Chapter 36 #2
My father nodded once, a sense of satisfaction spreading through him. He knew he’d affected me. As much as I’d tried to keep my emotions locked down, he’d shaken me and was relishing in it.
I rushed for the door, struggling to get it open in my haste to get away from him. I stumbled over the threshold, straight into Sinclair’s arms.
“What happened?” Sin demanded.
Dacre and Presley moved instinctively towards me.
I shook my head in answer to Sin’s question, my gaze reluctantly finding Boston’s. His eyes pinched at the corners as he clocked the expression on my face.
Then he slammed a palm against the door to the library to shove it open and storm inside.
“What the fuck did you say to h—” he started, his words cutting off when his eyes landed on the pictures spread across the desk.
My father sat back in his chair, deeply satisfied at having elicited reactions from two people with one vindictive plan.
“I thought it prudent to remind my daughter that she’s married to the most brutal enforcer Seattle has ever known and not a pet sent to fluff her pillows or bury his head between her legs each night.”
“Maybe if you’d spent a little more time with your head between your wife’s legs, she might not have run from you,” Presley said, loud enough for my father to hear.
My father’s jaw clenching just the smallest amount was the only reaction he showed to the slight.
But I didn’t care about my father. I only cared about Boston in this moment.
He was unnervingly still as he stared down at the desk, lost in the images of his past. He didn’t utter a word to my father, just turned on his heel and hustled from the library.
“Boston!” I called after him, but he ignored me, disappearing towards the front door.
“Go after him,” Dacre said, and my attention snapped to him. “He needs you right now.”
Chasing after Boston, I found him in the forecourt ready to mount his bike and ride away.
“Boston, please wait.” I grabbed his forearm, stilling him. “Please don’t run from me. Don’t let my father come between us.”
He blew out a long breath.
“I told you that night we were together here that I don’t know how to do this. I don’t know how to be the man you need me to be when I was a man who wasn’t worthy of you for so long.”
My brows crashed together. “I don’t need you to be anyone other than exactly who you are, Boss. Can’t you see that?”
He said nothing, his head hanging at his chest.
I reached out to cup his cheek. “Why won’t you let me all the way in?”
He was silent for a long moment, then his eyes met mine.
“You have no idea how it felt,” he said quietly, expression pinched with pain.
“To come here and find you with the three of them. I’m not like them, and your father’s games tonight were a harsh reminder of that.
I’m never going to be a rich playboy who never had to get his hands dirty.
I have demons and they’re coming back to haunt me right fucking now. ”
I wouldn’t apologize for loving Pres, Sin, and Dacre, but I didn’t need Boston to be anything other than exactly who he was. After all that we’d already been through together, I knew I could make room for Boston without hurting my step-brothers.
I took his hand in mine. “The situation I’m in, it’s not… traditional. But that’s the beauty of it. I love each of them in whatever way they need, and they do the same for me.” I tilted my head to catch his gaze, forcing him to look at me. “I can do that for you too, Boston.”
There was something so desolate… so tortured… in the way he looked at me.
“I’ll ruin it,” he said with a broken kind of desperation. “I’ll ruin you.”
I shook my head. “You won’t. Because I won’t let you. If you piss me off or hurt me, I’ll just keep coming back. Probably to yell at you for pissing me off.”
The corner of his mouth quirked, but the humor didn’t cut deep enough through the pain.
He stared back at me, and I could see the slightest edge of hope in his eyes that maybe what I was saying could be true.
“Let me love you, Boston.”
His gaze collided with mine with a fierceness. He lifted a hand to cup my face, his strong, rough fingers sliding along my jaw and into my hair. He dropped his forehead to mine, eyes closing. A thrill thrummed in my veins at being close to him like this.
“You don’t understand how badly I want that.”
A small smile spread across my face. “Then let us have it.”
He pulled back, watching me for a small, incredulous moment.
Then his lips dropped to mine, our mouths fusing. I could feel it all in that kiss—every desperate, lingering emotion that had been running through him for weeks.
His kiss was like the ocean—powerful and intense. Overwhelming, and then gentle.
When we broke apart, he was silent for a moment.
“Thank you.”
I smiled. “You don’t need to thank me.” I paused. “But you do need to show me your tattoo.”
He gave me a wry smile in return, then reached for the button on his jeans.
“Hey, woah, no need to whip your dick out here, big boy. We can get it on later.”
He quirked a brow. “You think I’m big?”
I shot him a look. “You know you are. Everywhere.”
He popped the button on his jeans and partially lowered the zipper, small lettering visible below his waistband, above his cock. I bent to read it, sucking in a small breath.
Property of Mrs. D. Ivers.
I stood tall, staring at him in surprise and affection. He’d tattooed a version of my name on his skin forever. “You branded yourself for me.”
He reached for me, fingers tangling in my hair and kissed me softly. Or at least, as softly as was possible for Boston.
“I belong to you, Dempsey. And I always will.”