Page 171 of This Life of Mine
“I’m not.” I reply.
“No?”
The Wraith,my Alex,takes a slow step towards me and my pulse betrays me.
“No.”
His hands settle on his hips.
“Most people are,” he says, tilting his head.
“Most people don’t know who’s underneath the mask.”
An unspoken quiet exists between us.
My hand rests against the center of his chest. The armored material rough beneath my palm.
“You know what I keep wondering?”
“What love?”
I glance up at the dark mask.
“How many times were you there?”
The silence tells me he already knows what I’m asking.
“Lina.”
“The drive home.” My heartbeat quickens.
“The nights I believed I was alone.” A gentle smile flits across my mouth.
“You watched over me.”
He says nothing. Which feels like an answer all by itself.
“I should find it concerning.”
My fingers curl slightly against the armor.
“Instead, I find it strangely comforting.”
The silence that follows feels heavy. Charged.
“You are going to be the death of me,” he says.
Chapter fifty-one
The Wraith or Alex
Oh my dirty little Lina.
When I stepped out of that room to change, to pull on the armor and becomeThe Wraith, in my mind I was risking everything.
Not this secret life of mine. Her.
I was terrified I would walk back through that door and watch something in her eyes change forever.
