15. Chapter 15
I n those rare moments that I needed to let go and have sex, it was usually a rough and tumble sort where we fought over dominance like two snapping dogs.
Lots of painful thrusting, hair-grabbing, biting, and shoving, which was what I preferred.
So, this gentleness with Luca was almost beyond me, and why I kept checking on him for fears of slipping into the more primal state.
Another fucking reason I was afraid to do anything with him.
After everything he had been through, the last thing he needed was for me to lose control, so I had him on top of me instead.
But him just slamming his ass down on me was unexpected. Pleasantly so. I arched my back to his tightness… And, fuuuck , it had been a while.
“Jesus, Luca… so tight. So fucking nice wrapped around me.”
I opened my eyes to his closed ones when he stopped moving. His full lips were parted, and a wavy swoop of blond hair fell in his face. “Don’t ask… I’m adjusting.”
I cracked a smile since he knew exactly what I was about to say after saying it countless times tonight. Can’t blame me for caring about his well-being.
Fuck you, Dante. If that were truly the case, I wouldn’t have taken him to my bed at all.
God, I was a selfish prick, not that I was a good person, but I tried to be better for Luca.
In the end, I was my father’s son. A killer.
There shouldn’t be any more room in my black soul for love, yet here I was, allowing Luca to do just that.
I didn’t love him. I wasn’t capable anymore.
But he certainly believed he did for me.
All that I knew was that I wanted to protect him against anything that would harm him and claim him as mine.
He finally opened his eyes and looked down at me with his big, blue eyes, resting his hands on my chest. I waited him out despite his warm walls squeezing the life out of my cock.
Then he blessedly moved, which was slow, languid, and methodical, like getting a feel of my dick in him and finding out what worked best for us.
No doubt this position was a new one for him, too.
As he moved, I ran my hands over his silky skin along his arms, chest, and stomach.
He’d been filling out quite nicely with the higher-caloric foods and working out either in my basement or at the District building.
Small muscles formed where there were none before, and his face looked less gaunt.
It made him even more beautiful. He truly was stunning to look at.
What was it about Luca bringing out my protective and gentler side?
Both were incongruent with one another. Something I didn’t think existed any longer.
It especially surprised me when I cupped his face as he pumped on me and pulled him down into a slow kiss full of sloppy tongue.
I swallowed all his sounds, from grunts to keens. It was a beautiful symphony of need.
“Have me, Angel. Take me in your wings and show me happiness. Please.”
A surge of emotion hit, but I shut that shit down and locked it away, leaving me just to feel him wrapped around me.
I only needed to focus on the sensation of sex.
Nothing more. Regardless, I did as he asked, sitting up and pulling him into my arms. He reached around to my back and clawed at my skin with blunt nails as he continued to ride me.
I thrust back up to meet him halfway, it was an awkward position, but I didn’t think this was really about sex for him.
This was healing. Luca placed his sweaty forehead against mine, panting on my skin, and I could tell he was getting close.
His keening sounds traveled down my spine and straight to my balls.
I was close, too. As we claimed one another, I took his cock in my hand and stroked.
He threw his head back, and his groan sounded like it was torn from him.
I ran my tongue along his Adam’s apple and gently bit it.
Soon, my hand flooded with his hot and sticky release.
When he finished, I held on tightly to him and rolled him onto his back, then finished pumping.
One… two… and I was done, spilling into the condom.
“Fuck… fuck…” I mumbled.
I looked down at Luca to check on him, but his hands covered his face.
After a few shuddered breaths, I knew he was trying not to cry.
Shit. I pried his hands from his face to see the tears and trembling bottom lip.
So pouty and cute were it not for his pain.
He had his eyes averted away from me as if doing so kept me from seeing him cry.
“I thought I told you to tell me when I needed to stop.”
He glanced back at me, slamming down his brows. “No, stupid. It was so good. Perfect. This is a release not just from me but from my tormentors.”
I slipped out of him and pulled him upright, and held him.
This entire scene had me flashing back to my past hard, wanting to hold his limp and dead body, but I never got the chance.
Blood was everywhere. From him. From me.
I wrenched the vision away, forcing me back into the present.
I gave Luca what I thought he needed. To be held as he let go.
He rested his head on my shoulder as hot tears slid down my arm.
His hands gripped me so hard it hurt, but I didn’t tell him to stop.
“Thank you, Angel.” His voice was a whisper, but at least he was calming down.
“You shouldn’t be thanking me. You should be fucking running.” Despite my words, I told him to stay put, climbing out of bed. I removed the spent condom and tied it off before tossing it in the garbage can.
“Don’t go,” he begged.
I smiled and kissed his sweaty forehead.
“I’ll be right back. Promise.” In the restroom, I washed my hands and soaked a washrag with hot water, then came back and gently cleaned him up.
Not wanting to get up again, I tossed the rag onto the floor.
As soon as I was on my back with an arm tucked under my head, Luca draped his leg over my thigh and rested his head on my other arm, swirling his fingers over my scars.
“We can do that again, right?”
I blew out a laugh. “You won, Sunshine. I’m yours now. You’ll come to regret it, though.”
He nuzzled his face into me and gave me a hard bite on my peck. “Hey!”
“Never. I told you we belonged together.”
“I stand corrected.”
Who would have thought the boy I nearly killed a month ago would have been living with me and ended up in my bed? I fought hard, but he was determined—relentless—in seeing us together.
“Angel?”
“Hmm?”
“Do I have to really look like this?”
“What do you mean?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. These clothes you got me are… not my style, I don’t think. Well, I do love that banana shirt.”
“You can wear whatever you want, Luca. I was just trying to help you get out of being a little boy. If you want something else, just tell me. You can pick some stuff out online or whatever. Just don’t make me go clothes shopping again.”
He snorted a laugh. “Deal.”
“Soon, you’ll have your own money. Your mother is setting up a bank account for you. Then you’ll have access to it to buy whatever you want.”
While it was great his mother didn’t deserve to die, I still worried about Luca being out in the open.
With his father dead and Luca suddenly turning up, it would stir up trouble.
I was sure of it. Sid was still looking into why the client kept Luca a secret, if they even knew about him, but he’d been unable to get any information, which was concerning.
In the meantime, I told his mother to keep a lid on Luca’s return for now until we got answers.
“Does this mean I can stay?”
I kissed his head again. “Yes, it means you can stay. You still need to get to know your mother. You may not remember much about her, but she remembers you. Then you’ll need to explain to her that you’re staying.”
“I can do that. She didn’t even… seem to care that I killed him.”
“Because she loves you more.”
“I suppose.”
“How do you feel about it? Does it still hurt with what your father did?”
“It always hurts. It’s just… how I can shut it off or move it around in my head, so it doesn’t hurt so much. Does that make sense?”
“It does.”
I rolled over on top of him, pinning him down with a kiss, then pulled away, staring at his goofy grin.
“Since you’re staying, we’re both going to get tested because I hate fucking condoms. I want to feel all of you.
And you’re mine. Understood? No one hurts you.
No one messes with you. If anyone does, you tell me immediately, and they’re dead. ”
“Yes, I’m yours. Always. You own me, but not like Father did. He only owned my body. You own all of me… willingly.”
I lay on my back again, pulling him with me.
“Angel?”
“Yes,” I said, yawning.
“Can you tell me about these now?”
“Right now?”
“Please don’t say you’ll tell me later. You’ll avoid it. I want to know who hurt you. They… make me upset.”
His finger dragged along a long laceration that went from my shoulder to my peck, which required over one hundred and twenty stitches.
“They’re from my father… well, mostly from the men whom he hired.
He was too cowardly to do it himself, or he had so little regard for me, he didn’t bother.
If you thought your father was an asshole, mine was…
brutal. A tyrant. My mother was murdered when I was five years old, and he did whatever it took to train me to kill or be killed.
To fight or get beaten. His training involved a lot of pain, even at a really young age.
” I ran a hand through my hair, shoving back the sweaty bangs.
“I often wondered if it was his way of punishing me for not being her.”
“But why would he do that? It wasn’t your fault.”
“No, but it was my fault for not dying instead. I guess that’s how he looked at it.”
“He’s a jerk.”
I would’ve laughed were it not so painful. “Understatement. Anyway, he trained me to kill and fight. I think she actually died because of him, but I’ll never know now. He was a killer in his own right.”
“Is he still alive?”
“No. I killed him.”
“Like I killed mine?”
“Oh, my father died so much more painfully and slowly. He deserved it.”
“Because he hurt you?”
“No, because he hurt and killed someone I loved.”
I sat up and dug around in my nightstand drawer, pulling out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter. Once I tapped out a cigarette and put it to my lips, and after I lit it, I stood to open the window, staring out into the darkness, listening to the crickets as I took a deep drag.
Luca stood and wrapped his arms around me and rested his chin on my shoulder, saying nothing to wait me out.
With another drag, I blew out the smoke through my nose and craned my neck to kiss his head.
“I was twenty-two years old when I went back home to meet with my father with some news.”