He found a spare blanket and wrapped himself up on the sofa. He was tired from the chase and then the long swim … followed by the even longer run home. He assumed that sleep would not be far away.
But he was wrong. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw Emma’s sweet smile, the way her eyes glinted with lust, and the beautiful sigh of her breath when he pleasured her. He could feel her velvet skin under his fingertips and sense the heat rising from her body as she came for him, over and over.
Sleep taunted his tired muscles and sore joints, refusing to sweep over him and set him free. He tossed and turned, tortured by his own thoughts. He could not relax … he may never sleep again.
Not unless she was by his side.
Ace thought about going to her and lying beside her. Part of him really believed she would welcome him. The other part of him swept a cloak of sharp, hard darkness around his heart. She didn’t really want him … she never had. There was no hope for a savage animal like himself.
Ace sank deeper and deeper into self-hatred and further from sleep every moment that slipped by. He’d almost rather be in the river again … at least there, his choices were easy and his options simple.
Chapter19
Emma
Emma curled up in bed, wrapping herself around a pillow as if she could use it to tape her shattered heart back together. She couldn’t stand the look on Ace’s face, the hurt and rejection that echoed deeply in his eyes, yet he refused to show it in any other way.
Emma didn’t want to break his heart, and she sure as hell didn’t want to break her own. Now that she’d admitted to the Don that she loved Ace, she couldn’t take it back. The words had sprung out of her unbidden, but now she was almost positive they were true.
She heard Ace in the shower, and her sobs grew quiet for a moment. Emma imagined his gorgeous body slick with warm water, the rhythmic motion of the soap as he lathered himself and ran his hands over his skin. Arousal built in her so strongly that she gasped aloud, trying to cover up a moan of need.
She wrenched her mind away from the thought of him, hot and slick, and barely a few feet from her, separated by meaningless walls. These were the kinds of walls that were not easily surmounted … they were the invisible kind that were built around hearts to protect them or those of pointless animosity between warring families.
The tears returned, and she let them flow. She wondered if she would ever stop crying.
Not if we can’t be together. If we can’t figure this out, I will cry every day of my life.
Emma had never felt so trapped. The only way to keep herself safe was to betray her heart and her soul.
When Ace left the shower, her mind followed him back to the couch. It seemed so simple to get up from her nest of sorrow and go to him. It was all she wanted with every last fiber of her being. She held herself still with a kind of strength she’d never even known she had … and it was the desire to protect her love at all costs.
Even if that cost is my sanity, my happiness. The Don will kill him, and I can’t let that happen.
Eventually, the exhaustion caught up to her. Emma drifted away into dreams where Ace walked ahead of her, and no matter how hard she ran, she couldn’t catch up to him. When she finally got close enough to call out his name, he turned and looked at her with such hurt in his eyes that she couldn’t stand it. She jumped away from him so violently that she woke herself up.
For a moment, she stayed wrapped up in bed. She hadn’t even changed her clothes last night. Wearily, Emma dragged herself to the shower, feeling terribly exposed as she undressed and jumped under the hot water.
Is he thinking about me the same way I thought about him last night? Is he imagining his hands on me, his lips, his…
Emma shut her thoughts down. It didn’t stop arousal from rising in her, a heat between her legs that seemed like an ever-renewing fire. She knew, deep down, that no one would ever make her feel this way again. There would be no point to dating … if she couldn’t have Ace, then she’d rather be alone.
Emma dressed quickly and headed to the kitchen. Ace was up, making coffee. She wanted to slink by him and not look at him, but she couldn’t. She had to hear his voice, see his eyes when he looked at her.
“Good morning, Ace,” she said very softly.
“Morning,” he snapped.
He did not look at her. Emma’s heart mourned, wanting to see that light in his eyes spark like chips of fire against the amber depths when he saw her face. Ace kept his head down as if he was quite deliberately hiding that beauty from her.
Emma waited for Ace to move out of the way and made herself some coffee. He had his back turned to her again as he made a piece of toast and buttered it with such violence that he almost turned it into breadcrumbs.
She could relate to his mood, and she knew her stomach wouldn’t handle much in the way of hard food. Emma took a small cup of yogurt and sat at the table, staring into her coffee.
Ace sat across from her, but they didn’t speak. It was a harsh difference from the morning before when they had talked easily and shared food together. Several times she opened her mouth to speak but closed it again when she realized she had nothing to say.
Secrets rose in her, fluttering in her chest like trapped birds. She had so many that she didn’t know how to hold them all. Secrets from the Don, from Ace, from Fritz and Benny … hell, even from the law!
Emma finished her coffee and yogurt, eventually glancing up to see Ace finishing his toast. He had his head up, and he was looking toward her, but not right at her, maybe over her shoulder. She couldn’t stand how he looked with dark circles under his eyes, pale skin, and haggard cheeks.