12. Zane
12
ZANE
She walks out of the bathroom as fresh and pink and sweet as a summer rose, far quicker than I expected, and I still only have a towel around my waist having showered in the ensuite next door.
Willow is wearing little pyjama shorts that reveal her legs, and a top with tiny straps. Her nipples are clearly visible. My cock responds immediately.
“You have tattoos,” she murmurs.
I struggle with the instinct to put on a shirt as she approaches. I’m covered in tattoos and scars, and tattoos that cover uglier scars. Her looking at my naked chest is revealing the dark crevices of my past, and I don’t want to scare her.
“You have a tree tattoo? Or is it a bush?”
“A mulberry,” I explain in a low voice. It covers a nasty scar from the fight that made me a kingpin. “It’s an emblem of Bethnal Green. I had it done when I took over the territory.”
“Oh, they all have meanings?” She gets this curious look in her eyes. Green eyes to go with my territory. As though I needed more signs that this was meant to be.
“Yeah.”
“What are these?” She points at the mulberry fruits and skeleton hands that run down both my arms.
There is no nakedness like someone asking about your tattoos. “Each fruit represents one of my brothers.”
“You have brothers?” She tilts her head like she can’t imagine it.
“Had. They weren’t biological brothers. They were my friends.” I swallow. “I killed them all. There was a difficult transition when the former kingpin was murdered. Not by me,” I hasten to say, an old twinge of hurt in my heart, no more than an echo now. “Shane Bethnal was like a father.”
“ Like a father?” Her gaze flicks between examining my body with something like fascination, and looking up into my eyes. “Not your actual father?”
I point at my side.
“Smith?” She runs her hands over the gothic lettering.
“I’m an orphan.” Is it shameful to admit that? Perhaps, but Willow’s face just pinches with sympathy, not disgust. “It was my surname because they couldn’t think of anything else. I was brought up in care.”
“But now your surname is Bethnal? Did you marry?—”
“No.” I quickly cut her off and see relief in the set of her shoulders. Was my little bunny jealous? “I adopted the name when I took over the territory. But I didn’t want to forget.”
“I like that.” Reaching out, she runs her hands over my upper arms, and continues to explore, circling me. There are some tattoos I’d really rather not explain, but I do. Detailing the kills and the deals, the small triumphs and the losses as I climbed my way up to where I am now.
“There’s a blank here.” She’s made her way around and stands before me again, tracing the space over my heart. The dip of my sternum and most of my left pectoral is only covered with dark hair. No ink.
“I never found anything I want to put there,” I tell her rawly. “Until now.”
Her fingers stop moving, and she takes a breath, then pauses, as though she wants to speak.
“A tree would fit.” I didn’t know I was waiting for her. But it never felt right to get a tattoo in that spot, and now I know why. It’s for my girl.
“Another mulberry?” she asks tentatively.
“I was thinking of a willow,” I murmur. “With a pair of animals under it.” I push my hand into her hair, and she moans as I lower my head, breathing in her sweet strawberry scent. “Maybe a wolf and a little bunny.”
Leaning forwards, I press a kiss onto her sleek hair. “I want to breed you, like the little bunny you are. One baby, then another. Then a third, a fourth.”
Her lips part, but there’s hope in her eyes as she gazes up at me.
“Do you want that? A big family that we love and raise?”
She nods eagerly. “I’ve always felt like it should have been like that for me, but…”
“Same.” I never had a family, and she, for all that she’s a Maldon and had three brothers, didn’t either. “We’ll have a family who is cherished and protected.”
Deliberately, I run my hand down her side, familiarising myself with every inch of her. “I want to know you better than you know yourself. I’m obsessed with you, Willow.”
I almost kiss her mouth, but fuck, as I’m a whisper away from her lips, I remember. Firsts. Only firsts.
For now.
So instead of devouring her as I’d like to, I put a hand to her back and tip her onto the bed. She shrieks and giggles as she bounces on the mattress, then stares up at me, taking me in as I discard the towel.
“I always sleep naked.” But I don’t always lower myself onto the bed with a hard-on that could break diamonds.
She bites her lip and doesn’t take her eyes off me as I pull back the covers and let her wriggle underneath.
A soft huff of amusement stops me as I’m about to join her.
“What’s so amusing, little bunny?” I say severely. No man wants his naked body laughed at.
“Nothing,” she says, faking innocence.
I raise one eyebrow.
“It’s just…” She pauses and rakes her gaze over my chest again. “I thought earlier that you couldn’t look more attractive than you did in that suit.” Her mouth stretches into a wry smile. “Totally wrong.”
“Careful. You wouldn’t want to swell my… Ego any more.”
“It might explode,” she replies. My naughty minx.
I slide into bed and pull her into my arms.
“I like this side of you,” she whispers.
“The rough side?” My scars and tattoos are hardly attractive for a sweet thing like her.
“Relaxed. Funny. Telling me about yourself. Real,” she says with a blush. “Though I like it when you take charge too.”
I tangle my fingers in her hair. It’s warm silk. “Both sides are real, little bunny.”
She sighs contentedly.
“First time I’ve seen a man naked.” Her gaze dips again to my chest.
Fuck. I am a fuckwit. I have made this impossible for myself, and wasted a first on getting into bed with her. Am I only going to see Willow naked once, too?
As I wrestle with what I can possibly say, her eyelids droop closed like a sleepy kitten, until she gives in, and her breathing is deep and even.
Watching her sleep—so beautiful, so young, so innocent—a sheen of guilt emerges onto my skin. I am not good enough. I shouldn’t have made this devil of a bargain with her, she had no choice at all.
But every breath is the scent of strawberries, and looking at her…
There wasn’t any option for me either.
I have to find a way to make her want to stay.
Something. Anything.
And I have an idea. Pulling my phone from the bedside table, I put my plan into action. Half an hour later, I’ve done what’s needed and toss my phone back in favour of holding my sleeping girl with both arms.
She won’t get away from me.