Banking the Billionaire (Bad Boy Billionaires Book 2)(100)

“Like what?” she whispered.

I ran a thumb under her eye and twisted her hair between two fingers. “Peace. Contentment. She was still so young and restless. Searching for everything and coming up with nothing.”

Her nod was unhurried, and her eyes studied mine. I was sure she was looking for some kind of sign that I was over it all, but to me, I never even had to think about it anymore.

I’d never be over the way it happened, but all I felt was Cassie. She didn’t leave any room for anything else.

She tapped the word “Trust” on my chest. “Why trust?”

“Because it’s the only thing I really need.”

“The only thing you need to what?”

“To live,” I answered simply. “I don’t need to know what’s going to happen, or how it’s going to happen, or even the why. I just want to know that whoever’s making it happen cares about me enough to give me that freedom.”

“Mmm,” she acknowledged.

She settled like she might fall asleep, so I tapped her on the nose, my heart in my throat. I wanted her to know something that I hadn’t bothered to tell anyone yet. “You missed one.”

She lifted her chin off of my chest, and her eyes opened again as she’d thought it over. She was convinced she’d studied my body enough to know. It hit her like a truck. “Of course!” She rolled off of me enough to free my arm and turned it over to expose the inside. “Evolve” scrolled across in fancy, rolling script.

“Okay,” she said as she traced it. “So what’s this one?”

I took a deep breath and blew it out. “That’s the first tattoo I ever did.”

Her startled gaze jerked to mine. “You did this one?”

I nodded. “Last fall.”

“What? How? I don’t get it,” she rambled.

I shrugged and looked to the comforter. “I’ve been apprenticing with Frankie. They make you do your first real run on yourself. You know, so you don’t permanently f*ck somebody else’s skin up.”

“It doesn’t look like a first tattoo,” she said, excited. “It’s amazing.”

“Yeah?”

“Oh my God, yes. It’s really good!”

My smile would have blinded an airplane. “I was really f*cking nervous about that thing for a while. I actually had to go to rugby practice the day after I did it. And of course, I ended up on the skins team. I had this gut reaction that everyone would give me a hard time for how much it sucked.”

She shook her head quickly and then leaned forward to touch her lips to mine. “Do you have any more stuff?”

“No more tattoos on myself, but I’ve got some drawings.”

The sheet left me in one smooth motion as she jumped up and wrapped it around herself, demanding, “Show me now.”

Up and out of the bed and boxer briefs on, I led her out of the room and to the second bedroom. When I opened the door, she stomped her foot.

“I can’t believe I hadn’t snooped in here yet! What is wrong with me?”

Chuckles shook my chest as I watched her spin in a circle, taking in the room. The walls were filled with drawings I’d done, and my notebook sat right in the middle of my sketch desk. She made a beeline for it and started flipping through the pages.

I had all sorts of different things in there. Original designs, sayings that stood out to me sketched in varying script, and even faces and places that I’d remembered vividly enough to draw.

“Holy shit, Thatcher.”

I walked up behind her and put my lips to her shoulder. “Have you ever thought about getting a tattoo?”

She shook her head slowly as she flipped through the pages one a time. “No. I’ve never felt like there was anything I felt strongly enough about to commit to my skin for life.”

I nodded there, right in the crook of her neck, until the tickle of my facial hair made her shiver.

She paused on one page, and I read it over her shoulder. One of my absolute favorite sketches filled my chest with new meaning.





She was crazy. Wild.


Chaos & beauty.

My heart.





Mine.


Vulnerable and soft, she whispered right out into the emptiness of the room. “I want to be yours.”

My eyes closed and love overwhelmed me. “You f*cking are.”

Forever.





The huge motor whined as we sped up through a hole in traffic. People barely moved out of the way, but despite our slow progress toward someone’s life-or-death situation, I couldn’t find it in myself to get angry. It was three o’clock in the afternoon, I was sitting shotgun in a fire truck, and I was in all my motherf*cking glory.

“Thatch!” I shouted into my phone over the blaring sirens in the background.

“Cass? Where are you?”

“I’m in a fire truck cruising down 5th Avenue!”

“What?” he yelled. “I’m having trouble hearing you. It sounded like you said you’re in a fire truck.”

“You heard me right!” The sirens increased in three loud bursts as the fire engine maneuvered through an intersection. “I’m saving lives and putting out fires for the day!”