Chapter 10 #2
Rafe moves to the hearth, his movements heavy and deliberate.
He flicks a metal lighter, the flame dancing against the dry kindling until the fire roars, casting flickering orange light over his massive frame.
He strips off his helmet. The dark headgear hits a wooden table.
He strips his tactical rig, but stays in his dark shirt. He turns around.
I pull my blackout helmet off. My dark hair falls in a wild, tangled mess around my shoulders. I clutch the oversized leather jacket to my chest.
He stares at my face. He sees the wreck the night made. Smudged lipstick. Exhausted eyes. Trembling hands.
Calix’s vile insults echo in the quiet room.
Another man’s mistake.
The words hit like poison. Tainted. Wrong in my own skin. I wrap my arms tighter around my ribs. The splintering pieces refuse to hold together. The spiral begins. A panic attack threatens to swallow me whole.
Rafe’s jaw clenches. A thick muscle leaps in his cheek. He watches my breathing turn shallow and erratic.
He steps into my space. No sweet platitudes. No gentle comfort.
“Hit me.”
Confusion cuts through the rising panic. “What?”
“You are shaking.” He crosses his arms over his broad chest. “You are holding it all inside. It will eat you alive. Hit me.”
I step back. He steps forward.
“He put his hands on you for the cameras.” Rafe uses his rough, gravelly voice to dig at the buried Costa rage. “He threatened your kid. And you just stood there and took it.”
Anger sparks hot and fast.
“I had to.” The tremor in my voice is undeniable.
“You do not have to do anything anymore.” Rafe looms over me. “Fight back, Lucia. Hit me.”
I shake my head.
“Are you a coward?” He pushes harder. “Are you exactly what Dominic thinks you are? A weak, compliant little sister?”
The anger explodes.
I swing my fist into his solid chest.
It is like punching a concrete wall. Pain shoots up my wrist.
Rafe doesn’t flinch. He doesn’t move a millimeter. “Again.”
I hit him again. Harder. The oversized leather jacket restricts my movement, but fury provides the strength.
I hit his shoulder. His ribs. Over and over again.
“He is a monster!” The scream tears raw from my throat. “Dominic is a monster!”
My fists pound against his scarred chest. Twenty-seven years of rage unleash into the freezing cabin air. The terror of the bathroom stall. The fear for Tyra’s life.
I break down.
My strikes turn sloppy. My breathing turns into ragged, desperate sobs. Hot tears stream down my face.
I pound my fists against him until the rage turns to exhaustion. I fall against him, my face buried in the dark fabric that smells of baked leather and gun oil. I let him see every single piece.
His arms wrap around my shaking body. He absorbs it. He takes every ounce of the terror and anchors it to his own frame.
His head lowers. His mouth presses against my forehead. A long, hard kiss. Then another. The rough bristles of his beard scrape my skin. His calloused hand strokes down the center of my spine in a slow, grounding rhythm.
For the first time in my entire life, the mask falls away. I don’t have to calculate survival. The cage door is shattered. The vast, open sky is terrifying, but Rafe is a solid mountain. He makes me feel fiercely protected. He makes me feel aggressively wanted.
My wet cheek rests against the rough fabric of his dark shirt. The sharp scent of cold rain and pure danger fills my lungs.
My hands unclench from his chest. My fingers slide upward. I trace the thick, rigid muscles of his shoulders.
His breath locks in his chest.
The slow strokes on my back stop. His hand slides lower. He grips the lush curve of my hip over the thick tactical canvas of the borrowed pants. The blistering heat of his palm burns through the heavy fabric.
The embrace shifts.
The air in the freezing cabin turns thick and heavy. A dark, possessive hum vibrates deep in his chest.
I tilt my tear-streaked face up and look straight into feral, golden eyes.
The emotional dam breaks.
I don’t know who moves first.
The kiss is a collision.
Raw. Punishing. Desperate.
Rafe crushes his mouth over mine. He tastes the salt of my tears. A deep groan rumbles in his throat. The control he fought so hard to maintain fractures clean through.
He backs me hard against the solid log wall of the cabin. The impact knocks the remaining breath from my lungs.
His large hands drag over my body. He claims my mouth with territorial dominance. The line blurs between rough comfort and primal heat.
I grab the collar of his dark shirt. I yank him closer. The friction is necessary. The fire is demanded.
He breaks the kiss to drag the oversized leather jacket off my shoulders. It hits the wooden floorboards with a heavy thud.
My hands slide upward, and I yank his shirt over his head. That’s when I see them—the raised, jagged burn scars mapping his chest and shoulder. The scars burn hot against my palms. I drag my fingernails down his hard abdomen. A harsh curse breaks from his lips.
His hands drop to the waistband of my borrowed tactical pants. He doesn’t bother with the buttons. He grips the thick material and yanks it sharply down my hips.
“I am going to tear these off you,” he snarls, his teeth grazing my earlobe as his large hands grip the meat of my bare thighs.
He shoves me back against the log wall, his heavy, rigid cock grinding against my soaking pussy.
“And then I am going to breed that Costa princess out of you. I’m going to fill you so full of my seed you’ll forget any other man ever tried to claim you.
You’re in a wolf’s den now, Lucia. And I’m going to make sure you take up every inch of my bed tonight. ”