it cuttin' into my feet, and I walk straight to him, and I put both my hands flat against the leather over his chest, and I tip my face up, and I kiss him.
And just like that, the ugly reality from a minute ago—the no skills, no purpose, no belonging spiral—goes quiet.
Not gone, exactly. But quiet is enough.
Shelved somewhere I don't have to look at for a little while.
We kiss for longer than is necessary. Which is the whole point, I think—that it isn't necessary at all, and we do it anyway.
His hands settle on my hips and mine stay flat against his chest, fingers spread wide over the leather, and I can feel his heartbeat underneath all that armor. Steady and unhurried. The way everything about him is unhurried when it comes to me.
I like this about Legion. I have always liked this about him.
He is never in a rush to pull away, never checkin' over my shoulder to see if someone's watchin', never calculating the cost of another thirty seconds with his mouth on mine.
He just stays.
Present and warm and tasting like wind and road dust and whatever gum he was chewin' on the ride over.
And I stay too, because there is nowhere else in the entire state of Montana where the noise in my head goes this quiet, and I am not fool enough to walk away from that on purpose.
But eventually, we do part.
And it's tellin', I think, that we both part smilin'.
Not the careful kind.
Not the kind I've been trained to produce since I was old enough to hold still for a camera.
The real kind. The kind that just happens because your body remembers what happy feels like before your brain can talk you out of it.
"What are you doin' here?" I ask him.
He swipes a piece of wind-blown hair out of my eyes. "I just needed you."
"You did? Problems back at paradise?"
He chuckles. And his eyes go a tiny bit serious. Not enough to erase the smile, though. "Fuckin' Badlands. It's a crisis factory, that place."
"Anything you need to get off your chest?"
"Nah," he says. "It's all good. I'm just done for the day so I thought I'd come by."
His words are interesting. Because "done for the day" implies goin' home.
"Are you gonna stay at the trailer tonight?"
"Well." He shifts his weight. "I was hopin' to stay here."
And then he holds his breath. Just for a second. Just long enough for me to notice, which means it's long enough to matter.
Like he's actually afraid I'll say no.
Like the answer isn't written all over my face already, hasn't been written there since I was fifteen years old and climbin' a condemned ladder in a grain silo because the boy at the top was worth every rung.
And this is when it hits me.
Really hits me.
Things have changed.
The Ashby ranch used to be a place where Legion was not.
That was the whole architecture of it, the unspoken blueprint my mother built when she was still alive and framing shots and decidin' who belonged inside the composition and who got cropped out.
Forty-seven thousand acres of land that followed the bloodline, not the name, and Legion Kane was never part of that bloodline.
But this is the second day in a row where he just rolled up like he belongs.
And nobody stopped him.
No alarm tripped.
No brother appeared barkin' threats.
Just Legion, smilin' at me like the property line doesn't exist.
And maybe it doesn't anymore.
Somehow, it got erased.
Which particular incident did that, I'm not sure.
The end of Marcus?
The protective custody of Mercy?
The birth of Marigold?
Hard to tell.
And no one cares, anyway.
I take his hand and start leading him back towards the house. "Then stay here you will."
CHAPTER 8
Savannah's hand is warm in mine as she leads me into the house. Once inside, there is no hesitation, she takes me right over to the grand stairway. Throwin' me a coy look over her shoulder as we ascend.
"Ya know, we don't have to fuck right away, Miss Ashby. You could offer me a lemonade and we could sit on the porch a spell before I rip your clothes off and spread your legs open."
She looks over her shoulder again—but this time she's blushin'. Doesn't stop her dirty mouth. "If I wanted to sip something, I would. But I don't. I want to suck something, Mr. Kane."
We reach the top of the stairs and I'm already hard. "Well," I say, following her down the hallway and into her room. "If you've got the urge to suck, I won't be standin' in your way."