Chapter 11 - Josiah
I arrived just in time to stop them from being dragged away.
She was taking too long. I hated the fact that I didn’t know where she was, so I tracked her phone. The longer she was sitting at that bar, the more agitated I became, until I told my security team to go there and keep an eye on her. Then I changed my mind and decided to join them.
Thank fuck I did.
If I hadn’t done that…
I don’t even want to think about it.
The girls are both silently in shock on the drive home. I sit with my body right up against Kayla’s, protectively close to her. I keep eyeing her friend in the dark as we drive through the city. Who is this girl?
Where did she come from, and why is someone suddenly trying to target Kayla at the same moment that this girl rolls up on our doorstep?
Her friend is quiet and fidgeting with her hands in her lap. Kayla reaches out and takes Isabel’s hand, squeezing it gently. “Are you okay?” she whispers.
“Yes, I…I just want to get back to the hotel.”
“You can’t go to the hotel. You need to stay with us,” Kayla says.
I clench my jaw. Now she’s inviting this stranger into my home.
Kayla turns to look at me. “Izabel is staying with us. The hotel might not be safe!” There is so much worry in her voice that I become concerned that if I say no, she’ll go and stay in the hotel with her friend.
“Fine,” I snarl, but I slip my arm around the back of Kayla’s seat. I’ll have my men look into her friend. It will give me peace of mind.
We arrive home, and I tell my butler to show Izabel to the spare room so she can relax and get some rest.
Kayla hugs her friend and whispers something to her. They seem very close.
Izabel leaves, and I’m finally alone with Kayla.
“Who is she to you?” I ask.
“She’s my best friend, Josiah,” she huffs.
“How do you know she isn’t the reason for the attempted kidnapping?” I ask.
“Izabel? Don’t be ridiculous. I’ve known her for years. Nothing like this has ever happened to us before. It’s not her fault.”
“I’m going to look into her, Kayla. If you know something about her, you should tell me now,” I warn her.
“You’re being paranoid. I promise you, Izzie is a good person. She’s my best friend. And it wouldn’t be right of us to let her stay alone in a hotel when there is plenty of security here,” she presses.
“I agree. Fair enough,” I sigh, giving in.
Reaching for Kayla, I want to pull her into a hug, but she steps away.
“Are you hurt at all?” I ask, feeling the sting of rejection.
“No, um, but I want to check on the twins, so….” She takes another step away from me.
“Go on,” I say quietly.
The problem is that if I can’t blame Izabel for this attempted kidnapping… I have to blame myself. All those years ago, I forced myself to let her go in order to keep her safe. And now I’ve pulled her back into my world, and she’s already at risk.
Half of me wants to run off and start an investigation into her friend right away.
The other half feels like it would be a betrayal to Kayla not to trust her.
She says she knows her friend. She says she trusts her.
Maybe for once I have to put my doubts aside and have faith in what Kayla insists.
Besides, I am almost certain I only want to blame Izabel so that I don’t have to blame myself.
And how much worse would it be if the girls were with her when something like this happened?
Kayla disappears upstairs, and I pace the living room. If I can’t protect my wife, then what kind of a man am I? If I can’t protect my family…
I can’t sleep. I can’t stop thinking about her. I can’t stop the continuous looping thoughts telling me to go check on her, but then the contesting thoughts tell me to leave her alone because she wants nothing to do with me.
It’s quarter past one in the morning. The house is silent, the kind of silence that weighs on you. Empty silence. The silence I fear will come if I mess all of this up and she takes the girls and leaves.
I will never let that happen.
But something breaks that silence. Footsteps.
I sit up, cocking my head to the side.
Someone is coming downstairs. Standing up, I move to the doorway in the dark, positioned so that I can see who is coming downstairs without them seeing me.
It’s Kayla.
My heart stammers, beating faster.
She’s wearing white shorts edged with lace and a cropped white cami. Her hair is loose over her shoulders, hanging in messy curls down her back. She looks like she might have been asleep, or maybe struggling to sleep.
Kayla walks past me without seeing me and heads into the kitchen.
I follow her.
She flicks on the soft under-cabinet lighting.
“Can’t sleep?” I ask quietly.
She sighs and shakes her head without looking at me. “Not really,” she replies.
“Why do you keep shutting me out, Kayla?” I ask, walking closer to her and leaning on the counter with my arms folded over my chest.
“What?” she snaps. “Josiah, it’s one in the morning. Now can’t be the time for this.”
“When, then? When is the time for it, because I’m getting sick of being pushed away and never having a chance to talk to you,” I complain.
“I’m tired. I’ve had a really long day,” she mutters.
My eyes drift over her. Every perfect piece of her.
She glances at me and notices my hungry gaze, and it seems to piss her off even more.
“Josiah, go to bed. We can talk in the morning,” she grumbles.
“No, I want an answer now. In the morning, you’ll have some other excuse.”
I take a step closer to her, cornering her against the counter.
She looks up at me, and I see the dark shadows beneath her rose-tinted eyes.
“Have you been crying?” I blurt out, horrified.
She quickly turns her face away. “No,” she snaps.
Threading my fingers around her jaw, I force her to look at me. It breaks my heart because all I see is the burden she is trying to carry alone.
“Tonight…” I sigh. “Tonight was a lot. I’m so sorry you had to go through that. I’m sorry I wasn’t there sooner to protect you.”
Her shoulders soften, and her eyes shift, trying to look anywhere but at me.
“Kayla, do you hear me? I’m sorry.”
She bites her lower lip.
I can’t take it. I can’t take how beautiful she looks. How sweet and vulnerable.
“At least you’re sorry about something,” she mutters.
“What does that mean?” I ask, stung by her words. I drop my hand away.
“Forget it, Josiah,” she snaps, trying to push past me.
But I grab her arm and pull her back against the counter.
“No, you aren’t doing this. You’re going to talk to me even if I have to tie you up and force you to stay.”
Her eyes flare for a second, flooded with intrigue. Really? How interesting.
Kayla pulls her mouth tight, and I fight the urge to step even closer to her. To press my body against hers.
“Talk to me, Kayla,” I demand. “What did you mean by that? Is it because I forced you to move in here? Is it because of the marriage certificate I tricked you into signing?”
She shakes her head, her eyes glittering with a shimmer of tears that she refuses to allow to fall.
“It’s because of five years ago!” she blurts out.
“Five years ago, when you tore my life into shreds and did so with such intense brutality that I can never look at you the same again. You are a monster to me, Josiah. And I will never trust you with my heart. I will never trust you to take care of me in any way whatsoever.”
Her voice is breaking as she speaks. A single tear escapes and rolls down her cheek.
My heart cracks and bleeds in my chest.
My jaw is clenched so tightly it aches.
“Kayla…” I whisper, filled with the pain of what I did to her in the past. “I had no choice.”
“Everyone always has a choice,” she snaps.
“Yes, and I thought I made the right one!” I growl defensively.
“How? How could such a cruel act be the right choice? How could treating me like I was everything to you and then dropping me like a sewer rat be the right choice?”
“Don’t you get it? Someone like you…in this world.
In my world. It would never have worked.
Every single one of my rivals would have targeted you.
They would have hunted you down to use you against me.
And what happened tonight proves that! They tried to take you.
They tried…” My words fade as my throat tightens over them.
“So, you made a choice,” she says sarcastically.
“I made a choice not to let that happen to you,” I say.
“I hear you. I understand,” she says angrily.
“I don’t think you do,” I say, knitting my brows.
“I do. You had options. You might have loved me enough to put the effort in to keep me safe. You might have loved me enough to hold on to me and do whatever it took to have me in your life. But instead, you made the first, the easiest, choice that came to mind. You pushed me away. In fact, you didn’t push me.
You shoved me. Off a cliff. Onto a bed a glass.
” Her eyes are flaring with pain and anger.
“You’re wrong, Kayla!” I snarl.
“I’m not,” she snaps, trying to push me away again. She presses her hands against my chest and shoves as hard as she can, but she isn’t strong enough.
I grab her wrists and pin them behind her back. Fueled by the urgency to make her understand. Fueled by her scent, her raging spirit.
My eyes take in the sight of her, and it pushes me harder.
I trap her against the counter with my body pressed against hers. She squirms against the restraint of my hand locked around both of her wrists.
I grab her jaw in my other hand and force her to look at me again.
She will understand. I will make her understand.
Except when I look into her eyes, words fail me.
My self-control dissolves as though it were nothing.
My lips lock over hers.
She squirms again, trying to free herself, so I kiss deeper.
Her body melts against mine as her resistance fades.
Every part of me is on fire with need, and I realize that this is not something I could ever control.
I push my tongue into her mouth, and the soft moan of pleasure that slips from her drives me even harder as I push my engorged cock against her body.