Beautiful Broken Promises(25)

When he walked away from the bed and scooped up his bag, I rushed to say, “Don’t make me stick a needle in your eye.”

He let out a deep chuckle that was way too sexy for my own good. Then I watched as he searched through his bag before setting some pill bottles of his own on top of the dresser close to mine.

“Trust me, I’m not going anywhere.” He popped the top of his first bottle and let a few slide into his mouth. I watched the muscles in his throat bob up and down as he swallowed. He stared just like I had at the second one, but he ignored it as well.

“Pain meds?” I asked mockingly. He grunted in response and I smirked at the fact that we both didn’t seem to trust too easily. I knew I was too afraid of not being of sound mind around him and I wondered if he felt the same way.

He pulled a few supplies out of his bag and then to my chagrin, he tugged the back collar of his shirt over his head. My mouth blatantly hung open and there was no hope of it closing anytime soon. His body was unreal. Literally, it had to have been some kind of illusion, something straight out of my creative imagination.

The muscles in his back moved with a raw elegance that I had never thought possible for someone his size. They bulged and flexed with the movement of his good arm. The graceful line of his spine created the perfect symmetry for each side of his well-defined back. The line was a tease that disappeared into his shorts and I let my mind wander with thoughts of what his butt looked like. Probably perfect.

His skin was smooth and a blank canvas, all except for a little bit of script low on the back of his neck. I couldn’t make it out, but it looked like it fit perfectly, just resting above his shoulder blades.

He leaned toward the mirror over the chest of drawers and examined the area on top of his shoulder that was covered in white surgical tape and gauze. He began pulling back the tape and I watched the creases in his eyes as he winced. He moved to the other side and tried to pull the tape from there, but I could tell the movement from one arm pulled too much on the other, causing him a significant amount of pain.

I sighed and walked toward him. Scooping up all of his materials, I made my way to the adjoining room. If I was going to do it, I needed light and I didn’t want to disturb Kate and Braden. He stood there frozen, still leaning toward the mirror and watching me through it. I crossed through the double doors and a few beats later he shadowed behind me.

I pointed to the chair near the window and went to the bathroom to wash my hands. When I returned, I watched him effortlessly drag the chair in front of the mirror. He seated himself facing the glass, probably so he could watch me in the reflection.

“Don’t trust me?” I asked, repeating yet another one of his lines back to him.

“Should I trust you?” he asked gruffly.

If I could have, I would have dug my fingers so far into his shoulder he wouldn’t even consider saying something like that to me again. Instead, I kept it short and sweet. “I kept your daughter alive for four years. If that’s not trustworthy, I don’t know what is.”

A harsh breath rushed past his teeth and he closed his eyes, not willing to look at me any longer. Fine, I could deal with that. I grabbed the edges of the tape on his shoulder and quickly yanked it back. I was mindful of his injury, but I could really care less if the skin around it became a little sore.

“Agggh!!” he yelled, but it was muffled by the fact that he covered his mouth with his good arm. “Okay shit, I deserved that!”

“Please, stop insinuating that I’m a kidnapper,” I whispered. “I would never...” My eyes became glassy and I stifled the sob in my chest. “I would never put those children in danger. Never.” My last word came out as a harsh bite.

“Fine...” he grumbled, like a child who had just been reprimanded.

“Mr. Parker—”

“Please stop calling me that. I don’t pay you anymore and it’s just weird. Too formal. Besides, you’re not that much younger than me.”

“How old are you?” I asked.

“Twenty-eight. And you’re what… twenty-four?” he returned.

I nodded and said, “Okay... Lane...” I took a deep breath and thought about the best way to approach this without having to drag it into a prolonged conversation. I really would like to catch some sleep before the morning. “She tricked me. Mrs. Flores. She used my na?vety against me and she did it well. I just assumed she was some overly curious old lady that wanted to talk about a young girl’s life at the park.” I used some of the hand sanitizer he had on the dresser and began to take a good look at his shoulder. “I was an idiot.”