Relish: A Vicious Feast Book 2 (26 page)

A corner of my lips twitched. “That’s all well and good, but we both know that getting hurt is a part of life.”

“Not when I can do something about it.”

I would have laughed if his gazed hadn’t pinned me in place. “Luka, what are you really trying to say here?”

“Haven’t you been listening?”

“Ever have a dream come true?”

“What does that have to do with this?”

I touched my patch. “Just answer the question.”

It took a second before he nodded once—a slight dip of his chin.

“Weeks after I was attacked…” I reached behind me and removed my patch. Luka’s gorgeous blue eyes widened. For him to fully understand, he needed to see. I dropped the patch to the floor. My camisole soon followed.

He whispered my name.

Despite the cold, I stood there in just my panties. Without taking my gaze from his, I ran my fingers over the scar that was my left eye then moved my hand to the sea of jagged reminders of what happened to me on my abdomen. Luka’s gaze followed the movement. He swallowed. A muscle twitched along his jaw. I laid my palm flat across my largest mark.

“Weeks after my attack,” I repeated more for my sake than his, “I wished I had died that night.”

“Don’t say that,” he hissed.

“You have to understand,” I countered. “I wished I was dead not because of what happened. I wished I was dead because of after. The pity in people’s eyes. The concern they gave me without really getting the pain I felt. I hated every fucking second of it. I couldn’t even stand my mother’s touch. It pissed me off that all people saw of me was my patch. They no longer saw
me
.”

My fingers clawed across my belly. In quick steps, Luka took my hand, but he’d been too late. I’d already left scratches on my skin. He dropped to his knees and kissed the five parallel lines my fingernails created. I moved my hand to his hair and fisted his curls. If I hurt him he didn’t react. His lips never left the place below my navel.

“When I thought I’d reached a point where I couldn’t take it anymore, I discovered a love for photography.” I barked a sad laugh. “I guess you can say my camera is my one true love. It never let me down, and when I was feeling cornered by an ugly world, it gave me a way to find beauty again.”

He tilted his head back so he looked up at me. “What does this have to do with me loving you?”

I cupped his cheeks with both hands. “Because before this moment the only wish that has come true for me is photography. It gave me something to live for.” I dropped to my knees so I was at eye level with him. “That night, before I found you drunk, I wished for more time with you. Only when I returned to the real world did I realize my wish was for you to love me too. I might have taken the long road when it comes to understanding my feelings for you, and I have issues of my own that I’m working on, but I guess what I’m trying to say here is I love you too, Luka Visraya. I’ve loved you from the second my viewfinder first found you at Sacrifice.”

His worry melted away, leaving a gentleness that made him look so young. He took my face in his hands too then leaned in. At first I thought he would kiss me. Instead, he tilted his chin so his lips landed on my scar. He started at the top all the way to its tip right at my cheekbone. He murmured “I love you” the entire time.

I wanted to kiss him too, but he kept dodging my lips, content to place chaste kisses all over my face. Only when I was close to giving up and letting him do what he wanted did he find his way home. I opened for him, letting him in. His tongue coaxed mine to life and I met him stroke for slow stroke, hot glides that reached deep into me. The stud at the center of the pad added to the already overwhelming sensations of his touch. I whimpered when he pulled back.

“Come,” he said, pushing to his feet and taking me with him.

Holding my hand, he turned toward the bed. I gaped when my gaze landed on his back. “Where the hell is your tattoo?”

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY
-N
INE
M
UTILATION

I turned him so I had a better view of his entire back. My mind flashed to New Year’s Eve. Luka was lying in bed, confessing his love for Phoenix. My heart twisted. He rolled onto his front and bared the extent of his feelings to me. At the time, if I’d had any doubts, the image of his massive tattoo erased them. It covered every inch of his back, starting with flames at the base and from the ashes of that fire rose a majestic bird. Its wings stretched out, encompassing the sides of his ribcage. No one got serious art like that without a certain amount of commitment involved.

During the months of my pity-party, I often wondered what Phoenix had that drove the cousins to immortalize her on their flesh. Now, as I stared at the strong lines of Luka’s back, I was struck speechless. Nothing remained of the massive body art. I’d read about tattoo removal and how the process was both painful and often still left the outline of the tattoo even after all the ink had been removed. Aside from four parallel scratch marks going up his left shoulder blade, not a blemish remained on his skin.

“I had it removed,” Luka said.

His voice jolted me away from my wonder. Fingers trembling, I reached out. My palm made contact with his nape. Its smooth surface was warm beneath my touch. I ran my fingers down the line of his spine. A soft hiss escaped him. I continued my exploration, adding pressure when I reached knotted muscles. His hiss turned into a groan. He relaxed beneath my hand, his head bowing forward.  

“When?” I finally found my voice, but it sounded weak to my ears, uncertain. Still, my hand wandered. Using both, I kneaded and squeezed where I wanted. His skin was hot and his muscles were taut, yet supple. I loved each and every tremble and groan I coaxed out of him. It took him a minute before he could answer my question.

“A week after you left.” When I reached a particularly stubborn knot between his shoulder blades, he growled. I stepped forward and used my elbow to unravel it. The sigh of pleasure he let out dropped his shoulders. Job done, I traced the scars. Finger marks, I realized, the same as the fresh ones running across my abdomen. I shifted my weigh onto my toes and placed a kiss on each one, as he’d done to my scars earlier.

“I thought there would be scarring, but these are the only ones.” I rubbed my cheek over them. Each raised line sent darts of pain to my gut.

“I had a good doctor,” was all he said.

I glided my hands around his waist until I hugged him to me, my breasts crushing against him. “Was it painful?” Stupid question because everything I’d read about the procedure confirmed my suspicions. The bigger the ink, the more difficult it was to remove. It must have taken several visits to complete the process.

“Not as painful as not having you in my life.”

My heart somersaulted only to land poorly in a heap. “I will not apologize for leaving.”

He turned in the circle of my arms so I looked up at the face I thought I’d memorized. In the shadows of my hotel room, I found new lines and planes I’d yet to commit to memory. Was it possible to live and die at the same time? Because that was what it felt like as I stared into the deep blue his irises had become. Like a tide, he pulled me in and wouldn’t let go. I knew no matter how far away I ran, I’d always end up right back where I’d started—his arms. What was the use of denying myself what he laid out in front of me?

He held my face with both hands when he said, “I’m not asking you to.”

The corner of my lip quirked up as I said, “Good.” I shouldn’t make light of an obviously serious situation, but I couldn’t help myself. The twinkle of mischief in his gaze told me he saw through my personal brand of bullshit. He knew how trapped I was.

He dipped down and erased my insubordinate smirk with a searing kiss—the kind that melted my insides a molecule at a time. The slow burn began at the inside of my mouth and traveled down my throat to linger at my chest. I threaded my fingers through his curls to keep him from moving his lips anywhere else. I wasn’t done with his tongue yet.

At the scrape of his tongue ring against the roof of my mouth, the heat in my chest spread to my quivering belly to culminate at the center of my being. As we explored each other’s mouths in turn, Luka’s calloused hands slid down to cup my ass. He pulled me forward until we stood hip to hip. His erection sent electricity down my legs. I bit his bottom lip, a feral rumble rising from my throat.

“I swear,” I said between kisses, “if you say this is not happening right now, I’m going to kill you.”

Unfazed by the threat, he chuckled into my lips at about the same time he cupped me. My legs gave out, sending his thumb grazing my clit. I sucked in a breath. All my pent up frustration rolled out of the release. We hadn’t done much of anything yet and he already had me coming like a first-timer. I shuddered, clutching at his shoulders for balance.

As I pressed my forehead against his collarbone, he placed an open-mouthed kiss over my rapid pulse. Then he chuckled again.

“So not funny.” My breath hitched when he traced the seam of my pussy with one smooth stroke of his finger.

“Done already?” he whispered into my ear.

In retaliation for his mocking tone, I caressed him over his sweats. He bit down on my shoulder. The pleasure pain of it sent renewed desire through my veins. All my nerve endings were attuned to him. Each touch seemed magnified tenfold. I planted a kiss against the side of his neck before I stepped back far enough so I could pull down his sweats. Another time I would have stopped to admire the view. Right now, I wanted him too much to take my time. Before he could do much of anything, I circled my fingers around the base of his shaft and took the tip into my mouth. He staggered. To maintain balance, he leaned forward and rested his hands on my shoulders.

“Fuck,” he said as I swirled my tongue over him. I slid the rest of him inside my mouth then sucked on the velvet hardness. “Shit.”

I would have grinned if I hadn’t been too engrossed in tasting him. As punishment for teasing me earlier, I added teeth into the mix. Luka no longer spoke coherent words. Instead he fisted my hair. I glanced up at him. The muscles on his neck strained. His pupils consumed his irises, turning them black. He was close.

“Stop,” he pleaded through his teeth.

As if. Served him right. I quickened my pace until he howled up at the ceiling. The salt of him filled my mouth as tremors rolled over him. With a smirk of satisfaction, I got to my feet and swiped the back of my hand across my lips.

Quicker than a blink, Luka hooked his hands over the backs of my thighs. I yelped when he lifted me and practically threw me onto the bed. His mouth covered mine, his tongue shoving in. He clutched the fabric of my panties and tore them off. Then in one swift slide, he entered me. The sudden fullness shocked me. Nothing could have prepared me for how good he felt inside. I moaned into his mouth, my hips lifting to accommodate him better. I wanted more.

He threaded his fingers through mine, lifting our linked hands above my head. I expected the same urgency when his thrusts began, but he surprised me with the slow glide. Like he savored the feel of me. He stoked the flames with the kind of patience that irritated me. I wanted the release he kept just out of reach with his maddening pace. I hooked my legs around his hips and met him stroke for stroke, attempting to quicken the climb. For my hurry, he stopped. How the guy managed it without exploding took my breath away.

“Luka,” I said, embarrassed by my moan.

He licked the column of my neck until he reached the shell of my ear. “So impatient.”

“Please.”  To punctuate my begging, I clenched around him.

When he laughed, my nipples rubbed against his chest. But before the insult of his torture pushed through the fog in my brain, he gave me what I wanted. I screamed at the force of his thrusts. I squeezed my thighs around him just as his grip on my hands tightened. This time, I felt the build. All my muscles tightened with every breath I took.

Luka claimed my lips the second I reached my limit. He pulled back and said, “Look at me.”

The command forced my eye open, no matter how much it wanted to roll into the back of my head. I met his stare as I unraveled. In my release, I let go of one of his hands to touch his cheek. Maintaining eye contact, he joined me in the plunge.

As quivers wracked my body, Luka laid on top of me, breathing hard, no longer able to support his weight. I didn’t mind the crush. I keep one leg hooked across his lower back while I peppered what I could reach of his face with kisses. We stayed like that until our panting evened out. I would have fallen asleep like that if Luka hadn’t rolled over. He took me with him until my boneless body sprawled across his.

I stretched, enjoying the feel of him beneath me. “Mmm,” I hummed.

“That good huh?” His breath ruffled the hair at the top of my head.

I kissed the bar on his nipple to hide my grin. “I think we can do better.”

“Ouch.” But he laughed. “You really know how to hit a guy where it hurts.”

Not taking the bait, I pushed up and straddled him. The position reminded me of the morning I dry-humped him to get away from my nightmares. As if thinking the same thing, his hands circled my waist. As much as I craved round two, there were things I needed cleared up first. So I splayed my hands over his chest and stared down at him. His expression remained focused. He picked up on my seriousness.

“I’ve never loved anyone before,” I said. I touched his lips when he opened his mouth to respond. “That being said, I don’t share, and don’t play well with others who want to take what is mine. I know it comes with the territory because of who you are—being a rock star and all. But you are mine. No one else’s. I don’t care how many groupies surround you. Am I making myself clear?”

He nipped at the pad of my fingertip. “I don’t want anyone else.”

“You say that now.”

“I’m yours.”

The thrill of those words wasn’t enough. “Then you need to prove it every day of your life. Are you prepared to do that?”