Blood & Rust (Lock & Key #4) (64 page)

“That was for me?” I searched his bright blue eyes. “For me?”

“Yeah, that was for you. I haven’t sung in front of people in a long, long fucking time. I wanted to surprise you. I wanted you to see that part of me, and I wanted to give it to you.”

“Oh, honey, I saw, and I heard, all right. And I loved everything about it.”

He leaned into me, his lips brushing my ear. “You gave that back to me when you gave me the guitar, when you believed in me.”

I wrapped my arms around his middle. “You were fantastic.”

His hand fisted in my hair and tugged my head back. That carnal zing exploded in my ovaries right there.

“Baby, I need to tell you. I—”

I put my hand over his mouth. “Shh!” I grabbed his hand and dragged him into the back room where I immediately unbuckled his huge leather belt.

“What the hell are you doing?” He laughed. Knowing. Turned on. “There’s no door here.”

“So what?” I pulled down his zipper. “Don’t say another word before I make it up to you.”

“Make what up to me? I’m lost.”

“Our hook-up that never was at Wreck’s shop over twenty years ago? We need to appease the bad Karma gods before we do or say anything else.”

Yes, yes, I would make this happen before either of us spouted those three little words. With that heated, intense look in his eyes just moments ago, those words that were on the tip of my happy tongue, were most probably on the tip of his as well.

I pushed up on the sturdy butcher-block table I had in a corner and bunched up my skirt. I hooked my fingers in the loops of his jeans and pulled him in between my legs. I was in a frenzy for him, for his cock, for doing it all right for a change. No more looking back over my shoulder.

“Scarlett, wait.”

I blinked at him, breathless, willing my hands to stop moving at the waistband of his boxer briefs.

He cradled my face, his lips a breath from mine. “I don’t ever want to forget this moment. How this very second feels. This, right now.” His deep voice vibrated against my skin. “Not ever.”

His hands went to my bare thighs and slid up my skin, taking my breath away. He tugged on my satin panties and ripped them off my legs.

My head fell back. “Hell yes,” tumbled from my mouth.

I’d never been so grateful for having gone to the gynecologist and gotten myself birth control.
Ciao, rubbers!

Butler hooked one of my legs around his torso as I steadied myself back on my arms. His fingers nudged at my opening, swirling through me.

“Fuck, you’re ready for me, aren’t you?”

“Since I heard you sing those first notes.”

A grunt escaped from the back of his throat as he stroked his cock once, twice. He thrust inside me. Slowly, controlled. “Ah, shit, Scarlett…fuck. Feel so good on me bare.” His eyes squeezed shut as his chest heaved for a breath.

“Oh, yes.” I raised my hips, taking him all the way in.

He leaned over me and took my mouth and held on to our groans with an unforgiving kiss. He rocked inside me again. “I want you slow. Want to feel every stroke in you. Every fucking one. Deep and tight. Want to feel you come on me.”

“Markus.”

His fingers painfully gripped my flesh, pinning me to that rough table. “I love you, Tania. I love you.”

“I love you, too, baby,” I whispered.

I reached for his mouth, and he gave it to me.

He gave it all to me.

The noise of the crowd, the spirited, moody music of The Innocents, our choppy breaths—all of it dinned in my ears. The artwork and antiques we had found together, Wreck’s pieces, pieces I had brought from Wisconsin, my great-grandmother’s house—all of them here, in the small back room, were silent witnesses to our lovemaking.

I couldn’t see his eyes in the dark, but I could see everything in my heart. Butler was there, larger than life. His passion, his strength, his generosity. I trusted the sensations whirling inside me and danced to their beat. The steady, torturous, and sure thrust of his hips into mine, the sliding of our damp skin, his cock filling me, his every grunt as he suddenly quickened his pace were a raucous maelstrom that whipped every dream, every wish, every heartbeat into its vortex, making us one.

We both came within moments of each other, and I bit down on his shoulder to stop from moaning out loud.

I kissed the bite mark I’d left behind. “What do you think, Blondie? Did we put our bad Karma to rest with that?”

He licked the skin under the side of my jaw, and I shivered. “Oh, baby, I think we just cured that great blue wound of the past. But I think you’d better stop calling me Blondie if you want it to stick.”

We clung to each other, the two of us shaking with laughter.

“
YOU WOKE ME UP
.”

“You didn’t like that?”

“You woke me up with kisses,” Tania said.

“Yeah.” My fingers cupped the side of her face. “Again, you didn’t like that?”

“I loved it.”

And I loved having her here in my bed, at my place.

She ran a hand across the base of her neck, over her sexy collarbone. She was confused.

“You want to tell me what that reaction was about now?”

She bit her lip.

“Okay,” I said. “I’ll start.
Kyle
…”

She put her fingers over my lips. “Yes, Kyle. I used to complain that he’d never kiss me good morning, but he’d say he kissed me good morning when I was still asleep. He always woke up first, and I’d never realize since I’m such a heavy sleeper.”

“Baby, when I wake you up with kisses in the morning or in the middle of the night, you’ll feel it. You’ll wake up. You’ll fucking remember.” I rubbed my hand across her collarbone and up her throat. Goose bumps raced over her flesh. “Your body will fucking know.”

She squirmed against me. “I sure woke up that night in the motel in Sioux Falls.”

“Yes, you did. See what I mean?”

“Hmm.” She raised her hips against mine, her lips pressing into my skin.

I ground against her, bringing her hands around my shoulders. “You understand what you got here now?”

“Make me understand some more,” she whispered, giggling softly.

Her mouth opened to mine, and I took her in, our tongues tangling, stroking. A laugh bubbled up in my throat.

She pulled away, her dark eyes flashing. “What’s so funny?”

I kissed the side of her chin. “I’m glad you like kissing me as much as I like kissing you.”

“I love kissing you.”

I pulled her in closer. “You know what else I love?”

“I cannot wait to hear.”

“I love it when I touch you right here.” My fingertips whispered over the smooth skin of her hip, right over her bone, and her body tightened, her breath audibly catching in her throat. “See what happens? You like it a lot; it’s a little thrill every time for you. Such a simple thing, slight, delicate even, over a small passage of curves, yet everything about it drives you tighter and higher for me.”

“Lordy, I love how you can’t shut up after we have sex,” she said. “And during sex, too.”

“We didn’t have sex just now.”

“We had lots of sex last night.”

“Yeah, we did. Well, enjoy my talking because, who knows? Years from now, I might just roll over after and fart.”

She laughed. A hearty, rich laugh.

Years from now.

Her one hand caressed the side of my face, and that wave of warmth slid through me again. I leaned into her palm for a moment. I liked that, settling there in her touch. There was comfort born from surety there. Understanding. No noise. Fucking peace.

We kissed again, slowly, more gently than before. I took her in my arms, and we settled back against the pillows. The window shade flapped and floated in the warm breeze streaming in through the open window.

“What’s with the nightlight in the bathroom?” she asked.

“What do you mean?”

“It wasn’t on when we went to bed.”

“I got up and put it on after.”

“Scared of the dark?”

“No, it’s this thing Stephan and I had. We shared a bathroom at home. He liked having a nightlight in there just in case one of us woke up in the middle of the night.”

“Practical.”

“Very. I hated it though. I’d tease him about it. But since he died, I’ve always used one.” I took in a breath.

“I like nightlights,” Tania whispered, her hand stroking my arm.

Her gaze fell to the row of medicine bottles lined up on my dresser.

“We haven’t really talked about what the cardiologist said yesterday. We fucked about it, but we sure didn’t talk about it.”

Always insightful, my woman.

“You complaining, Scarlett?”

“Not me, no way. But I’d like to hear how you
feel
about it. We went out to dinner after the opening, came here, and attacked each other. I think you can say a few things about it now, don’t you?” She smoothed the hair back from my face.

I let out a breath. “Yeah, I feel great that I have an arrhythmia. That I gave myself this life-threatening condition. When I think about your mother, who, through no fault of her own, got struck with a debilitating, life-sapping, body-strangulating, pretty much uncontrollable disease, and then here I am, responsible for my condition—what can I say?”

“You know what it is. You have a good doctor monitoring your condition. You’re being treated. That’s positive. Not skipping doses anymore.”

“I have to eat better and sleep more.”

“That, I can help you with.”

“I quit smoking.”

“I can imagine how hard it must be after years of doing it.”

“It’s not’s so hard now that this fucked-up heart of mine is beating for you, Tania. I fall into your arms at night, rest my body against yours, and it feels so fucking good. What’s tobacco next to that?”

“I want to be that for you,” she breathed, a finger trailing over my chest. “I want to be where you rest.”

“You are. And you’re where I celebrate what I have, what we have.”

She blushed, curling into me, her lips brushing over the base of my throat.

I took her hand, and with it, I stroked my dick’s hardening length from top to bottom, harder and harder.

“I love it when you do that.” Her voice came out hoarse. “I love feeling you, with you.”

I twisted on top of her. “Spread your legs wide, baby. My cock can’t take the wait.”

She threw her head back and laughed.

“You don’t laugh when your man’s dick is in his hand, and he’s telling you he needs to fuck you. Kiss me, Scarlett.”

Her eyes gleamed. “Cock or mouth?”

“Mouth is good. Cock would be better.”

Her fingers stroked over my hard dick.

“Let’s not lose it now,” I said on a hiss.

I fell back on the mattress, and she slid down my body. Her mouth took in my tip, her hands digging into my ass.

“Fuck, woman. Stop teasing.”

She took me all the way in and swallowed me down her throat, like the hungry girl she was. My jaw clenched, and my lids lowered over my eyes as sweat prickled my skin, low grunts escaping my tense lips. Her hand twisted my base, rubbing hard.

“Ah, baby. That’s it. Yeah.”

Her mouth worked hard and steady, and I gulped in air.

“Fuck, Scarlett…feels so damn good.”

She pulled up and climbed on me, straddling my legs.

Her eyes blazed over me, her hand still working me. “I want you inside me.”

“Demanding bitch.” I let out a growl and shoved her hand away from my cock. I pulled on it myself, her saliva making it easier, faster. “How do you want me, Scarlett?”

She positioned herself, her hands planting on my chest. “I get to choose?”

“This is all yours.”

“Slow first and then hard,” she whispered, rocking over my dick, her wet softness killing me with every pass.

I stroked her clit with the tip of my cock, and she moaned, her jaw going slack, her hips squirming at the contact.

“I love this, the very beginning.” Her voice had a dreamy quality to it, her large eyes simmering in a glaze. “The very, very first…
ooh
.” She bowed her head down as she rocked into me, taking me in.

I lifted her face at her chin, and our eyes hung on to one another’s in the same mist. I took in every little sensation—her cries, the tingles, the burning, the fullness of having Tania all around me. The heat of our bodies, us moving together—all of it carried us both somewhere other than this bed.