Page 13 of Saber's Claim
And she’s looking at me like that.
Eleven o’clock. Her door.
I knock twice.
The lock clicks. The door opens. She’s in the pajamas I brought her, and her hair is damp from the shower. The room smells like the soap I put on her dresser four days ago.
My soap. She’s covered in me, and she doesn’t even know it, and I’m standing in this hallway with my hands at my sides because if I lift them, they’re going to pull her close to me.
“Need anything?” Two words. Same ones I say every night. Like I’m some kind of gentleman. Like I’m not standing here with a hard-on and a head full of every filthy thing I’d do to her if she invited me in.
She leans against the doorframe. Tips her chin up to meet my eyes, and the height difference puts her mouth about six inches below mine.
She smiles. “The eggs were good. You didn’t have to do that.”
“I know.”
She bites the inside of her cheek. Her eyes drop to my throat, my chest, and the tattoos that disappear under my collar. The look is fast, but I catch it. I catch everything she does.
“Saber.”
I wait for her to continue.
“I don’t know the rules here.” She takes a deep breath. “I don’t know what I’m allowed to do or where I’m allowed to go. I need to know, because I can’t live inside a box again. Even a nice one.”
My fists tighten at my side. Nice box. She’s comparing my protection to his cage, and the worst part is she’s not wrong. I locked her in a building, put guards on the doors, and told aroom full of men she was mine before I ever asked her if she wanted to be.
“You’re allowed to go to the kitchen, bar, and common room. You want fresh air, find me or Duke, and one of us will walk with you. Not because I’m keeping you inside. Because I’m keeping you alive.”
She processes that. I can see the fight between the woman who wants to trust me and the woman who’s been trained not to trust anyone.
“And if I want to leave? For good?”
“Then I put you in a car with cash and a phone. We’ll keep an eye on you.” I hold her eyes. “You’re not a prisoner, Shelby. But you’re safer here.”
She nods. Pulls her bottom lip between her teeth and releases it, and I track the motion.
She’s so fucking hot.
“Goodnight, Saber.”
“Goodnight.”
She closes the door. The lock clicks.
I press my palm flat against the wood and stand there in the dark hallway longer than any man should.
I’m fucked.
I’m completely, irreversibly fucked.
CHAPTER 5
SHELBY
A week in,I stop eating standing up.
Duke is at the kitchen table with a plate of eggs and a deck of cards, dealing himself a hand of solitaire. I walk in, and he kicks the chair across from him out with his boot.
