Beyond the Horizon (Sons of Templar MC #4)(51)

Gently was where I started, hungry and claiming was where he finished it.

“You still want to try and look for answers at the bottom of a bottle, I won’t approve, but I’ll be there. You’ll do it at the club,” he said firmly against my mouth.

I nodded more on instinct than anything else. I was questioning the answers that lay at the bottom of any of the bottles I’d emptied. I knew that nothing of value was there, and it wasn’t exactly a long-term plan.

“Can I ask you one question?” he murmured softly, searching my face.

I nodded.

“Do you want to be with me? Do you feel this, us, right down to your soul?” he asked in a raspy tone.

I swallowed. “That’s two questions,” I whispered, my heart beating one hundred miles a minute.

Asher gave me a look but didn’t say a thing. He seemed to realize my need for silence. So he let the quiet expand while I searched my head.

“Yes,” I said finally. I opened my mouth to say the reasons why it wasn’t that simple. How he’d realized that I wasn’t right for him. How I was a broken shell that wouldn’t fool him for long. His finger at my lips silenced me.

“It’s that simple, flower. You want this, you feel this. I want you. I’ve f*ckin’ craved you for three years, babe. I’m holding on as tight as I can without bruising you, and I’m not letting go anytime soon,” he declared hoarsely. “That’s all there needs to be right now. You want me. I want you. The other shit doesn’t matter,” he said simply.

I wanted to believe that. With all of me, I did. I wanted to believe that fate had finished screwing with me, and somehow in the midst of all the turmoil in my life we could make it work. I knew doubt would creep in, later, in the future. But right now I did believe him, did feel the warmth settle in at his promise.

“Okay,” I whispered.

He nodded, kissing my nose. He moved me off him to tuck me back into his chest.

“Sleep now,” he commanded softly.

I snuggled closer to his warm body, squeezing my eyes shut. Hopefully, the presence of it would help make the nightmares go away.





I jolted awake with a pounding heart and a panicked mind. I was suffocating, choking, air trapped in my chest. My throat closed up, and I struggled to get any oxygen into my lungs, no matter how hard I sucked it in desperately. The light switched on, Asher’s worried face was illuminated, and he clutched my shoulders.

“Holy f*ck, Lily, what is it?” he commanded urgently, his eyes darting over my entire body as if he was looking for a wound.

I struggled to catch my breath, to get words out. It wasn’t lost on me, I hadn’t told him about my asthma, so he wouldn’t know about the terrifying attacks that had plagued me since I was a kid. Right after I turned nine in fact. I hadn’t had one in a long while, the terror was not unfamiliar, but unexpected.

“Lily?” he shouted as I wheezed, unable to speak.

Be calm. Try to be calm, I told myself. I knew panic made it worse. Calm is hard when an invisible hand tightened around your throat, making you drown with no water in sight. I moved my shaking arm to the drawer beside my bed where my inhaler lived.

“I’m calling a f*ckin’ ambulance,” he bellowed, his eyes saturated with panic he couldn’t disguise. “Breathe, flower, hold on,” he pleaded.

The door opened and Asher’s eyes cut to it, his body tightening even further. Bex didn’t even say a word, as soon as she laid her eyes on me, she knew what was going on. She rushed to the bed, pushing Asher’s hands off my shoulders. He moved, more with shock than anything else I think.

“Lilmeister, look at me,” she commanded calmly. “Go to your place,” she ordered softly.

“What the f*ck’s going on?” Asher yelled his phone at his ear.

Bex didn’t glance at him. “Get off the phone and get me the inhaler and nebulizer from the drawer beside her bed,” she snapped.

Asher’s face jolted for a spilt-second in surprise, then he moved.

“Lils, at me,” Bex commanded.

I locked my frantic eyes onto her calm ones.

“Think of the horizon,” she whispered as she fiddled with the inhaler Asher thrust into her hands. “You’re on a beach, remember? The air’s clear, it’s so warm it sinks into your bones, and you can hear the waves crashing in your ears. Take a deep breath, taste the saltwater air,” she commanded softly, her voice serene, eyes on me.

“What the f*ck is going on?” Asher shouted, juxtaposing Bex’s gentle tone. His eyes locked on mine with something I’d never seen behind them. Fear.

“She’s having an asthma attack,” Bex replied quickly.

She placed the nebulizer over my mouth and pressed the button on the inhaler.

“Breathe,” she instructed calmly.

I focused, remembering my mom doing the same thing when I was little. She’d be calm, not panicked as I struggled to catch a breath. She’d told me to think of a sunset, go somewhere else and close my eyes and focus on that, not the strangling feeling in my chest. She’d sat holding my inhaler, describing in her melodic voice the place where I could go to find a way to breathe, to get through. She was never frantic. Though I’m sure she felt it, she never let it show, not until after at least. Then she’d rush me to the ER.