48 Kimmy
I heard him before I saw him.
I'd been sitting on the couch, knees drawn to my chest, scouring the news on my phone, hoping the unraveling of Caius Valmont had already magically begun. Even though I still had the footage.
My heart jumped in my chest at the sound, and I looked up from the screen to the door.
The main room was dark except for the line of wet city light leaking in through a small opening under the blackout shades.
Seven hesitantly crossed the threshold and stood just inside the door.
For a whole minute, he was still. His jacket, baseball cap, and pants were drenched with raindrops, and his face was hidden by a bandana. A puddle of mud was forming around his boots.
I unfolded myself, swung my legs over the edge of the couch, and rose up.
"I called you," I said.
He didn't answer.
"I called you a lot."
More silence.
"I was worried something happened to you," I admitted. I was worried you didn't want to talk to me anymore.
Instead of responding, he kicked off his boots, retrieved the yellow envelope from underneath his jacket and walked toward the table. He placed the envelope on the table, then removed his gloves and dropped them next to the envelope.
"Did you look?" I asked.
Seven moved to the refrigerator, pulled the door open, grabbed a bottle of water, but didn't do anything with it as if he was scared to bare his face in front of me.
Maybe I had imagined it all—him choosing to show himself.
He braced one hand against the fridge, staring at nothing and actively avoiding my gaze. He looked as he always did. But something in the angle of his spine read differently. Like he was bracing for something, or coming down off something hard.
I waited until he shut the fridge and turned to me.
"Are you okay?" I asked, feeling on edge.
The conversation felt one-sided. Still, I didn't want to be in complete silence. I'd been in it for the past two days.
Finally, he looked at me. His eyes seemed darker than normal, darker and stormier.
"No… I didn't have the guts," he said, jerking his chin in the direction of the envelope.
"Oh."
He took a step forward in my direction. Then another and another. Until we were close enough to touch. We didn't, though.
"How do you feel?"
I shrugged. "Fine."
He put the bottle down on the table, reached out, picked up my hand, and gently turned it over. His fingers traced the inside of my forearm, stopping at the purple-brown bruise just below the elbow. "Does it hurt?"
"No." That wasn't exactly a lie. I wasn't in pain anymore. I was high from his touch. He was like a battery, charging me up, and I felt it going down my legs and into my toes.
He held my wrist in both of his hands, careful, like he was afraid I'd break. He inspected the left side of my forehead and then dropped his gaze to my neck. "If I could, I'd kill him."
I smiled. "That's dramatic."
"I mean it."
"I don't need him dead, Seven," I whispered, trying to keep the flutter in my stomach under control. "I just want him to pay for what he did."
"He will."
Our eyes met, and we stared at each other for a long time. I felt that same familiar buzz just below my skin I felt every time he was near. I lifted both hands to his face and slowly grabbed the upper edge of the bandana.
He didn't stop me.
I pulled the fabric down his face, exposing it completely.
His jaw was cleanly shaved, and I wanted to touch it. I wanted to see if his skin was as smooth as it looked in the moonlight the other night. I wanted to kiss those lips to make sure I hadn't dreamt of it.
He was ethereal.
His mouth was a little asymmetric, the top lip fuller than the bottom. The thin scar at the corner was real, not a figment of my imagination. He looked tired. He looked like he hadn't slept in years. But he was stunning.
I couldn't resist. I ran my index finger gently over the scar and along his cheek. His jaw tightened at my touch. He looked into my eyes, but remained silent.
I moved closer.
Our bodies were separated by an inch of heated space.
"Kimmy," he started.
I launched myself at him, pressed my mouth to his.
It wasn't a romantic move. It was animalistic, unplanned, driven by the weeks of terror and tension, and everything I'd tried not to feel.
He didn't move at first as if shocked by my boldness.
Then his mouth slacked a little, molding against mine as if testing the waters.
His lips moved, crashing mine. He kissed me back like he was dying. Like he'd spent his whole life waiting to breathe, and this was his first hit of oxygen.
His hands curled around my neck gently and cupped my face. I couldn't tell where I ended and he began anymore. It was rough and desperate, then soft, then rough again, like he was fighting his own body for control.
His tongue parted my lips and slipped inside, licking mine. I gasped from the contact, felt electricity rushing down my chest and to my stomach, and then there was fire between my thighs.
Oh God. What was happening to me? I'd never once wanted a man so badly, not after the penthouse party.
I did now.
And it felt almost as if I didn't get to have him, I'd combust and burn in this blaze.
We kept on kissing until we ran out of air. He'd pull back, suck in a lungful and would kiss my cheek or my jaw next, or slide his lips over the bruising on my neck as if erasing away all the hurt, all the damages inflicted by someone else.
Then he suddenly stopped, drew back an inch, just enough to put some distance between our mouths. His forehead was still pressed to mine. His breath was ragged, almost as if he was running out of gas.
"This is a bad idea," he whispered.
"Why?"
"You don't know what I am."
"I don't care," I said, and I meant it.
He grabbed my face in both hands, held it there. "I'm not the man for you, Kimmy. I'm bad. Rotten on the inside. Damaged goods."
I laughed quietly. "Don't you know? I'm a little rotten on the inside, too."
He closed his eyes. When he opened them again, they were even darker than before. Hungry. "You deserve better."
"No," I said. "I deserve exactly what this is because I want it."
He groaned. "I won't win this argument, will I?"
"No."
He seemed to fight with himself on the inside for exactly three seconds before he grabbed my chin, tilting it up to kiss me again. This time it was slower. His tongue found mine, caressed it with reverence that felt like a prayer. A jolt went through my body.
He ran his hands down my back, under the hem of the shirt, found my waist, and yanked me forward. I could feel him, hard and alive, through his pants.
He bit my bottom lip. "If you want me to stop, now is the time."
"I don't."
He grabbed my ass and lifted me up. It was an instinct. Like some primal part of me knew to wrap my legs around his torso.
He carried me to the bedroom, stumbling over a chair on the way. He didn't bother with the lights. Lips still on mine, he set me down on the bed, then wrestled out of his jacket. He only stopped kissing me when he needed to remove his T-shirt.
The body underneath was all lean corded muscle and I pulled back a little to study it, to memorize the lines of him, the angel wings tattoo, and the shape of the burn scar. Even the new one from the stabbing incident that had already healed a great deal.
He caught me looking. "Does this scare you?" he rasped out, tilting his head forward to meet my gaze again.
"No," I said and reached out for his zipper. He stood at the edge of the bed, towering over me as I yanked his pants and his boxers down his thighs, freeing his erection.
My body responded immediately, betraying me completely. My nipples hardened and my pussy clenched at the sight of his cock. It was big and thick, and stood at attention, and I'd wondered if looking at it would make me change my mind, would make me not want to have him inside me.
It didn't.
I desired him with the kind of despair I'd never felt in my entire life. I wanted him to erase all the past, to cleanse me from these memories, to ruin me to the point where I fell apart so he could put me back together again.
The burn scar ended just below his hip bone, and I traced the edge of it with my index finger.
His muscles tensed.
I looked up.
We stared at each other.
"Do you understand what we're about to do?" he asked as he wrapped his hand around his cock and stroked himself a couple of times. It sounded a little mechanical as if he was reading this off some invisible manual, but I understood why he asked.
"I'm an adult woman," I whispered and reached around to place both hands on his ass. Then I pulled him closer.
"You sure you want to do this?" His voice was tight.
"I'm very sure."
He nudged me back and I fell onto my elbows. He climbed onto the bed, sat on his haunches and kissed me again. I was wet, I realized. Everything between my legs was swollen and aching from the need and my panties were soaked.
When we came up for air, I placed my palms on his chest and dragged them across his skin.
He shuddered, ground his teeth, as if he was in physical pain, but let me map out every inch of him while watching me with those unsettling eyes. His hand wrapped around my waist, his other one curled around my shoulder and my skin sizzled from the contact even through the fabric of my T-shirt.
We kissed in between the exchange of touches until our lungs couldn't take the torture of being air-deprived anymore.
When he pulled back, his hand moved from my shoulder to my jaw, his thumb on my lower lip, pressing into it just a little. "We shouldn't be doing this," he said. It was so quiet, I thought I read his mind instead of hearing him say it. "I shouldn't be doing this to you."
"Why?"
"Because…" He paused.
"Because of what had happened to me?" I finished for him.
"Yes."
"It wasn't consensual. This is different. This is what I want."
He drew a lungful of air through his teeth. There was a shaky quality to his inhale. "I don't think I can control myself with you. I'm not the one to do this with."
"You're perfect," I murmured as I landed a kiss on the spot above his collarbone.