“My cherry earring,” I said, nonplussed. I lost it months ago and they were my favorite pair that I wore to work. “How—”
“Six months ago, you drove by the house with Lexi and I was outside playing horseshoes. I thought I was hallucinating when I saw you step out of the car. Damn, I couldn’t even speak when you looked at me with those hazel eyes. You were like an angel fleeing from a devil when you ran to your car and sped off. I found this on the driveway and…”
“What?”
He tucked it back in his pocket and lowered his eyes. “I’ve carried it with me ever since. A good luck charm I never leave home without. Ever. Austin caught me off guard once with an emergency and halfway down the road, I turned back around to get it.”
Holy smokes. “Some luck,” I muttered.
“Yeah,” he said with a dazed smile, gently cupping my face with his warm hands and centering his eyes on mine. “Brought you back to me, and I’d say that’s pretty damn lucky. I don’t think you’re aware of one important detail, and I’m going to clear the air so there’s no confusion. You’re my girl and I’m putting my claim on you. Maybe I still need to earn it, and that’s fine, but you’re not walking out of this room without knowing what you mean to me. You’ve got my heart. You’ve got my loyalty. You’ve got everything a man can give a woman, including my love. Yeah, that’s right, princess. Love. The first time I saw your eyes, my chest squeezed so damn tight I couldn’t breathe. But what sealed the deal was the first night we slept together. And I don’t mean the sex, but lying next to you in bed and talking. The same feeling I get when I’m on my bike and thundering ninety on an open stretch of road, I get when I’m with you. I feel alive when you’re in my arms, and that’s a helluva thing for a man like me to admit. Trevor was wrong when he called you submissive, and he knows it. When life keeps kicking a man down and he gets right back up, that’s strength. You’re just finding your way in this world and keeping your chin high, and that’s what attracts me. You’re a proud woman and I love you because you ain’t perfect. I’ve never felt like this, and I’m not about to screw it up by letting you go.”
“You don’t mean that.”
Please God, let him mean that! my inner voice screamed with giddy excitement. I didn’t want to imagine that he was just messing with my head. It would kill me, because I still had strong feelings for him I couldn’t erase. Reno was a man I wanted to know everything about, who not only made me feel safe, but happy. Nothing I told him about my past shocked him, and it made me want to open up to someone for the first time. Even Trevor didn’t know all the details of the baggage I carried around.
“I say what I mean. How ’bout that?”
“You don’t think I’m broken?”
His forehead touched mine. “We’re all broken. Don’t you see that? We’re just pieces of ourselves, trying to fit with someone else to become whole. You and I fit.”
“I don’t want anyone talking down to me because I’m a human.”
“And I won’t let any man utter an unkind word to you without my fist breaking every bone in his face,” he said in chilling words. “You have my word on that.”
“Don’t you want to ask me about Maddox?”
“Not really. I’m not your judge and jury.” Then he looked up in my eyes, just a breath away. “I do want to know what happened between you and Sanchez.” His eyes became a smoldering inferno.
“He’s dead now and it doesn’t matter. Nothing happened.”
“Nothing between us, April. No secrets. I can’t be with a woman who has shadows in her life she won’t let me see.”
I licked my lips and lowered my eyes to his mouth. “I owed him, as you know. We were at the warehouse and part of the payment he wanted was for me to take off my shirt. Nothing happened. He just stared at me and… you know. I was scared to say no to him because we were alone and he had a knife.”
His eyes closed as if he were processing it and every muscle in his face hardened. “You’ll never be alone, princess. I’m going to protect you. No scumbag will ever treat you like that again,” he promised, softly kissing the corner of my mouth.
God, the way his lips moved across my jaw. Some of the alcohol buzz was dissipating and I felt intoxicated with bliss.
“Tell me something about you,” I asked of him. I had to know more than just the man I saw, but a glimmer of who he once was. “Something no one else knows. Tell me about your shadows, Reno.”
His eyes closed heavily before he spoke. “I lost my faith in humanity when I served in the war.”
I spoke cautiously. “What happened?”