S. K. Lessly's Book Excerpts

Excerpt

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Someone was waiting for me in my room. I felt it, sensed it, and don’t ask me how I knew; I just knew. Sadly, I didn’t have this intuition when I was in the army. Maybe if I had, I wouldn’t have been assaulted by Byron in the dead of night. I would’ve sensed his presence and high-tailed to safety. No, this blessed curse developed after the army, the result of the bastard stalked me for years.

 

I wasn’t sure if Byron was the one lying in wait inside my room, or if it was someone else, but there was someone waiting. I put that on everything.

 

“Let’s move back from the window, okay? The guys are on their way.” That was Ayana speaking, and I felt them stand, each of them gripping me underneath my arms, guiding me away from our table into the shadows of the bar.

 

I threw myself against the wall and closed my eyes, wishing that my body would stop shaking, but it wouldn’t stop. I couldn’t stop shaking. Voices were everywhere, invading my senses, tires screeching in the distance. Darkness started to close in on me.

 

Friendly voices that once comforted me sounded so far away. All I could hear was his voice.

 

Oh god, this can’t be happening. Not again, please…

 

“I’m going to find you and fucking kill you. You think you can run away from me? You think you can hide. Never. You’re mine. Do you fucking hear me, bitch?”

 

My eyes widened as his voice echoed in my head. That’s what he said to me that night he broke into my house. When he grabbed me, he told me I would never be free of him. God… was that him waiting for me in my room? Was he coming for me?

 

I can’t breathe… I can’t…

 

I tried to get my lungs to work, to take in air, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t fucking breathe.

 

No…

 

I glanced around the pitch-black room. I could hear him calling my name. Taunting me.

 

“Don’t let him get me…” I think I said, or hell, maybe I mumbled or screamed. I couldn’t tell you which.

 

Someone touched me, and it felt as if their hands were on fire. Their touch burned me to my soul. I scrambled away, dropped to my butt, and wrapped my arms around my legs. I started rocking back and forth, trying to think of something other than what was lurking around me in the surrounding shadows.

 

Please don’t let me die… please…

 

Someone faintly called my name, but I couldn’t tell who it was. It was probably him… I couldn’t trust the voices, couldn’t…

 

I buried my face in my arms and it was then that a vision of someone’s face filled my mind’s eye.

 

Lock…

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I whispered his name, and the darkness behind my closed eyes lifted ever so slightly. I said it again and again and wouldn’t you know I could hear his voice? It was faint, but it was there.

 

Was my mind playing tricks on me? Was it him again? No… I didn’t think so. I didn’t know how to make sense of what I was feeling. Warmth seemed to cover me like a soft blanket, protecting me from the cold, from the danger lurking in the inky shadows around me.

 

I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to picture everything I loved about Lock. His intense eyes, his gorgeous face, so chiseled, masculine. The seductive smile of his, his laugh, the heated looks he would give me right before he kissed me. And oh, his lips… those suckers were heaven on earth.

 

I felt my breathing picking up, but for very different reasons. His touch was everything. It seemed to soothe me, to calm me, to relax me. I was safe with him. Safe in his arms.

 

Lock…

 

“Yeah, baby, I’m here.”

 

I froze.

 

That voice sounded as if he was right in front of me. Right… It was then that I became fully aware of warm palms against my cheeks, thumbs caressing the skin underneath my eyes.

 

“Open your eyes,” he instructed in that demanding voice I loved so much.

 

I didn’t do it right away. Instead, I reached for him, climbed in his body, folded myself in his arms and buried my face in the safest place I knew, his neck. I inhaled, and I swear all the darkness fell away. I was acutely aware of someone crying in the background.

 

The voice of an angry Ayana talking about stringing someone up by their balls and

 

Brad saying, “Not unless I get to him first.” Wait what?

 

More sounds hit my ears and one of my worst fears had seemed to come true, yet a-freaking-gain. I had a panic attack in public. God, someone kill me now!

 

A comforting hand caressed my back, soothingly. Oh, it felt so good. It made me forget my embarrassment, but it also allowed the fear to creep back in.

 

“Someone was in my room,” I said against his neck.

 

His hold tightened.

 

“Yeah, baby, I know.”

 

He pulled back, and I reluctantly came up for oxygen that wasn’t filled with of the scent of Lock, and met his concerned eyes.

 

“Hey, beautiful,” he whispered for only me to hear. My cheeks curled slightly from the warm tone and gentleness coming from him. “You’re safe now. Whoever it was is gone. But you can best believe I will find him.”

 

“Not before I find his ass, first. Fucking son of a bitch!”

 

That was Ayana again.

 

Lock rolled his eyes and for the first time in what felt like a lifetime, I allowed myself to relax, and I smiled. That was, until my eyes fell on a very pissed off Reed Watson.

 

Rut-Roh, I said to myself, in my best Scooby-Doo voice.

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