CHAPTER 15
The knife is a good weight, and judging by the condition of the blade itself, it’s never been used for cooking. It’ll do just fine.
Brandishing it, I begin to walk back to my bedroom. I will not sit around and wait for my uncle’s men to find me. Today was a close call, and I know I’m not safe here. Not really.
Knox may have sent them away, convinced them he hadn’t seen me, but it’s only a matter of time before they come looking again. They won’t be satisfied until they find my body, and since I’m not dead, they will keep searching. Eventually, I’ll be found.
So, I’m sleeping with the knife.
“Elena,” Knox’s deep voice calls from behind me, and I can hear the exasperation layering the tone.
I look over my shoulder, finding him with the bridge of his nose between his fingers.
He then runs that meaty hand down his face, smoothing it over the thick hair of his beard. “What the fuck are you doing?”
He looks at the knife pointedly.
I blink slowly. How has he not caught on after what happened today? He really thinks I’m not going to defend myself?
“I don’t have a weapon.” I point out since he took it from me.
He just stares at me.
“Listen, not sure about you, but I don’t particularly want to be murdered in my sleep.”
“No one is going to hurt you here.”
“You don’t know that,” I tell him. “They’ll keep coming back; they’ll keep looking. You’re upstairs in that big room of yours, and I can bet my ass you have a gun within reach just in case, while I’m down here, in easy reach of the front door.”
“A knife isn’t going to stop a bullet.”
“No, but it’s better than nothing.”
His blue eyes look behind me, to the slightly ajar door of my bedroom, and then he glances at the front door.
He releases a heavy sigh. “Would you be more comfortable upstairs?”
“Yes,” I don’t lie.
“The other rooms upstairs aren’t set to take guests right now,” He gets up from the table and places his empty plate in the sink, “You can take my bed tonight and I’ll get the guys to help me move the bed from down here into one of the rooms tomorrow.”
Snatching the bottle from the table and his glass, he trudges toward the living room.
“Where are you going to sleep?” I follow behind him.
“In your bed.” He lowers into the chair and pours himself another glass of whiskey.
Conversation seemingly over, I turn toward the stairs, the knife still in my hand. I’m not giving it up.
The moment I step into his bedroom, the smell of him wraps around me.
Something spicy and rich, like leather and black pepper.
The room is dark, moody with aged wooden accents and dark bedding, a large painted picture of the Bighorn Mountains dominates the wall behind the headboard, and a large hide rug sits in the center, beneath the king-sized bed and the brown leather ottoman at the foot. It’s warm and masculine.
His bedroom window provides a view of the ranch, the dramatic, craggy faces of the mountain filling the horizon, bleeding into rich forests and open fields, the cattle grazing in the pastures.
The sun has yet to fully set, setting the peaks of the mountains on fire and sending rays of orange and pink streaks through the fading blue sky.
An eagle soars over the ranch, and just when I’m about to turn away from the window, Ralph lets out another mournful bellow from his paddock directly in front of this bedroom window.
Never thought I’d feel sympathy toward a bull, but here we are.
Grabbing the high-back chair that’s set in front of a fireplace that doesn’t look like it’s been used in a while, I drag it toward the window as if my presence there can somehow help the lonely bull.
I rest the knife on the windowsill and gently bring my legs up, careful not to disturb my thigh too much.
While it’s still fucking painful, it has eased some, but the ride today as well as climbing through bushes to hide didn’t help.
I don’t know how long I sit there for, trying to formulate a plan, long enough for my legs to go numb beneath me and the sun to set, plunging the surrounding landscape into a darkness so deep it’s unlikely you’d be able to see your hand in front of your face.
Stars twinkle in the endless abyss, something I haven’t seen for a while since the light pollution in the city blocks them out. It’s peaceful.
I could imagine just staying here, forgetting the life I had, letting go of the violence and the power and spending the rest of my days in the shadow of these mountains. But I was not raised to be invisible.
I was raised to be a fucking queen, with a throne and a city.
As tempting as it is to pretend I am someone else, I can never let it go. It is my blood. My bones. My name.
I’m Elena fucking De Luca.
And my father didn’t raise me to lose.
I stretch out my legs, willing the feeling to return before I unfold myself from the chair, heading for the door. Ralph is quiet, but I see his silhouette wandering the perimeter of his solitary paddock, as restless as I am.
I expected to find the living room empty, but Knox is still lounging in the chair, a grandfather clock ticking away at the edge of the room as he sleeps. He’s slouched down, the glass he was drinking from still in his hand, albeit empty now.
He’s softer in sleep, the creases between his brow and at the edges of his eyes somewhat smoothed out since he isn’t frowning at the world.
There’s a raw, almost untamed quality to his masculinity, a compelling blend of roughness and hidden gentleness that pulls me near.
I like his quiet strength, a potent, simmering energy held in check.
There’s immense power in that restraint.
Unassuming.
I let my bare feet carry toward him, silent on the aged, warm wood beneath them. They certainly don’t make them like him where I’m from. Not with his broad shoulders and suntanned skin, his scruffy beard and untamed hair. One of his arms is almost as big as my thigh, and those hands…
I’m a hand and arm girl. They have nice hands with those veins that wrap around the forearms, and you’ve got me roped.
I know there’s a body of steel beneath those clothes, abs that have been worked from the hours of labor he does on the ranch, a V that carves into his hips with a trail of hair that runs from his naval to the base of his cock.
And that was something too, even in my drunken state at the time, I can recall it, not as vividly as I’d like to.
There’s nothing pristine about him, not with the calluses on his hands or the scars on his knuckles or the worn leather boots with the scuffs on the toes.
He made me feel safe today, protected me when he could have as easily gotten rid of me. And then he held me, and he didn’t judge me for the moment of vulnerability that I showed him.
I will give back what my family stole from him.
He doesn’t stir as I reach forward and brush a single finger down the strong length of his nose, a bump in the bridge like maybe it’s been broken and healed bad. I let my fingers trace his features lightly, the high points of his cheeks, the coarse hair of his beard.
I’m so lost in the moment of committing the feel of him to memory, I don’t realize he’s woken.
His hand snatches up to wrap around my wrist, and he tugs me until I land against his chest, capturing my other wrist at the same time to trap them between our bodies.
My thighs are parted over one of his, a quick flare of pain loosening a gasp from me.
His other hand rests on my spine, fingers splayed and pressing in tightly.
Blue eyes bounce between mine, those fingers on my back flexing while his thigh presses up between my legs.
Heat wraps me up, an inferno that warms my skin and travels low in my abdomen. Both nerves and anticipation have my skin pebbling and my throat working on a swallow, something Knox doesn’t miss as his eyes dip to see it for himself.
My breath gets stuck in my throat when he leans forward, running the tip of his nose up the column of my throat.
Everything tightens, and heat blooms in my core, arousal making my nipples tighten.
He stops just below my jaw, forcing my chin to tilt, and I roll my hips slightly, using his thigh to ease the ache that’s formed between them.
The scratch of his facial hair and the feel of his breath whispering against my neck has a small whimper escaping me, my hands trapped.
Beneath me, he goes still and then he snaps himself away.
“Elena.” The rasp of sleep clings to his voice, and his eyes widen at the same time his hands release me.
It’s like a bucket of ice water has been thrown over me.
I don’t jump back or scramble away. I have far more dignity than that, but I do get up, righting my clothes.
His eyes dip to where my nipples are pressing against the fabric of my shirt, outlining them and the bars that go through them.
“Fuck,” He growls beneath his breath before he gets up and storms out of the room, the door to the downstairs bedroom slamming behind him.
Fucking men.