Chapter 41 DESPITE EVERYTHING
I cling to him as he deepens our kiss, his mouth moving urgently against mine. He lifts and presses me against the wall, hand clutching my nape, fingers tangling in my hair. His tongue delves inside my mouth, licking, tasting, claiming me as heat unfurls low in my belly.
“Don’t cry,” he whispers. “Your tears hurt more than bullets.”
More sobs rack me. How could he kiss me, hold me like this after what I’d done? Even if it was an accident, even if I didn’t mean to. His parents and baby sister still died because of my actions.
I clutch his neck, pressing kisses over his tear-streaked face, the rough stubble on his jaw, his soft, beautiful lips, needing to tell him without words everything I’m feeling—love, guilt, regret, anger—too many emotions to name.
But I know this much.
It’s always been him.
“How do you not hate me?” I ask as we break apart for air.
Elias pulls in a rough breath, the green in his eyes long eclipsed by his pupils. He brushes his thumb tenderly across my cheek, wiping away my tears.
“I tried to tell myself I hate you,” he murmurs, his finger dipping to my bottom lip, slowly pressing until it trembles beneath his touch. “And sometimes I thought I had succeeded.”
A whimper lodges in my throat. Keeping my eyes locked on his, I suck his thumb, my tongue dipping out and swirling, mimicking what I want to do to all parts of him.
His nostrils flare. A vein pops on his forehead as his gaze fixes on my mouth.
“The truth is,” his voice is gritty like sandpaper, “it wasn’t your fault. You were a kid. You didn’t know any better. It was a fucking tragedy. But I wanted someone to hate—anyone. You. My parents, who were obviously involved in something they shouldn’t have been…but…”
Elias groans when I bite his thumb lightly. He presses closer, singeing me with the hot brand of his chest and the throbbing hard-on digging out of his pants.
“I could never hate you, my Lana Elise,” he murmurs against my lips before trailing kisses down my neck, leaving sparks in his wake. “I hated myself for not returning home sooner. For not being strong enough to stop them.”
“You were a kid too—”
“I couldn’t forgive myself, and hatred was all I had to keep me going. So I…I…”
He hated me. Hated himself. Self-inflicted punishment.
“Elias.” Tears cloud my vision.
“Shhh.” He nibbles the thin straps of my nightgown and drags them off my shoulders.
Cold air meets my skin as the fabric pools on the floor. Wetness slicks between my thighs as I rub my hard nipples against his shirt.
“Despite everything, I couldn’t stay away. I couldn’t let you go. I told myself my obsession with you was because of hatred. But that’s a lie.”
Hot, passionate kisses trail down my neck and I melt into him.
He presses his confession over my heart. “The truth is, you’re the only good thing in my life. And I would’ve done anything to remain in yours. Sending you puzzles, the necklace—they were all because I couldn’t leave you. I couldn’t stand to be cut off from you.”
Gripping my thigh, he bears down, dragging his groin against my soaked core, letting me feel every inch of him. “For the past twenty years, those twenty-eight minutes have been what I lived for each day.”
The hiss of the zipper slices through the air, and I moan when I feel his thick cock rubbing against the seam of my underwear.
“T-Twenty-eight minutes?” I whimper when his fingers tug on the straps, ripping the delicate fabric from my body.
“Your birthday, February twenty-eighth…the day the most beautiful angel descended on earth and the day I entered hell.”
Elias caresses my heavy tits, his thumb flicking one nipple while his mouth claims the other, mainlining ecstasy into my core.
My knees buckle, and he catches me easily. He hoists me up and drops me onto the bed.
A chilly draft meets my heated flesh. He hovers before me, his hands quick at work on his clothes, revealing every solid inch of him. Up close, I see the scars—slashes, burn marks, round puckered holes that must be from bullets.
Agony twists through me as I trail my fingers over each one, a testament of the pain he’s endured to transform from Kian to Elias.
Then there’s the scar bisecting his cheek.
I gently touch it, and he closes his eyes.
“This one I inflicted on myself,” he murmurs. “A reminder that the Kian, the pretty boy, couldn’t exist. Not if he wanted to avenge his family.”
A lump thickens in my throat as I press a kiss on the scar. “It must’ve hurt.”
“Don’t feel sorry for me,” he rasps.
He stands naked before me—glorious and breathtaking—a dark-haired demon with tattoos writhing up his arms, the vines swirling over scars. The simple Asian character stands out on his chest.
I trace the strokes with my fingertips.
He throttles out a breath and stills my hand. “Trust. Believe. It’s the Chinese word for it.”
“Because?” My gaze catches his.
His eyes soften, and he leans down, slowly pressing his hard frame against mine, burning me up with his presence.
Elias cradles my cheek the way he usually does—reverent, gentle, like I’m precious.
“I had it inked after the fire,” he says quietly. “When everything I believed in…was gone.”
Closing his eyes, he dips his forehead against mine. “At first, the tattoo was a reminder for me to keep going. To trust that I’d get through this. Find Sofia. Get revenge. It kept me standing while I worked my way through seedy clubs, collecting secrets, trading favors…”
“Becoming Elias Kent,” I whisper, my heart cleaving in half.
His voice thickens, and he presses my hand over his heart. “But I think…secretly,” he clutches my fingers tightly, “there’s a voice here that still hopes Elise can find a way to love the monster within.”
My breath hitches, and I pull him down and kiss him.
He still loves me. Elias, Kian, whoever he is now, this man in my arms loves me more than anything.
Our kiss turns messy. Teeth against teeth. Tongue dueling, soft suctions, sharp bites. He pins me onto the bed as he moves down my body, dragging kiss after kiss across every inch of me.
My clit throbs, my wetness leaking down my thighs. I’m aching, empty, needing him inside me, filling me up.
“Elias, please,” I moan.
“Please what?”
He bites my inner thigh, and I shudder.
“Fuck me. Make love to me. Fill me up. I need you.”
He lets out a masculine groan and spreads my legs. “Look at this beautiful pussy throbbing. The pretty pink. Your sweetness, all for me?”
“Yes,” I cry out when he clamps his lips over my clit, tongue lashing the hard point.
Stars appear behind my eyes, and I clutch his hair, hips canting up, holding on as he devastates me with his talented mouth. Soft circles. Hard flicks, a finger teases my entrance before sliding in, then another.
The sounds of his suction and fingers join the drumming of the rain and the thundering of my heart.
Every cell in me sensitizes, pressure gathering at breakneck speed.
“So sweet,” he grits out. “Fuck, you’re too sweet for me. I should stay away. I’m not right for you.”
No, you’re exactly who I need.
Another full lick from my tight rosebud up to my clit.
“Elias, please!” My legs tremble. I feel the pinnacle barreling toward me.
“Not so fast, my beautiful Elise.”
In a flash he’s above me again, his cock nudging at my entrance.
His jaw tics and he braces himself on his forearms above me, holding still.
“Who am I?” he whispers, echoing the same question from the dungeon.
A flurried pulse hammers in his neck. I don’t know what he wants me to call him…Kian or Elias…but it doesn’t matter, because he’s one person to me.
I trace the thick scar on his cheek.
“You’re my husband,” I whisper. “And all your scars are beautiful to me.”
Those brilliant eyes widen. He crushes his lips to mine and surges in, thrusting his cock inside me to the hilt.
I cry into our kiss as the pain ignites the overpowering pleasure, and I shatter into pieces.
He threads our fingers together, joining us body and soul as he powers his hips, thrust after thrust, dragging out my orgasm.
The sparks never abate but burgeon once more.
My mind blanks, my vision flickering, I thrash under his powerful body, my feet digging into his ass as sharp currents run through my nerves again.
A live wire sizzles from deep within my core, building, building, and building, until I can no longer bear it.
A roar rips out of him, his cock becoming impossibly harder and thicker.
“Fuck yes,” he grunts, his rhythm faltering. “Come for me, wife, flood me with your cum.”
My release detonates. Wetness drips out of my pussy as wave after wave of his hot cum bathes my insides.
Elias presses kisses upon kisses while he moves on top of me, eking out every ounce of ecstasy. His lips travel to the sensitive pulse point on my neck, my jaw, my eyes, then my lips again, like he can’t get enough.
“My zemer,” he whispers minutes later, cradling me, chest against chest, his semi-hard cock still lodged inside me.
My eyes flutter open. Wind howls outside. Another flash of lightning slashes the room in white.
But I don’t care. The unease from earlier has long vanished.
“What does that mean, zemer?” I smile and brush his hair from his forehead so I can see his eyes again.
My favorite emerald eyes.
“Heart.” His lips curve into a small smile. “I lost my heart years ago, but you’ve kept it safe for me, my zemer.”
I give him a wobbly smile, heat prickling the backs of my eyes again.
I push him down onto the bed and straddle him. His breath hitches in surprise.
My hair forms a curtain around our faces when I lean over him.
“Kian…Elias…whoever you are,” I whisper, “I will always keep your heart safe. Always.”
His groan fills the room when I move on top of him, letting my body speak the rest.
Later that night, he stays, our bodies touching, connected like we’ve been waiting all our lives.
Two hearts reunited.