He hurt me on purpose. And he was going to do it again.
Jonathan stands over me and draws his foot back—the same way he does when he plays soccer in the park with his friends, and he's about to go for a goal. With a dramatic pause, as if he wants somebody to take a picture right before he scores a point.
The childhood version of me—the version I worked so hard to suppress all these years takes back over in an instant. I instinctively curl up in a ball, some subconscious part of me knowing that it won't just be one kick but several.
He intends to hurt me worse this time. But someplace others won't see—the physical abusive version of a whisper.
I brace. But I don't scream out. I don't cry or try to stop him. That was another thing my childhood taught me. Fighting back only makes things worse. Ant paid the price the last time I did that.
Besides, no one was coming to help me. I didn’t invite Ant—and even Sierra’s not bold enough to come back here after what went down at the altar. I’m in this all alone.
So I curl up as tight as I can in a little ball, hoping that will be enough to protect me from the worst of the pain.
But the kick…it never comes.
The coldhearted smack of a fist hitting flesh sounds instead. Once. Twice. Then again and again. The only thing is…this time, the flesh getting punched isn't mine.
I uncurl from my ball and open my eyes to find a man holding Jonathan by his tuxedo tie and raining blow after blow into his face.
Oh my God.
It's Waylon!
Waylon. Waylon is here in the same room with me for the first time since I told him to get out of my life.
I'm so shocked it takes me way too many moments to process that he's beating the man I was supposed to marry to death.
Jonathan's whole body has gone limp, and his head lolls to the side. The only reason he hasn't fallen to the ground is because Waylon's fist is clenched around his tuxedo tie.
Yet, Waylon draws his fist back for another blow.
A final blow, I suspect, based on Jonathan's appearance. His entire face looks battered and bruised. And he's bleeding profusely from his nose, which has to be broken after taking that many hits. Maybe even shattered.
I climb to my feet and call out, “Waylon, no! You’re going to kill him!”
I rush forward, once again getting in front of Waylon's weapon. This time it’s not a gun, though. It’s his fist prepared to deliver the killing blow.
“Get out of my way,” he growls, reminding me of why I kept on comparing him to a tiger before.
He looks even more like an animal underneath the church library’s recessed lights. He was wounded before, but he’s all better now. Stronger and even more capable of violence.
His eyes glitter with murderous intent. The same as that night when he awoke on Ant’s kitchen table and immediately pulled his gun on me. As if it were a biological reflex.
“Get out of the way,” he growls again, a predator on a mission.
I don't know what to say. Or how to get through to him.
So I don't say anything.
I kiss him instead.
CHAPTER 20
I kiss him.
I kiss him to throw him off balance. To distract him from his mission of killing a man in cold blood with his fists.
At least that's what I think I'm doing when I stand on my tippy toes to press my lips into his.
But I kiss the devil once, and he immediately takes my soul.
A loud thump thuds behind me. The sound of Jonathan's body hitting the floor when Waylon lets him go and grabs onto me.
He slants his mouth over mine and presses me into the church library’s door, grinding….grinding himself against me.
He's so hard I can feel his erection through his jeans, even though I'm wearing a thousand pounds of wedding gown over my privates.
He’s back, and he’s consuming me. Consuming me like a fire.
And all I can do is whimper as he burns me alive.
My lips greedily accept his kiss. I press my breasts into his hard chest. And my hips…. Oh God, they grind back, seeking, seeking the thing—the man we’ve been secretly wanting for months. But there are too many barriers between us.
Damn this gown! I've never wanted to be rid of clothing so badly in my life.
I moan in frustration. And Waylon groans like he’s in the same kind of pain.
He yanks up the skirt of my dress, and the next thing I know, I'm in the air—at least the bottom of me is.
Waylon uses his body weight to keep me pinned to the door. He shoves down his black jeans and pulls something out of his jacket….a condom….a condom he seems to get on in a blip of a second.