Chapter 8
LAYLA
The world outside the rain-soaked window sleeps. Inside, Beast moves with the steady certainty of a man who’s claimed his space in the world and tonight, for reasons I can’t understand, he’s chosen to embrace me and pull me into his world.
He carefully dries me off before he wraps a towel around me and hands me my glasses.
His movements are slow and deliberate while his gaze never strays from my face. He shows profound patience and lingering touches that make my chest ache. Like he wants to show that I am safe with him, and not just use his words.
When he lifts me into his arms, the motion is effortless.
I let my head fall against his shoulder, breathing in the scents of clean cotton, his skin, and the faint, wild note that lingers in the air.
It’s a smoky orange scent that is uniquely part of Beast, I’m coming to understand.
I want to drown in it, let it erase every ugly memory that’s been carved into my brain.
He carries me into a massive bedroom. The walls are warm brick and the floors are a beautiful dark wood.
It’s welcoming and warm. A wide, low bed piled with thick white blankets and pillows sits toward the back wall with a leather armchair tucked on the opposite side beside a window streaked with rain.
Its panes flicker with far-off lightning that only adds to the illusion of being tucked away in a bubble the outside world can’t touch.
The room feels safe, lived in. Like a haven built for a man who’s had to fight for everything he owns.
He sets me down gently in the armchair and disappears for a moment, only to return wearing gray sweats, a fresh white T-shirt, and with two mugs of coffee in his hands. He pulls over a small table and places the mugs down, the steam curling in the gold lamplight.
He hands one to me, crouching in front of my chair so his bulk is the only thing between me and the night pressing at the glass. Again.
“You keep acting like my knight in shining armor and I might give you that job for life.” I’m kidding, but when I look up from the mug in my hand I find him looking at me like I’m the center of his universe.
He gathers my free hand and places tender kisses on each of my knuckles before slowly turning my hand and kissing the center of my palm. I curl my fingers around his.
“It’s been a long time since anyone has touched me with kindness instead of hatred and malice.”
“I’ll spend the rest of my life making sure I erase every single bad memory you have.”
I offer a small smile. “That sounds like you want a forever with me, Beast. You just met me.”
My heart races as his dark eyes hold me captive.
“And yet you have not taken your hand out of mine, and I can’t seem to function right unless I’m touching you.
Who are we to question what simply is? The Vultures will pay for what they did to you and I’m going to be by your side from here on out.
Those two things might as well be written in blood. ”
Memories of being snatched out of my university’s parking lot, being drugged, forced to cook up drugs and beaten when I didn’t perform plague my mind the second he mentions their name.
The trembling starts in my toes and there is nothing I can do to stop the onslaught of fear working its way through my body.
His touch is warm and steady, covering my fingers where they won’t stop trembling over the mug of coffee in my hand.
We’ve been here already, him trying to calm me, and it makes me want to scream. I don’t want to be weak, but my mind is having a hard time keeping up with what my body wants.
I latch onto the feel of his touch and immediately become grounded in the here and now.
“Easy, baby,” Beast rumbles, voice low, steady as a heartbeat in a raging storm.
Up close, his vibrant tattoos of blues, greens, and reds seem to pulse with life against the stark white of his clean cotton tee.
The vivid ink sprawls up his forearms, all the way beneath his neckline, a kaleidoscope of violence and survival.
I know people get inked to reflect something they survived and from the looks of it, the man who pulled me out of hell tonight has been there personally, too.
I’m not used to being protected. Not like this. His presence fills the room with an aura of calm. Outside, thunder rattles the city, rain slapping the glass hard enough to sound like gunfire.
I flinch, causing the coffee in my hands to spill over.
Beast notices and takes the coffee to place it on the low table.
His brows knit together, eyes fierce and impossibly gentle all at once.
He reaches out, slow and careful, to tuck a damp strand of my hair behind my ear.
His knuckles graze my cheek and a shiver trails down my spine that embarrassingly enough has nothing to do with fear.
He leans in, his voice controlled and low. “You’re safe here, Layla. No one knows where we are and if they do find us, no one is putting their hands on you again. That’s a promise.”
I want to protest. I’ve spent the last five months in the hands of an evil man’s violence.
I know what they are capable of and I have the bruises and nightmares to prove it.
But Beast's hand slides around the nape of my neck and strokes a thumb along my pulse in a way that makes my words and fears fade. Instead of arguing, I simply nod once because it’s all I can manage.
He searches my face like he’s memorizing every freckle behind my glasses. “Good girl,” he murmurs, and something in me, something battered and tired, unclenches just a little.
For the first time in months, I let myself believe I'll be okay. I let myself breathe.
Beast takes my glasses and puts them on the table.
He lifts me from my seat, discards my damp towel and settles my naked form over his lap.
He reaches around and tucks a blanket around me.
His warmth surrounds me like armor. I let myself hope that maybe—just maybe—the monster guarding me is exactly the kind of danger I need.
I curl into him, the heavy blanket slipping down my bare back as I settle my cheek against his shoulder.
The heat of his hand moves over my thigh, a slow, possessive stroke that makes every nerve ending sing.
I want more. Not just the heat, but the connection.
The sense of belonging to someone after being nobody for so long.
I trace the curve of his jaw with my fingertip, studying the deep lines and the bristle of his stubble. His strong arms wrap around my body tighter and he pulls me in.
“Tell me something true, Elias,” I whisper.
“Something no one else knows about you. I’ve told you so much about me, but I know nothing about you.
” Heat hits my cheeks. “Except that you are a great kisser and you can make a girl orgasm hard enough to think the stars of the Universe have fallen over them.”
His smile is instant. “Never heard it put like that before.”
He lets out a long breath. His arms tighten around me, the blanket falling to pool at my hips.
That one movement is all it takes for me to realize the crackling energy simmering between us has resulted in giving him an incredibly hard erection.
His grin turns pure molten lava, and there’s not an apologetic bone in his body. “I can’t seem to help my reaction to such a beautiful woman in my arms.”
My eyes widen and his growing grin is nothing less than sinfully wolfish. The thin material of his sweats does nothing to hide the fact that he’s solid steel beneath the cotton material.
His warm hand engulfs my face, and he pulls me in for a slow, tender kiss. When I sit back up, I bring the blanket with me, covering my breasts. If I want to know anything about the man, I’ll have to cover temptation.
“Beast?” I say softly, leaning forward and pressing a slow kiss to his lips. “Tell me.”
“It’s not a pretty story.”
“Either was mine.”
He brushes the wet hair from my face and starts.
“I lost my twin brother young. We were fifteen at the time. He got into some nasty shit and it didn’t end well.
After that, my mother disappeared into her grief and my father walked out.
He couldn’t handle the pressure. I didn’t get the luxury of falling apart.
I had a sister to raise who needed someone, and I was all there was left of our little family. ”
“I’m so sorry.”
He shakes his head. “It was a long time ago.”
“That may be, but the pain always lingers. I settle my hand over his heart. It’s not like I can take the pain away, but I want him to know I understand grief.
“Thank you, baby. Anyway, a few years later the Marines gave me meaning and structure instead of the chaos I was living in. That’s where I met Reaper.
After we were both honorably discharged, he gave me brotherhood with our crew.
The Savages gave me a place where loyalty still means something.
It took a bit to trust others, but here we are. ”
“I wanted that kind of family growing up. You know, a sibling to share secrets with and cousins to run off into the woods and cook up secret witchy potions of mud and whatever else we could find.”
His laugh is a low rumble, and the pure confusion on his face makes me laugh too.
A different kind of heat creeps into my face at my confession.
“Um, I would never tell my parents this, but I didn’t always want to hold three PhDs or be such a book nerd.
Once upon a time I wanted to be like all the other school kids and just let my imagination run wild and life in a fantasy world for as long as possible.
I even have a half written manuscript tucked away somewhere back home. ”
“Ah, I see.”
“It will never see the light of day so throw away those thoughts I see crossing your face right now.”
His hands move under the blanket and settle on my bare hips.
“We will see about that, baby.”
Pure mischief plays over his handsome expression and I think I’ve made a grave mistake.
I change the topic. “How long have you been with the Savages?”
He lifts a heavy shoulder and looks into the distance for a minute before answering. “A long damn time. Too long, maybe. But I’ll bleed for this club without hesitation.” He pauses and drags his gaze to find mine. “Just like I would for you.”
His words hit me with the force of something I’m not prepared for. I want to say love, but really? Love?
His voice is raw, scraping against my senses and pushes my thoughts deeper giving them roots that bury into my soul.
“Layla, you’re the first good thing I’ve found in years. Maybe ever. You make me want to do better and be the kind of person you need.”
His honesty undoes me. The truth is that powerful sometimes, I’ve come to learn.
My chest cracks open, letting the hurt and hope and longing pour through. I shift in his lap, knees straddling his hips, the blanket slipping away to bare my skin to him.
My hands cup his face. “Make love to me,” I whisper, desperate and a little broken. “I need to feel something that isn’t pain. Can you do that? Can you make it last longer? Can you make me remember what it’s like to feel alive?”
For a second, he just looks at me. Really looks. Like he’s trying to decide if this is real. If I am real.
Ten very powerful fingers dig into the flesh of my ass possessively and my head falls back.
Then he stands. He places a strong arm beneath my thighs and moves the other to my back, lifting me effortlessly as the blanket falls away.
He lays me down on his bed, spreading me out like I’m something precious and sacred he needs to worship.
I lick my lips and he watches hungrily as my tongue darts over the plump flesh.
Lips come over my pulse point and the second the tip of his tongue strokes over my skin I want to melt into him.
I have never wanted to be fucked so bad in my life.
“And don’t you dare be gentle.”