AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I’m fine. We’re both fine.”
Nothing would ever be fine again. How could it be?
Gasping, I was still crazed with fear and worry, fighting to get out of his hold, managing to do so until he spun me around, gripping my jaw with one hand, wrapping his other arm around my waist and holding me closer.
“No. No. No. No!”
“We’re okay. I have you. I’m not letting you go. I would walk through flames to keep you safe.” His voice was soothing but there was no stopping the rush of adrenaline keeping my pulse skipping or the way my heart thudded against my chest. He lowered his head, capturing my mouth and I was as stunned by the swell of emotions as I was from the constant rush of terror.
Yet I yielded to him, his kiss giving me strength. As he swept his tongue inside, I realized he was okay, unhurt by the horrific blast.
So I clung to him, fighting with the anger and uncertainty inside. He pulled me against his body, his crushing weight everything I needed at this moment. The fire raged but he was protecting me, and it felt as if I was floating.
When he finally backed away, he pulled me into a hug. “It’s okay. You’re safe now.”
“Safe. I’ll never be safe.”
“As long as you’re with me, you will be. You’ll need to trust me, princess.”
As we stood watching the flames, I felt sick inside. This man would have stopped at nothing to save my life.
What the hell was I supposed to do with that?
* * *
Trust me…
The words remained lingering in the back of my mind as he drove away from the horrific scene, making a single phone call to the man I knew as Maddox.
“Yeah, state route fifty-seven. You’ll find it. Just get a cleanup crew here as soon as possible.” He growled the orders, although he was trying to keep anger from his voice. “No, Maddox. I have no clue who the motherfuckers were. But I will find out. See what the hell you hear on the streets.”
I tuned out the rest of the conversation, staring out the window as the city of New Orleans came into view. I wasn’t entirely certain how I felt, other than brutally cold inside. I folded my arms, shivering violently.
“Are you okay?” Arman asked at some point a few minutes later.
“Sure.”
“Do you want me to turn the heat on?”
I glanced over my shoulder. “I’ll be okay. You don’t know who they were?”
“I have suspicions, but I didn’t have a chance to confirm them.”
“Because they’re dead.”
“It was a necessity, Raven. They wouldn’t have hesitated to end our lives.”
“Because of me or you?”
“That remains to be seen. Just rest. We’ll be at my house behind secure doors soon.”
Take a leap of faith.
That’s what it felt like Arman was saying to me. No, what he was demanding I do, given I had no other choice whatsoever.
He also had the audacity to believe I could trust him. Could I?
Perhaps that’s what I was doing after all, which was ridiculous. My mother had told me more than once that it was okay to take a giant leap, grabbing a hold of whatever brass ring caught my attention. That’s what she’d attempted to do with my father, learning later than his aspirations weren’t what she’d believed them to be. She’d wanted him to run for office, eventually becoming the leader of the free world.
