Hook
HOOK
H ook was shaking harder than Nova was when he led her into the apartment and straight to the bathroom. Even with her earlier reassurance that Brent wasn’t Casey, he’d almost hoped he had been. That would’ve meant that chapter of his life would finally be closed, the wound cauterized.
Maybe that’s why he saw similarities everywhere. But one look at the body on the floor proved him wrong. Not only was his old wound flayed open and gushing blood again, but it also renewed his obsession with eliminating Casey. It saddened him for what he would be losing. He knew his MO; he’d push the people he loved away when that obsession took over every cell in his body. It was the brotherhood of the Bastards that had pulled him back last time.
That’s why he’d buried it deep, bringing it up just renewed his determination to rid the world of a monster. He’d gotten close once, right before he became a prospect. That’s when he found out that Casey had gone back to trading sex for favors, barely ever stopped. If that had been all, he could’ve taken pity on him. People who have nothing to bargain with but their bodies aren’t inherently bad people. But word on the street was he exploited his customers; one person even suspected he was recruiting others.
Prospecting took all his time, and he resolved that suspicion wasn’t proof. So, when he’d lost the trail, he tried to let it go. thought Casey had finally moved on to another state. Some said Vegas, so let it go and embraced his club, his family…his future.
drew a bath and poured some Epsom salts in for any aches she had. Nova was right where he’d left her, standing by the sink.
“Babe? Let’s get you cleaned up.” She raised her eyes and smiled at him. It was a small smile, but it gut-punched him. took the phone from her hand and set it on the counter.
He didn’t know exactly what she’d gone through, but when Carl had looked him in the eye and shook his head, a silent understanding passed between them. She wasn’t raped, that was something. However, there were a lot of things a man could do to a woman that were still bad.
“I’ll try not to touch you, but we have to get these off.”
She raised her arms. “It’s not that , I promise. I want you to touch me. Always.”
He pulled the shirt over her head and locked his green eyes on her brown. Searching for…he didn’t know.
“I promise. I love you, remember? I just need to get rid of…” She motioned her arms up and down her body. “This. I’m filthy.”
He understood that feeling.
The way she said the last word broke something in him. nodded and forced himself to speak around the lump in his throat.
Yes, Carl indicated as much, but he needed to hear it from Nova. “Did he…I mean?” He couldn’t bring himself to even utter the word.
Nova cupped one of his cheeks. “No. Not that. He tried, but Carl got there in time.” The sigh of relief he breathed was almost painful in its intensity. He would not only see Linda cared for as promised, but he’d make damn sure that Carl was set up in prison too, as much as was within his power.
“He did…well.” She indicated her face. ’s heart felt like it was in a vice until she amended. “Not that, I didn’t mean…” She sounded exhausted. “Can we talk about it later? I just want to take a bath and be held by the man I love.”
“We don’t have to talk about it unless you want to.” knew that holding on to that kind of secret would slowly rot the soul from the inside out, but he also knew that being needled about it rotted it from the outside in.
shucked his clothes while Nova brushed her teeth. After leading them to the oversized tub, he sank in first, coaxing her in after him. Nova leaned back into his body with a sigh. simply held her.
When the water started to chill, he used his foot to turn the faucet on as hot as he thought she could stand. Reaching behind him, he grabbed the shampoo bar and gently rubbed it into her hair. Placing it aside, he massaged her scalp, and she sighed.
Using the cup on the side of the tub, he rinsed her hair before lathering the washcloth and washing her body. She relieved him of the cloth and scrubbed her face. After about three minutes, he stopped her. She was scrubbing her face and neck raw.
Nova held the washcloth to her mouth with his hand still over hers, and she wept. “He said the vilest things about my daughter. He was going to sell her and then use her to breed more kids to exploit. That was his plan. I can’t comprehend how a father could even think such things.”
It took everything in him not to shush her. Each word was like a bullet ricocheting around the bathroom. Piercing his heart and hers too.
“Fathers can’t, Nova. Not real fathers. That man was no father.” He may not know what a father was, but if getting bounced from foster home to foster home to group home to group home taught him anything, it was what a father was not .
Nova sniffed and dropped the washcloth. “You’re right, . You’re more of a father to June than he ever was.” He inhaled her words like oxygen. Nova stood and turned before she lowered herself back into the water.
Her body never failed to entice him, but she wasn’t ready for that kind of attention yet. never felt so flawed as he did in that moment. He’d always dealt with things with either violence or sex. Even if what he was dealing with was the same thing. He was a sick fuck, but he wouldn’t taint Nova with that. If Barbara had taught him anything, it was that he was not a slave to his body, he was its master. He willed his dick not to respond.
Nova wrapped her body around his, resting her cheek on his chest. “Thank you.” He whispered against the crown of her head with a lazy kiss. No one ever thought about him the way Nova did.
“It’s true. You’re not only the father I’d choose for her, you’re the man I’d choose for me.” Her words were sleepy and relaxed. He hated to disturb her, but he needed to see her eyes. Erase his ridiculous insecurity that she didn’t realize who she was speaking to.
Lifting her face gently, he met her gaze. “You don’t mean that, Nova. You’re hurt right now.”
Her expression was confused and angry.
“First of all, don’t ever tell me I don’t know my own mind, and second, stop doubting your worth. Just because no one else can see it doesn’t mean it’s not there. You’re everything I’ve ever wanted. You said you claimed us earlier. Did you not mean it?”
“Of course I meant it. It’s just…” He didn’t know how to explain how he backslid after seeing with his own eyes that Brent wasn’t Casey. But he had.
“I’ve had my obsession under control for years, but…” Fuck. How could he phrase it so she didn’t think it was her fault? “I have to protect June, and knowing Casey is still out there, I can’t sleep.”
lost focus momentarily as Nova caressed his cheeks.
“I am sitting here plotting to take a man’s life for crying out loud, Nova. I am not the good man you think I am. I will scorch the earth if it means keeping you and my little girl safe. Do you understand that?”
When he focused on her face, she was smiling. Smiling.
“How can you smile? The man who wants to fuck you senseless, even after what you just went through, told you he is premeditating murder, and you’re smiling?”
stood them up in the tub, snapping the towel down from the rack, and wrapped it around Nova. She still smiled at him, almost like she was drunk.
Lifting her straight up, he carried her to the bed. Setting her down just enough to flip the comforter back, he dried her hair a little and wrapped the towel around her head. He then coaxed her under the covers.
She still smiled. It worried him.
“You’re in shock. I’m going to call Joanie. She’ll know what to do.” He walked off to dry himself and find his phone.
“?”
He walked back to the bed and raised the phone to his ear, waiting for Joanie to answer.
Nova sat up and took the phone away. Ending the call and tossing it aside.
“I’m not in shock.”
“Yes, you are.” He leaned over her, reaching for the phone.
She wrapped her arms around him before he could reach it.
“What did I tell you about knowing my own mind?” She spoke softly and tugged at him. He allowed her to drag him down. He shifted to land on the bed rather than on top of her.
was genuinely puzzled when he gazed into her eyes. He brushed her cheek with the back of his fingers. She looked perfectly fine, better than before. Even the exhaustion was pushed away, but he knew it couldn’t be gone.
“I’m sorry, Nova. I’m not a smart man, and I don’t understand.”
“You said, my little girl.”
He tilted his head.
“She is, you know. Yours. And so am I.” Nova kissed him. It was gentle at first, but as her words sank in, took it deeper. When she moaned, he remembered where they were and what had just happened.
pulled away and looked into her eyes.
“Make love to me, Jeremy.”
“But—”
“But nothing. I can’t stand it if Brent’s is the last touch before I go to sleep. I need your touch to cover up the ghost of his. Then we can sleep and go see our daughter.”
That was all it took. As Nova shimmied down the bed, he rolled to his back. She settled between his thighs, tossing the towel from her hair.
“Fuck, you look like a goddess.” The sight of her licking up his cock was heavenly. The opposition between her hot mouth wrapped around the head of his cock and her cool, wet hair pooling on his thigh brought him almost to the edge of orgasm.
Testing the limits of his control, he kept his hands to himself when his instinct told him to hold her head down and fuck her mouth. He understood the aftermath better than most. She would need to be the conductor of their pleasure. One hundred percent within her control. clasped his hands behind his head and kept them there while she sucked him all the way to orgasm. Instead of swallowing, she pulled her mouth back and pumped his dick, directing his release and shifting her face in what seemed to be a very specific pattern.
Then he understood what she’d meant in the bathroom. Hell, he’d covered up touch before too. The urge to roar out was strong, he didn’t resist. Hopefully Nova thought it was just his release and not the anger and murderous rage it was. He wanted to ride back over to her house and eviscerate Brent’s corpse.
When Nova slid up his body, a shudder preceded her path. Gods, she was so beautiful with his cum dripping from her cheek and neck that he momentarily forgot why it was there. He made a mental note to repeat the facial when it served no other purpose but pleasure.
The thought of seeing his seed clinging to her eyelashes re-hardened his dick in record time.
Nova straddled him and lifted up. She gripped his rapidly hardening dick and sank down. With a moan, she leaned down to kiss him. He gripped her chin, his fingers slipping in his own cum, and he brought her the rest of the way to his lips. She spoke against his lips one word. “Neck.”
knew exactly what she needed. He deepened the kiss before sliding his hand down to encircle the front of her neck. He pushed her back into a sitting position. Even with his hand in its favorite place, she was still in control. Her hands at his chest curled in, scoring his skin with her nails.
matched the vigor of her touch, and she rode him hard. Fuck. There was no way he could come again without her, even if it meant wrestling with a modicum of control in their pleasure. With his free hand, he slipped it between them until he found her clit. He started with lazy circles that picked up speed the harder she rode.
prided himself on the control he’d gained over his body, even if it was won through adversity. But Nova was robbing him of that, and fast. He was about to blow again, so he pinched her clit in the way she loved. Her pussy rippled around him. Her moans of pleasure were silenced with his hand and his own groans of release.
When their bodies stopped pulsing, he pulled her face back to his and kissed her. Rolling them to the side, he slowly loosened his grip and released her lips.
“I fucking love you, Nova. Don’t ever leave me again.”
“Never…” Her voice trailed off as she lost her battle with exhaustion.
couldn’t sleep. Instead, he held Nova as she did, lazily caressing her shoulder.
He confessed to her in sleep what he’d tried to confess earlier.
“I can’t rest until my family is safe and Casey is dead. I pray to a god I don’t even believe in that you both can forgive me when it’s all said and done. But I have to end him. I can’t let it go any longer. I’ll lose a little bit more of myself every day that I know he draws breath until there’s nothing left.” He kissed her hair, and she shifted with a mumble.
“Casey’s already dead. Safe.” She burrowed deeper into his chest. He felt the words warm and humid against his skin before he heard them.
What?
Did he hear that correctly?
He was loath to wake her, but her words compelled his tongue. “What did you say about Casey?”
She opened her pretty brown eyes and looked up at him. “He’s dead. Brent killed him.”
“How do you know that? It makes no sense.” sat up, forcing her to do the same.
“There were things Brent said that add up with what you’ve told me. Casey stole him years ago and started a new business model. He sent him out to have kids of his own, so they didn’t have to risk taking kids anymore. Brent snapped and killed him.”
“I can’t.” threw off the comforter and started to pace. “It’s too convenient. This is real life, not a movie that gets wrapped up all nice and tidy before the credits roll. Life is messy, Nova. I’m messy...broken. I don’t know?—”
didn’t realize Nova had left the bed until he turned and almost ran into her. She stood in front of him with the sheet wound around her. His breath sawed in and out as he stared down into her face. Eyes glittering with love. He watched her every move as she raised her hands to his cheeks.
“You’re not broken, . Just a little dinged up.” She rose up on her toes and dropped a gentle kiss on his lips. “Just because you’ve not had many things work out before, you don’t trust it. I get that, but trust me . I wouldn’t lie to you. I promise you the things he said make me believe with my whole heart he wasn’t lying about killing Casey.”
didn’t know what to say, she was fucking right. He never trusted when things were going well, always waiting for the other shoe to drop. But she wasn’t asking him to trust the situation; she was asking him to trust her. The only people he’d trusted since Casey were his club brothers.
“If you’re not ready to trust me yet.” She dropped her hands and cast her eyes to where she picked at one of her nails. “My phone’s on the sink. It was recording the whole time.”
Nova turned from him. “I really wish you wouldn’t listen to it. There are things I’m ashamed for you to hear—things you can’t unhear but will wish you could. I would love it if you could just trust me, but I understand if you can’t.”
The hurt in her voice was killing him. He wanted to trust her. He wanted to remove those notes of sadness from her voice, but could he?
This was a moment, a very crucial moment. It would not only set the tone for any type of relationship they could have moving forward, it would also define him as a man, the type of human being he was going to be.
If he couldn’t give her his trust in this, he would never be close enough to another person to call what he would live a life.
took a tentative step toward her back, and then another. With a shaky hand, he reached out and brushed her hair aside and dropped a kiss on the nape of her neck.
“You, Nova. I trust you. I don’t have to hear it, it’s enough for me that you say it’s so.” Until he spoke the words, he feared they weren’t one hundred percent true. Once they were said, gravity lost its ability to hold him down, and the past relinquished its power to pull him backward.
She turned in his arms, and that’s when he saw it. Everything he was and ever wanted to be in her eyes.
“I love you so fucking much.” He kissed her, and she laughed.
“I fucking love you.”
Kiss.
Laugh.
“I mean it. I love you, Nova. I’ll never let you go. Once you’ve been snagged by , you stay snagged for good.”
Kiss.
Laugh.
“And now that you’ve snagged me, what are you going to do with me?”
“Take you to bed and make you scream my name, of course.”
He picked her up and tossed her back on the bed with a bounce.