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He tensed. Fuck, this was a good woman. And he was hurting her. “Something like that,” he said. He owed her a better explanation.
Sarah took that shitty explanation. “I like her,” she declared. “I get it. I could even see it. Whatever it is between you.” She finished her beer, hoisted her medical bag onto her shoulder. “I knew that when we were together I wasn’t getting all of you. I resigned myself to the fact I’d never get all of you, because the parts I got, were pretty great. I thought I was getting enough. But seeing you with her, I realized I didn’t even get an inch of you. Not really.” Her words weren’t bitter, or accusatory.
“She gets all of you,” she whispered. “And I like that for you. For her.”
“I’m sorry,” he croaked, throat raw.
She cupped his face. “Never apologize for finding someone who you look at like that. Even to me. I’m a big girl. I can handle it.”
“You’re a good woman,” he said.
She stepped back from him. “I know.” She winked. “Take care of her. Don’t let her get shot at again.”
“Don’t plan on it.”
In fact, he’d do everything within his power to make sure that didn’t happen. And if it wasn’t within his power, he’d figure out a way to make it so.
Sarah nodded. Waved. And walked away.
If Jagger was a better man, he would’ve watched her walk away, thought about what she gave him, what they had.
But he wasn’t a better man, so she’d barely turned before he half ran toward his room.
Toward his Peaches.
Caroline
The door opened abruptly, as I expected it too.
I had got Emily off to sleep in one of the empty rooms. The drugs were strong, but not strong enough to complain about the thread count of the sheets. I’d watched her for a few minutes, made sure she was okay, set the meds and water beside her bed and left.
I already had an alarm set for two hours so I could go and check on her.
Church had run long enough for me to do all that and to slip into one of Liam’s tees. I snagged it out of the laundry hamper and put it on, inhaling deeply.
He stood in the doorway as I sat cross-legged on the bed, inhaling his tee.
I didn’t even have it in me to be embarrassed.
He closed the door, kicked off his boots and his cut, all silently. Watching me the entire time, as if he were afraid I’d just disappear if he looked away.
I knew the feeling.
I still got it sometimes.
He sat down on the bed beside me. Still not touching me.
“She’s pretty,” I said finally, unable to stand the silence, and the scenarios my mind was playing for me. “And nice,” I continued. “And a doctor. Smart.” I thought about the steely glint in her eyes. “Strong too,” I commented.
Liam didn’t say anything.
Why wasn’t he saying anything?
“She was something to you?” I choked the words out.
His eyes were gemstones. Cold. “No,” he said. “She might’ve been able to be something to me. If I had it in me to want that.”
“What do you want from me, Liam?” I sighed. That’s what my voice was, my existence in this moment, a big sigh. I was too tired to carry my anger around anymore.
“Everything,” he growled. “I want to scoop you out, everything you have, take it for myself, own it. And I know that’s not what you’re meant to say, that’s not what love is meant to be. But I don’t give a fuck. I’m beyond being honorable. So despite the fuck I have nothing to offer you, I want everything from you.”
His words weren’t pretty or tender. But they worked. Because they were real. Ugly. And exactly what I needed.
Chapter Twenty-Three
“Where are you going?” I demanded when I walked into the common room to see Emily dressed, in heels and a fucking power suit, complete with sling, her small Louis Vuitton suitcase beside her.
She was tapping on her phone. “Do you not even have Uber in this town? How does anyone get anywhere? Horse and carriage?” she demanded.
At this moment, Swiss chose to come from the kitchen, wearing nothing but low-slung sweats.
It was safe to say he was hot.
And had abs so defined water could run through the ridges like a creek.
But we already knew that.
Emily glanced at him too, with none of the female appreciation I was gazing at him with as he walked past. She clicked her fingers at him. “You, you can give me a ride to the airport.” It wasn’t a request.
I wasn’t sure what surprised me more, that Emily clicked her fingers at a biker who I’d witnessed chop the digits of a man who didn’t give him the right answer to a question, or that Swiss stopped, smiled and replied, “Of course darlin’.”
