29 #4
“I love you, and I hate you for making me feel ashamed of it.”
“You should hate me.”
“I do.”
“Not enough.”
“Then make me hate you more.”
My mouth crashed into hers, and Charm met me with every ounce of anger she had left.
There was no hesitation and nothing gentle enough to confuse with forgiveness.
Her hands fisted in my shirt and dragged me against her while my arm closed around her waist. She bit my lower lip when I took control of the kiss.
Sharp pain sent heat through my body, and I pulled her head back by the hair beneath her stocking cap.
She stared into my eyes, breathing against my mouth. “I hate you.”
“Good.”
“You’re a cruel fucking coward.”
“And you’re still here.”
“So are you.”
She kissed me again, and we collided with the counter hard enough to rattle every bottle behind her. I caught the backs of her thighs and lifted her onto it. Her legs closed around my waist before I finished moving between them, pulling me against the heat beneath my jersey.
My body remembered hers with a loyalty that made me furious.
I tore the stocking cap from her head and threw it across the kitchen. Her hair fell around her shoulders while she shoved my suit jacket down my arms. It caught at my elbows, and she yanked harder until I wrenched free and sent it to the floor.
“This suit is fucking ridiculous,” she said against my mouth.
“You said you liked it.”
“I liked thinking about taking it off you.”
“Thought you came here for food.”
“I did.”
“Liar.”
“You came back because you wanted to be alone.”
“I did.”
“Liar.”
I gripped her jaw. “Careful.”
“Why? You’ll leave me?”
Rage flashed through me, and she smiled through the tears still wet on her face because she knew exactly where she’d hit. I kissed her hard enough to wipe the smile away.
Her coat opened beneath my hands, exposing the Frost jersey covering her body. Seeing my number on her after searching the arena for it destroyed what remained of my restraint. I dragged my mouth down her throat while she tore at my tie, jerking the knot loose and throwing it beside my jacket.
“You wore my name while you hid from me.”
“I wore it because it still feels like mine.”
“It isn’t.”
“Your hands disagree.”
I tightened them around her thighs.
“So does the way you looked for me.”
“Keep talking, and I’ll put you outside.”
“You won’t make it to the door.”
I pulled back far enough to see her face. “You sound sure.”
“You haven’t been sure of anything since you saw me in this kitchen.”
She was right, and I hated her for it. I wrapped one hand in her hair and brought her mouth within an inch of mine.
“This doesn’t save you.”
“I’m not asking it to.”
“It doesn’t fix us.”
“Nothing fixes us tonight.”
“I’m still leaving.”
“Then fucking leave when you’re done.”
Her answer tore through the last place either of us could’ve stopped.
I kissed her again while her hands dragged my shirt from my waistband.
Buttons struck the floor when she lost patience and pulled.
I caught both sides of her coat and shoved it from her shoulders, leaving her sitting on the counter in my jersey with my name across her chest and enough fury in her eyes to match mine.
There was no promise inside the way she reached for me and no forgiveness inside the way I pulled her against my body. Everything between us carried every word we failed to say, every wound we refused to show, and enough love twisted through the hatred to destroy us both one final time.
My hands locked around her hips, rough and demanding as her parted legs bracketed mine. Her mouth met mine again, but the kiss became another war for control. Teeth clashed and lips bruised while my hand fisted in her hair, tilting her head back so I could take more and give less.
A low growl vibrated inside my chest.
Her fingers clawed at the front of my shirt. She didn’t unbutton it. She grabbed both sides of the white cotton and yanked with all her strength. Buttons popped free and struck the tile with sharp pings as cool air reached my chest.
I didn’t stop her. My hands went to my belt, and the heavy scrape of leather and metal cut through the quiet kitchen before the zipper followed.
She broke the kiss, panting, her eyes wild. She hooked her thumbs into her waistband and shoved everything down her legs in one furious motion, kicking it aside before grabbing the bottom of the Frost jersey. When she started to pull it over her head, I caught her hands.
“Leave it.”
Her eyes burned into mine as she released the fabric.
I dropped my mouth to her neck and bit the tendon there without caring whether I left a mark. My hands moved up her thighs, forcing them wider before my mouth traveled lower.
My tongue dragged roughly through her, and Charm jerked with a sharp gasp. I didn’t tease or savor. I used my mouth with the same focused fury driving everything else, devouring her like I could consume every part of her I wouldn’t be allowed to keep.
When I pulled back, my chin glistened. I looked up at her, my gaze hard.
“Are you wet enough to take me?”
Defiance crossed her face. She brought one hand between her legs, gathered her own slickness on two fingers, and lifted them toward my mouth.
I caught her wrist without looking away and sucked both fingers between my lips. She tasted tart, sweet, and familiar enough to drag every dream I’d had about her into the room.
I released her wrist with a shove. “You’re soaked.”
I positioned myself between her thighs. Charm’s legs tightened around me as I drove inside her with one hard thrust. Her cry filled the kitchen, her hands clutching my shoulders while I buried myself completely.
There was no softness and no slow build. I set a furious pace that rocked her body against the cabinets with every drive of my hips. The countertop remained cold beneath her while her heat surrounded me, familiar enough to expose every lie I tried to tell myself.
It was only fucking. It meant nothing. I’d done this before and knew how to leave emotion out of it.
Every thought was bullshit.
Her body tightened around me, pulling me deeper while her nails scored the skin across my shoulders and back. Pain streaked through me, bright and welcome.
“?Mierda!” I caught her hip and drove into her harder. “That’s it, mami. Make me bleed.”
One hand left her hip and wrapped into her hair, pulling her forward until her mouth crashed against mine. She bit my lip hard enough for me to taste blood, and I answered by driving into her with every ounce of fury inside me.
She didn’t retreat. Charm met me thrust for thrust, her hips rising to mine while her moans turned into ragged pleas.
“Make me come,” she gasped against my mouth.
“So fucking tight when you come on my cock.” My thumb found her clit and worked it in rough, frantic circles. “Do it. Come. This is what you wanted, right? My cock without my heart?”
The words did exactly what I intended. Her release tore through her, arching her back away from the counter before a raw cry left her throat. Her body clamped around me in hard waves, dragging me toward the edge with her.
Watching her come and feeling her body fight to hold me destroyed every pretense of detachment. Everything buried beneath the rage surged upward, demanding its place between us.
I wrapped one hand around her throat without squeezing. My thumb pressed into the hollow beneath her jaw, feeling her pulse hammer against my skin while I held her against my body.
“Fuck you!” The words tore from the most wounded part of me.
I drove into her one final time and held myself there while my release ripped through me. Rage, agony, loss, and a love twisted so tightly around pain that I couldn’t separate them poured into the moment.
My forehead dropped against her shoulder, and my body shuddered against hers. We remained tangled together while our breathing filled the kitchen, fused by sweat, spent fury, and the connection I couldn’t sever even after she broke it.
Charm rested her forehead against mine with her legs still locked around me, as though her body hadn’t understood what the rest of her already knew.
My shirt hung open and torn beneath her fists.
Her coat lay somewhere on the floor beside my jacket, her clothes were scattered between the island and the cabinets, and one of my hands remained wrapped around her thigh.
The fight had burned itself out, but everything beneath it remained.
Her mouth trembled against mine. I tasted blood when I breathed, and when she noticed the split in my lower lip, her eyes fixed on it. Her thumb lifted as though she meant to touch the place she’d bitten, but she stopped before reaching me.
I straightened and looked down. Finger-shaped marks were already darkening across her thighs, while more circled her hips beneath the hem of my jersey. They stood vivid against her skin, proof of how hard I’d held her while trying to fuck the love out of both of us.
My stomach turned.
“Charm.”
She followed my stare. For one awful second, neither of us spoke before I stepped away.
Her legs fell open when my body left them. Cold air rushed into the space between us, and she reached for the edge of the counter as though my movement had taken something solid with it.
I turned my back and wrenched the ruined shirt from my shoulders. One sleeve caught around my wrist, but I ripped my hand free and threw it toward the pile of clothes without looking.
Charm made a small sound behind me, and I closed my eyes.
Thin streaks of blood burned across my back where her nails had broken the skin. I felt every one of them now that the heat was leaving my body, some cutting directly through the ink covering my barrio and carving tiny wounds across the streets and scripture I carried there.
When I turned around, she was crying.
There was no screaming, collapsing, or begging. Tears slid silently down her face while she stared at the marks she’d left on me, and that quiet wrecked me worse than anything she’d screamed during the fight.
“I hurt you,” she whispered.