Savage Redemption (3rd in Savage Series)

Chapter Nine

"'Bout how you'd imagine I guess." he replied. Allie scolded her heart and told it to slow down when Jack moved a little closer and then turned so that his shoulder was nearly pressed against hers as they stood side by side and looked out at the water.

"How have you been, Allie?" Jack asked. Allie snorted and threw the rifle over her shoulder.

"Like you care." she spat. Jack's eyes narrowed as he looked at the water.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" he asked, trying to keep his voice calm and free of anger.

"Five years, Jack. You've been gone five years and not once have you bothered to check on me."

"I couldn't, Allie." Jack replied. He had tried but his pa and his brother had taught him real quick that the past was the past and he couldn't try to go back to it… Or even send it a letter.

"You were probably too busy running crazy, playing poker, drinking whiskey and bedding whores to even think about me." Allie replied harshly. Jack felt his temper rise then. How dare her try to say he had not thought about her when it was thoughts of her that had kept him alive.

"You don't know what the hell you're talking about." he said, crossing his arms over his chest angrily.

"So I guess you're gonna tell me that there hasn't been a single other woman?" Allie demanded irritably. Jack shook his head.

"No I ain't gonna lie to ya. I have never lied to you before and I won't start now."

"So you have slept with other women!" Allie exclaimed accusingly.

"Don't judge me, doll, I ain't the one that's engaged." Jack replied. He didn't understand women one bit. Instead of being upset and wanting to know how many people he had killed, all she wanted to know what how many women he'd slept with. "Those other women don't matter no how. There's only ever been one woman in my heart."

"I never had your heart, Jack. If I had then you wouldn't have been able to leave me the way you did. And don't act like I betrayed you by getting engaged to Gavin. He is a good man and he cares about me and I care about him."

"That's nice that you care about each other but do you actually love that city boy?" Jack asked with disbelief.

"I um.. I do love him…" Allie replied weakly.

"But you're not in love with him are you?" Jack asked. He turned his body so that he could look down at her. Only inches separated them and Allie could feel the heat off his body and the warmth of his breath as it washed over her face. She felt a heat and a tingling starting low in her belly and spreading from her head to toes as if her blood was catching fire. She licked her lips and tried to back away from him as he continued to speak.

"Do you find it hard to breath when he gets close? Does your body fill with heat and does your heart beat faster?" Jack asked and Allie could hear the passion in his voice as she started having trouble breathing and her heart beat so fast she feared it might explode.

"I don't even know what those things are that you're talking about. They are not love." Allie replied, desperate for those things to not be love because she was feeling them right now and it wasn't her fiance that was causing them.

"Passion, Allie. They are passion." Jack replied, his voice deeper and more gruff. Allie felt her back press against a tree and knew she had no where else to run. Jack closed the distance between them and stared down into her dark brown eyes. Five long years he had dreamed of being this close to her again. Five long years he had done everything he could to get away from his pa and his brother and when he finally had and he had finally made it back home he had found the only woman he had ever loved engaged to someone else.