Page 27 of Texas Hold Em’ (The Devil’s Luck MC #3)
JAMESON
S omething dug into my lower back in the middle of the night. I hissed in pain and recoiled as Carrie’s heel struck me again right in the soft spot below my kidneys.
“Damn it, woman!” I barked and tried to squirm away from her.
At first I thought she was just trying to get comfortable, but as I rubbed at my eyes and woke up properly, I realized she was thrashing around in her sleep.
Her fists were balled up, her brow was furrowed, and every now and then she made thin noises of distress through clenched teeth.
“Carrie?” I called out to her, but she didn’t hear me. Sweat beaded on her brow and matted her hair. Her whole pillowcase was soaked and so were the sheets beneath her.
What the hell was going on?
“Hey,” I called louder, rising to my knees and leaning over her as she thrashed and kicked. I took a knee to the ribs as I held her face in my hands and called her name over and over.
Finally, her eyes opened.
But she didn’t see me. And if she did? Well, it scared the hell out of her.
She screamed and kicked more furiously. Her knee drove up into my hip and her elbow clocked me in the nose. I grunted but didn’t back off. She tried to claw at my face, but I caught her wrists and held them down on either side of her head.
“Carrie! Damn it, it’s me! It’s Tex!”
She writhed but only for a few seconds longer before falling still and staring up at me. The whites of her eyes disappeared as the panic in her face ebbed away. She searched my face as her breaths came in ragged gasps.
“Tex?”
“I’m here. You’re okay. It was just a bad dream.”
“A bad dream,” she murmured. “Yes… a bad dream.”
I released her wrists and rubbed at my nose. “Do you remember what happened?”
Her brow creased more deeply and she closed her eyes. She shook her head fiercely. “I don’t want to. Tex. Please. ”
“Hey,” I said, stroking her hair and wondering what the hell had scared her so badly. She sniffled and reached for me, and I did the only thing I could think to do. I rocked back on the mattress until I was sitting cross-legged, and I pulled her up into my lap.
Carrie fell to pieces in my arms.
She sobbed harder than ever—so hard I worried she couldn’t breathe—and curled into the fetal position in my lap. She was naked and so vulnerable, and I didn’t know what else I could do for her. She felt so fragile in my arms, like a small bird with broken wings, and she needed me.
But what if I wasn’t enough?
“Carrie,” I whispered. “I’m sorry.”
She sobbed harder.
Fuck.
I stopped trying to talk. Nothing I could say would spare her this pain, so I held her tighter, kissed the top of her head, and let her cry. She didn’t hold back. Her pain poured out of her and threatened to destroy me. I hated how helpless I felt.
What was worse?
I hated that I was the only one who could fix this, but I couldn’t. The only way to spare her this suffering would be to go back on the plans we’d made. To bow out. To give in.
I simply couldn’t do that.
So I let her cry.
When she started to tremble, I brought her back down under the blankets with me.
I kept a strong hold on her, keeping her crushed up against me as I brought the blankets up and tucked her in.
Her shivering stopped quickly, and she wrapped her arms around my waist and pressed her tear-soaked cheek to my chest. Her sobs slowed, and her breathing evened out, but we didn’t move.
Finally, she spoke. “I dreamed you were dead.”
I felt shallow. While she was tortured by her nightmare, I dreamed of coming home late one night and finding Carrie, naked, straddling my motorcycle in the middle of my apartment. No, the dream didn’t make sense, but everything we’d done after I found her?
Well, nothing made more sense than that.
“I dreamed it all went wrong,” she whispered. “I’m so scared for you, Tex. I don’t want to do this.”
“I know.”
“Please don’t make me.”
Her words threatened to drown me.
Gently, I pulled her away so we could lie face to face on our pillows and talk. I needed to look her in her eyes. I needed to see her understand my words.
I cupped her cheek. “Have you forgotten who you are, Carrie Hart? You’re the tough as nails Ranger who doesn’t take shit from anyone.
You came here to expose police corruption and put an end to Walter Bates.
And you’re doing it. You knew it wouldn’t be easy.
You knew there would be risks, and you did it anyway, because that’s who you are. It’s who we are.”
She sniffled. “We?”
“Rangers.”
Carrie’s sniffles stopped.
“If I still wore the badge,” I said slowly, “you would let me make this choice, wouldn’t you? You would trust me? ”
She closed her eyes and pressed her cheek more firmly into my palm.
“Answer me, Carrie.”
She licked her lips. “Maybe.”
“Open your eyes.”
Her eyes fluttered open and danced with tears.
“I’ve escaped death more times than I can count on both hands,” I told her. “If tonight is the night I go? Well, I’ve already made my peace with that, especially if it means finding justice for William.”
“Please don’t talk like this. I can’t bear it.”
“But,” I said, running my thumb under her eye to wipe away a new tear that escaped, “if Brody brings me back and I get to fight on Friday night alongside my brothers? Well, that will make me the luckiest man alive, because after the fight I’ll have your lips to kiss. Your body to make mine.”
Carrie’s eyes danced back and forth between mine. Her lips were parted ever so slightly, and as she gazed into my eyes, the tears stopped. “To make yours?”
“Yes,” I said firmly. “Mine.”
Carrie drew herself up to me and pressed her lips to mine. She tasted like salt and couldn’t breathe through her nose after all the crying. I didn’t care. She was sweet and soft in all the right places. I gripped her ass and held her fiercely to me, loving how she hooked a leg over mine.
When the kiss ended, she closed her eyes and left her forehead pressed to mine. “I’m already yours, Tex.”