Page 104 of Heartless Lord
Killian was back.
A tangle of excitement and nerves slashed at my insides as I rushed to the door, wrapping a silky sheet around my bare shoulders. I reached for the handle just as the dark timber whipped open, revealing a masked man in black.
“Shit!” I slammed my shoulder into the door in a desperate attempt to close it, but the guy on the other side was too strong.
He forced it open, shoving me back like I was nothing more than a rag doll. Wrapping the sheet tighter around me, I darted across the room.
“Come here, you little bitch!”
I circled the whirlpool in the center of the large room as the masked intruder snarled across from me, waving a knife.
“Your boyfriend stole something from my boss, and now you’re going to pay for it.”
Oh, fuck no.
What was it with these assholes always trying to take advantage of girls? Why were we always the hostages, the ones kidnapped and tortured?
“Take whatever you want. I don’t give a damn about whatever secrets Stanford Davenport is trying to protect.” Because I knew this was about him. It just had to be. It was the only reason Killian would act this way. He worshiped the ground that man walked on.
“It’s too late for that, sweetheart. My bosswillget his files back, but he’s out for blood now.” He curled his finger at me, beckoning me closer. “If you don’t fight me, I’ll make it quick and painless.”
“Kiss my ass.” I dropped the sheet, spun around, and raced toward the balcony.
Every inch felt like a mile with the pounding footfalls behind me. My heart raged in my ribcage, kicking and punching with each desperate step. Reaching the sliding glass doors, I pried them apart and darted through the small opening.
I took one step onto the balcony, then two, praying to all the saints my mom so fervently believed in. The thundering waterfall emptied into the lagoon just below. My stomach roiled at the twenty-foot drop.
I only had a second to make a decision. The crash of heavy footsteps loomed closer.Please, Mamá, let me survive this for Papá. I hated the idea of leaving him alone.
But there was no way I was letting this guy get his hands on me. I’d take death by drowning any day over whatever torture this asshole had planned. Bracing myself on the railing, I hauled myself up and over.
Then closing my eyes, I jumped.
I was weightless. Completely weightless for an endless moment.
And free.
For years, a heavy burden had taken permanent residence on my shoulders, and for a few blissful seconds, I felt nothing.
Until a familiar voice ripped through the tranquility.
“Lexi!”
My eyes snapped open at the rage in Killian’s violent scream. A painful crack spread across my chest at the sound an instant before the deep blue enveloped me. All the air rushed from my lungs, and I sank into the lagoon’s warm embrace.
“Lexi, Lexi, wake the fuck up.” A familiar, yet panicked voice tore me from the peaceful oblivion. A hand clapped across my cheek. “Breathe, damn it. Breathe, please.” Another smack, this time with a bit of a sting to it. “I won’t lose you again. I fucking refuse.”
A warm mouth covered mine, and air filled my lungs. Killian.
His scent blanketed me, his familiar presence pulling me back from the darkness. He breathed life back into me. Ironic since it felt like my life had ended the moment he walked out on me all those years ago.
“Come on, baby girl, come back to me.”
The anguish piercing his words snapped something inside me back to the land of the living. My eyelids jolted open, and I heaved in a breath, then coughed and gagged, expelling the water I’d just inhaled. Finally, what felt like a lifetime later, my lungs filled with sweet oxygen.
For a moment he just stared at me. Like I couldn’t be real.
“Thank fuck you’re alive,” he whispered, pressing his forehead to mine, those emerald eyes pinned to my own.
