Chapter 19 #2
Reaching the door to my room, I turn the knob and step inside. My eyes immediately move to the bed where Jess remains sprawled across my bed, still tangled in my sheets, still wearing nothing but my cum and the marks I left on her skin.
I lean against the doorframe and just watch her sleep.
This is the part where I’m supposed to grab my shit, load up, and hit the road. That’s what I’ve done every time before. I walked out the door without looking back because there was never anything worth looking back for. Never anybody to care whether I lived or fucking died.
Now, there’s a woman in my bed—a woman who is legally my wife on paper— and I want her to give a fuck.
But the truth is, I don’t know where we stand.
Yeah, we fucked like animals, and I came inside her, but that doesn’t erase what she said beforehand—that whole shit about fucking and forgetting.
That we can get it out of our systems and go back to pretending.
She can wake up, decide last night was enough and move on with her life.
Hand me divorce papers, and leave me with the ghost of her scent on my pillow and nothing else.
That thought makes something twist in my chest. I push off the wall and move to the closet, pulling on a black Henley. I grab my cut from the bedpost and shrug it on. My gun sits on the nightstand where I left it. I pick it up, check the magazine, then holster it at my hip.
I cross the room to the far wall, where a framed photo of the club hangs slightly crooked.
I lift it off the hook, revealing the safe behind it.
My fingers work the combination, and the door clicks open.
Inside, I grab the .45, a box of hollow points, and the backup piece I keep for situations that go sideways.
I load both, tuck the .45 into the back of my waistband, and slide the box of ammo into my cut.
Then I turn around and look at her.
She’s still sleeping, one arm tucked under the pillow, her lips slightly parted. There’s a bruise forming on her neck where I bit her. I sit on the edge of the bed and reach for her, my hand finding her shoulder. “Jess.”
She stirs, her brow furrowing, and then her eyes flutter open. For a second, she just blinks at me. Then the fog clears, and recognition floods her face. She smiles, all soft and sleepy and thoroughly fucked, and the sight hits me square in the chest.
She stretches her arms over her head, and the sheet falls away from her body, baring every inch of her to me. Her tits, still flushed pink from last night. The dried cum on her collarbone. The bruises. The scars. All of it. Every beautiful inch.
“Morning,” she whispers. Her voice hoarse from the sounds she made last night.
She lifts off the bed, and her arms wrap around my neck. She pulls me down, and her mouth finds mine, her tongue sliding past my lips. She tastes like sleep and sex and something sweet that’s just her, and my cock starts to harden against my jeans.
I could fuck her right now. I could push her back into the mattress, and bury myself inside her one more time. It wouldn’t take long. I’m already half-hard just from her mouth on mine.
But if I let myself get inside her again, I know what’ll happen. I’ll lose the will to walk out that door. I’ll call the whole run off, send Tormentor and Dread in my place, and spend the next three days with my face between her thighs.
My club needs me on this run. Two of our acquaintances are dead, and I’m not sending anyone else to handle my business.
I break the kiss and pull away, and her arms instantly tighten around my neck as she tries to drag my mouth back to hers. When I don’t comply, she inches back, her eyes darting around my face.
“What’s wrong?” she asks, her brow furrowing. Her lips are swollen, her eyes still heavy with sleep and desire, and she looks so goddamn perfect that it physically hurts.
“Nothing.” The lie sits heavy on my tongue. “I got some club business I need to take care of. I’m going to be gone a couple of days.”
Her arms loosen, and she sits up straight, the sheet pooling around her waist. “Oh.”
“Yeah.” I stand from the bed, putting distance between us because if I don’t, I’m going to crawl right back in. “I’m taking most of the guys with me, but listen . . . you uh. . . you should stay here. No one will bother you, and you don’t gotta worry about waking up Poppy if you have a nightmare.”
“That’s not necessary. If no one will be here, there’s no reason for me to be.”
I want to tell her that isn’t true. That she belongs here because she’s mine.
“The prospects will be here. I’m sure there will be shit for you to do. They’re a bunch of pigs.” Needing something to do with my hands so I don’t reach for her, I adjust my cut. “Plus, you’ll be safe.”
Something shifts in her expression. The glow she was sporting since she opened her eyes falters. She pulls the sheet up around her chest, covering herself, and nods. “Okay.”
That’s it. Just okay. No questions. No be careful.
I drag my fingers through my hair and nod.
“Okay, then.” I clear my throat. “You should sleep. We had a long night. I’ll see you when I get back?”
“Yeah, okay.”
With that, I tip my chin and head for the door.
“Lucifer.”
I stop, my hand on the doorknob.
She’s sitting in the middle of my bed, the sheet wrapped around her, her hair a mess, her lips swollen, her eyes big, dark, and unreadable.
“Just . . . come back,” she says quietly.
Three words. That’s all she gives me. But they hit harder than anything she’s ever said.
I nod once, then pull the door shut behind me.
Later, when I straddle my bike and kick the engine into gear, there’s a tightness in my chest, and it has nothing to do with the hell I’m about to raise. The wind whips past my face as I hit the highway, and I push the bike harder, faster, trying to outrun the feeling.
But it doesn’t work.
I guess that’s what happens when a man’s greatest obsession becomes the greatest love of his life.