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Kindle Notes & Highlights
“Every choice we make is one we can’t take back.”
What really happened was I felt you in here and you stopped me in my goddamn tracks.
The taste of violence and destruction on my tongue, though there was something about it that was dangerously sweet.
“Think you should go before I ask you to spend the night with me.”
“Why’s it I fuckin’ love that I marked you?”
“I’m sure you love making your mark on plenty of women.”
“Think you’re wrong about that, gorgeous. Haven’t been able to get you off my mind since the second you walked through my door. No forgetting you. Wreckin’ my mind the way you did.”
“Can’t stop thinkin’ about what would’ve happened had I actually asked you to stay. What it would have been like if you’d let me take you right on my chair. Wondering how good you’d taste. How good you’d feel.”
“I’m afraid that I want you to touch me.”
“Give us twenty questions, Charleigh. Twenty questions of getting to know each other. As simple or as deep as you want them to go. Then you can decide if you trust me. If when you’re in need, you feel safe enough to come to me.”
“It’s okay, Charleigh. It’s okay. I’m not going to let anything happen to you.”
Not when I felt this overpowering need to hold her forever. Keep her close. From here to eternity.
“Yeah, baby, you are. The second you ran through my door? That’s what you became. My responsibility. So, thank you, Little Runner, for runnin’ to me.”
“Nah. I saw you first. Wanted you first. Think that means you’re mine.”
“Going to show you that you don’t have to do that anymore. You don’t have to run. You don’t have to be afraid. You can stand in the beauty of who you are. And you, Charleigh Lowe, are the epitome of beauty. Inside and out. Everything about you makes me want to lose my mind. Gonna drive me out of my head, Little Runner.”
“Nah, I’m not going to break you, Charleigh, I’m just going to ruin you for anyone else.”
“I don’t let my mind go there when I’m tattooing, not ever, and there you were, making me break every rule I’ve ever set, and I’ve been wanting to break them ever since.”
“If you really knew, you’d go running so far and fast there’d be no chance of me catching up to you.” Then his voice dropped to a seductive threat as he edged in an inch. “And even knowing it, I still think I’d chase after you.”
“I wouldn’t get very far because you already have me on my knees.”
“Looking at you is like looking at the sun breaking on a new day and wishing I could hold onto that moment forever. That’s what I’m going to give you, Charleigh. A million new days where you get to wake up and shine all your light. Shower this world in your beauty because there’s so fuckin’ much of it, it’s a disgrace to keep it hidden. Gonna make you shine, Little Runner. Fuckin’ glow.”
Was pretty sure it was true. I was all hers. This girl could ask anything of me, and I’d give it to her.
“Who the fuck did this to you?” Because whoever they were? They were going to die.
“It doesn’t matter? It fuckin’ matters, Charleigh. It fuckin’ matters because you’ve been running scared for years. Running because some monster inflicted that kind of pain on you. Running because I know you’re afraid of him finding you. And you came running to me. Believe me, it fucking matters.”
“Please…just fuckin’ talk to me, Charleigh. Can’t leave things the way they ended last night.”
“Told you if you ran, I would only chase after you. Thought it was going to have to be across the country, but you didn’t seem to get very far. Think that says something, yeah?”
“That’s right, gorgeous. This is right where you belong. Wrapped around me, either on the back of my bike or in my bed.”
“Nearly went out of my ever-lovin’ mind last night,”
“Letting you walk out that door and not goin’ after you. Took every ounce of willpower I possessed. Think you should know I won’t be letting you go this time.”
“Nah, baby, I think you’re the perfect accent to all my dark. A light when things always look so goddamn bleak.”
“That’s because you belong to me.”
“Knew you were going to wreck me, Charleigh. Knew once I got inside you, I wasn’t ever going to want to be anywhere else. Going to live in this body, baby,”
“You don’t have to run anymore, Charleigh. You can rest in me.”
“Don’t know what you’ve done to me, Little Runner. Way I look at you and I feel like I’m standing on the precipice of something huge. Something bigger than me. Wanted to get lost in you the first time I saw you, and now that I’ve had you, I don’t ever want to stop.”
“I don’t want you to. I don’t want you to ever stop.”
This connection that couldn’t be severed. Because there was something about her that tied us. Something woven deep in our makeup that made her feel intrinsic. Essential. This woman the blood in my veins.
“I want you wherever I am. As close to me as I can get you.”
“I would follow you to the ends of the earth, Charleigh, if that’s what you wanted. But right now, there’s a little boy at my house who I’m pretty sure is eager to see us both. He about had a fit when he found out you’d left last night without saying goodbye to him.”
“How could it be too fast if I’ve been waiting on you my entire life?”
“Family’s just who you love most.”
“Yeah, I see what’s happened here, too. Little Runner wrecked me. Wrecked me good.”
“Think you’ve become the motivation, Little Runner. You changed everything. Every. Fucking. Thing.”
“Because I love you. I’m so fucking in love with you. So caught up I can’t see a future where you don’t exist in it. I can’t imagine a day that I wake up without you in my arms. You fuckin’ struck me the first time I saw you, Charleigh. Pierced me all the way through. Stole some part of me when I inked myself on you. But you have all of me now. If you want it. If you’ll take it.”
“I’ll take it. I need it. Because I love you, too. I think maybe a part of me fell for you that night. Because I was dead inside. So dead, and you lit the last vapor of hope that I possessed. Stoked it and brought it back to life. And I want to live. I want to live. And I want to live it with you.”
“It’s you and me, Charleigh. From here to eternity.”
“Always. I didn’t know what it was to want someone. To need someone. Not until I met you. And I need it. Fuck me, River. Possess me. Make me remember who I’m supposed to be.”
