Page 22 of Knox Unleashed
Knox marches to where I am and raises the hem of my T-shirt to look at my back.
Pain flares as he does, and I glance over my shoulder. I can see the raw scrape where my T-shirt lifted as I squirmed along the ground to get away.
Knox’s jaw tightens as he crouches in front of me. He doesn’t immediately touch me. He looks, first, his eyes moving over my skin like he’s cataloguing every mark.
I’m bumped and bruised and sore. Things are probably going to ache for a few days.
He reaches out, then, his hand warm and steady against my side. The contact is careful and measured, but seeps through me anyway. Suddenly, I’m hyperaware of exactly where he’s touching me.
“Does this hurt?” He slides his palm over my ribs and presses lightly.
“No.”
He lifts his palm higher, stopping just beneath my breast. My nipples pucker against the lace of my bra. “Here? Do your ribs hurt?”
“No. I’m pretty certain I didn’t break anything.”
His mouth tightens as he stands and gently moves a lock of hair from my face to check the injury to the side of my head. “You could have a concussion.”
“I wasn’t knocked unconscious.”
His eyes follow my lips. “We should get you checked out at the ER.”
“With what money? And in this weather?”
He runs his thumb along my jawline. Just the whisper of a touch, but his eyes are filled with the kind of heat that makes my heart pound in my chest.
“I’m not filing a report either,” I say. “In case you were worried.”
His expression tells me, in no uncertain terms, that he didn’t like the mention of the police.
Outside, the storm rattles the roller shutter doors. The lights flicker again before steadying. Rain pounds against the roof like it’s attempting to break its way inside.
The whole world suddenly feels reduced to this room and the violent weather trying to tear it apart.
Yet, I can only focus on the way Knox is looking at me right now.
“They put their hands on you,” Knox says. His tone isn’t dramatic or angry, but his eyes tell a different story. “I’m going to kill them.”
It’s wild how five words, spoken so pragmatically, can tip your world. I should be terrified of them. But for the first time since my grandparents passed, someone is standing for me.
I study him in the low light of the apartment. There’s something different about him up here. Maybe it’s because he’s not wearing his cut; maybe it’s because he’s not surrounded by members of his club. For the first time, I see the man, not the biker.
He turns away from me, breaking the intensity. His gaze stops on one of my paintings. The marsh landscape in shades of deep green and blue. A chaotic, abstract piece where colors crash into each other in violent streaks.
“That painting is too good to be in here if you barely use this place.”
I smile to myself. “Yeah? Why?”
He shrugs, rainwater dripping from the ends of his dark hair as he steps closer to inspect the strokes. “Don’t know. Not much of an art connoisseur, but you can almost feel the pull of the swamp in it.”
“You can have it,” I say impulsively. “If it pulls that kind of emotion out of you, then you’re right. It shouldn’t waste away up here.”
He shakes his head and looks back at me. “You can’t just give me one of your family’s pieces of art because I like it.”
“I can, because I painted it.”
His eyes go wide. “You did?”
