Chapter 36
John powered through with his shoulder to throw a right cross at me, and I ducked.
“Your reaction time is great, Ellie. I’m coming at you faster with this next one, so let me know when you’re ready.”
I shifted back into my defensive position.
“Okay, I’m ready.”
I had started training on the mats with him right after Will left. John trained regularly with his older brothers, and lucky for me, he’d been easier to convince that I needed to learn. Still, I knew he’d asked Will and been given permission but only because he was smaller and had no fighting experience outside the gym.
Will refused to teach me himself, insisting it was his responsibility to fight, not mine.
Before John, I had approached Thomas for the help, but he wouldn’t teach me either.
“There’s quite a lot of pain that comes with hand-to-hand training, Ellie, and I won’t have you suffer through it. You can’t imagine the physical strength involved. When we fight, it takes us over, and we become something else. It must be that way, or we die out there. The answer is no, and don’t ask me again.”
Thomas had been wrong, though, because I could totally imagine it. I’d experienced Will’s strength the night he took me hard against the attic wall…unbridled, wild strength…the kind used to take someone’s life.
John pounded his fist against his palm.
“You’re not ready at all…get out of your head, and let’s go,” he said.
All at once, I nodded, John swung at me, and Will appeared over John’s shoulder.
I took the blow on my face, the force of it knocking me right on my ass. My vision faded, the light giving way to nothingness for a few seconds, then it slowly came back to me.
A thud smacked against the wall, and Will snarled, the sounds registering in my ears before my rattled brain understood what had happened.
Shaking my head, I swiped at unshed tears, now seeing how Will held his brother against the wall by his throat.
“Don’t ever hit her again, John,” he said.
“Will, stop it,” I shouted.
And he did. He let John go and turned to me with my ass still planted on the floor.
I glanced at John for a second. He crouched forward with his hands on his knees, working to catch his breath. He lifted his face enough to see me.
“I’m so sorry,” I mouthed at him.
Will already stood over me before I could search for him. He pulled me onto my feet and held my face in his hands while examining my eyes.
“Look at me. Can you see me clearly? Are you all right, Elle?”
His warm spicy scent saturated my senses, and I wanted to bury myself in it forever.
I grabbed on to his hands and held them tightly.
“Yes, I’m okay…it’s okay,” I said.
My heart banged inside my chest as we stared at each other. I wanted him desperately and yet I hesitated to say so. Why was I so damn upset with him? I’d missed him, for God’s sake. And I had no right to be angry with him. He’d been grieving when he left…broken.
He had always been the broken one.
His father and I had broken him.
Richard Hastings had forced his son to be his soldier, a killer, a protector for me.
Even so, even with that guilt weighing on me, my anger beat out reason, and I hit him. I pounded on his chest with the sides of my fists. Tears rolled down my cheeks.
“You could have at least called. Never do that to me again!” I shouted.
He grabbed my wrists and pulled me against him, making me reconnect with his eyes. Then he covered my mouth with his, pushing his way into my mouth. His kiss was a huge storm of emotions…so passionate, fierce, tender, apologetic. Perfect.
But I fought him anyway. I twisted and pulled back.
His beautiful eyes burned with determination.
“Tell me what you want me to do. Tell me what you need,” he said.
I wanted him to kiss me again. I needed him to hold me.
I slapped his face.
Will took my slap without a word, even nodding to show me that he had.
After giving me a few seconds for it to sink in, he took my arms and jerked me against his body. He shouted at John and the others in the gym, his voice booming through the rafters.
“Get the fuck out…all of you.”
As they all hurried to the locker room, he slanted his mouth over mine and allowed his emotions to drive him again. In that mix, there wasn’t any anger or rage. His kiss expressed only love. A possessive, all-consuming, fierce love. Nothing could have completed me more than that kiss.
“Forgive me,” he commanded.
There wouldn’t be a compromise. The unwavering determination in his eyes made it clear he planned to win this round. And me, wanting him insanely...well, I would’ve let him have what he wanted anyway.
I wrapped my arms around his neck and breathed my answer onto his lips.
“I forgive you.”
He lifted me into his arms and kissed me again. We kissed longer, harder, both of us unrestrained, and our kisses fierce and breathless to the end.
“You’re part of me, Elle. You’re the only part of me that’s good, the one piece that holds the rest of me together. At times, I might be away, but I’ll never leave you.”
His tone sharpened for a second.
“Don’t doubt me again.”
I was completely high on him, and really, I had nothing to say, so he went on.
“The world round us will change. How much I want you will never change.”
We pressed our lips together, then I pulled back, looked into his eyes, and confessed.
“The truth is, I can’t find myself when you’re away.”
He kissed my forehead, my temple, my lips.
“Look harder, baby. You’ll find us both, I promise.”
The pleading in his eyes, not his words, made me see our reality more clearly. As individuals, we were broken and lost. As a couple, we were whole. I cemented his pieces together, and he anchored me to the place where I belonged.
I smiled at the thought…we fit together so well.
“Come take a shower with me,” I said.
His chest rumbled, and he kissed my neck, my butterfly.
“You might not get too clean,” he teased.
I wiggled my fingers through his hair. He’d had it cut shorter while he was gone. I’d loved his hair before, loved watching him rake it back when he was frustrated, but the messy spikes suited his handsome face just as well.
John abruptly banged through one of the steel doors.
“Umm…Uncle Robert is here. He insists on a family meeting.”
Will kept his eyes on mine and grinned.
“Quite a lot of cock blockers in this house.”
I laughed while John went on again.
“Well, I told him you’re the only one who can call a family meeting, but fuck, he just carried on and on until I couldn’t stand it anymore. And he dragged Mum into it. They’re both in the war room.”
“Christ. All right, John. Go on and tell them we’ll be there in a few minutes. And find Thom if he’s not already there.”
Will waited while his brother left the gym.
“Before we go, first I want you to see this on my arm, baby.”
I slid down the front of him to the floor.
“What is it? Have you been hurt?”
He lifted one brow, and then the corners of his mouth twitched as he extended his arm.
Sucking in a sharp breath, mouth hanging open, I stared at his arm while he stood there waiting for me to say something. I swept my fingers over his warm skin, unable to pull my eyes away from the half-sleeve tattoo on his left forearm, wondering how I could have missed it.
At the center, a dagger with a climbing rose winding around it. Even with a lot of feminine details, the design overall was still very masculine.
My name ran down the length of the blade, and he’d had it spelled the way he said it—Elle. Each letter had been crafted so artfully, appearing as if they were literally engraved onto his arm. Crimson drops of blood dripped from the tip of the blade onto his wrist, and a pretty green gem bedazzled the handle.
Finally, I moved my eyes to his.
“It’s so beautiful, Will.”
He pulled up my chin to lift my face higher.
“You’re more beautiful.”
My cheeks heated a little.
I couldn’t quit looking at his arm, couldn’t stop tracing the tattoo’s details with my fingertips, circling around the gem. Then it hit me…I recognized the shade of green.
“Is this?—”
“—the color of your eyes,” he finished.
My breath caught. I shook my head.
“I don’t know what to say,” I whispered.
“Say you love me, Elle. That’s all I’ll ever need.”
I shoved my hands into his back jeans pockets.
You’ve got this, girl.
“I do love you, Will.”
Tiny flutters tickled the walls of my stomach as he smiled with his eyes for the first time since Ethan’s death. He lowered his head, and we joined our lips, not really kissing but keeping them together.
As we entered the great hall a few minutes later, a security alarm went off.
Lissie ran shrieking down the staircase.