I’m glad the hotel is close to the church, because with every mile we drive and minute that passes, Reyna gets closer to a full-blown freak out.
She wants to crawl off my lap, but I haven’t let her. Instead, I hold her firmly in place as she hyperventilates and looks around wildly like a caged animal desperate for a way out.
There’s no way out for her, though. I’m taking this till-death-do-us-part thing very fucking seriously.
Which means she’ll have to kill me to get away.
But I won’t give her a reason to. I’ll be the opposite of everything her last husband was. I want her to learn that marriage to me isn’t the end of her life.
It’s only the beginning.
“Where are we going?” she says, staring out the window in rising panic.
I’m going to have to make her come again soon. She needs to calm down.
“The Ritz. I booked the honeymoon suite.”
She swallows and moistens her lips. Then she blurts, “Do you snore?”
I have to suppress a laugh at that. “To be honest, I have no idea.”
“Nobody’s ever told you?”
“Who would tell me?”
“Any woman you’ve ever slept with.”
I quirk my lips. “I don’t spend the night.”
She looks startled by that. “What do you mean? You’ve never had a long-term relationship?”
“My relationships can best be described as speedy disasters. Those were few and far between. I haven’t been committed to a woman in more than ten years.”
She examines my face in silence for a moment. I can see the wheels turning and know she wants to grill me for more information, but she doesn’t.
She looks away instead, nervously chewing the inside of her cheek.
“You can ask me anything,” I say, stroking my hand up her arm.
“It might be insulting.”
“As if that would be new.”
“Suit yourself. Here’s the question: did you…” She pauses to rethink it. “How have you been taking care of your needs for the last decade?”
“How have you been taking care of yours?”
“Romance novels and battery-powered devices.”
Her bluntness makes me chuckle. “You can throw them all away. You won’t need them anymore.”
Her cheeks turn pink. She purses her lips.
I love it when she looks at me like she’s a prude old maid.
She says, “Let me just push your ego aside for a sec to mention you haven’t answered my question.”
I hesitate, because I know exactly how bad it will sound out loud. But she was honest with me, so the least I can do is return the favor.
“I paid for it.”
“For sex, you mean.”
“Aye.”
She sits with that in silence for a while, then nods. “Okay. Thank you for the candor. Can I ask a follow-up question?”
Impressed that she’s neither upset nor judging me, I incline my head.
“Do you have any viruses or infections I should know about?”
“No. I’m clean. I’ll get tested again so you’ll feel better, but in the meantime, we’ll use a condom.”
The pink in her cheeks deepens to red. “Now’s a good time to remind you that you promised I could say no if I wanted.”
I lean in to press a soft kiss to her luscious lips. “You don’t want to say no. And don’t bother denying it, because we both know it’s true.”
She sighs and mutters, “Part of me wants to say no, just not my vagina.”
I don’t know why having her so conflicted about her desire for me gets me so wound up, but if my cock gets any harder, it will split open the zipper on my trousers.
Cradling her face in my hand, I lean close to her ear and whisper, “Then let’s make a game of it, viper.”
After a beat of surprise, she says, “A game?”
“Aye. You can pretend you don’t want it, and I can pretend I don’t know you do.”
She squirms a little in my lap, pressing her thighs together.
She likes the idea.
But of course, she has to act like she doesn’t, because God forbid the woman would ever let me get the upper hand.
She says, “How would I know it was a game? It could just be you and your giant ego doing their usual thing.”
I kiss her softly under her ear, nuzzling her there, dragging her scent into my nose. She smells like nothing else in the world, no other fragrance or perfume. The scent isn’t flowery, cloying, or sweet, because her essence is none of those things.
She smells like some kind of dark, dangerous heaven made of female flesh and poisonous fruit and exotic spices. A garden of deadly delights that a man could wander into and get lost.
A place he could lose his mind along with his heart and soul.
I say, “We’d agree on it beforehand. For a set time in a set place, we’d pretend.”
“What if I didn’t like it?”
“We’d make a safe word. Like…Black Widow, for instance.”
She says tartly, “Or I could just punch you in the face.”
When I start to laugh, it makes her even more aggravated.
“I’m not your fuck toy, Quinn.”
“Not yet, you’re not.” I bite her throat, and she shivers.
But she doesn’t try to push me away. She lets me hold her and kiss her neck as we drive into the underground parking area at the hotel. She lets me fondle her thighs. She lets me squeeze her breasts through the beaded bodice of the gown, and when I pinch her hard nipple, she lets her head fall back so I can take her mouth.
When she curls her hand around the back of my neck, slides her fingers into my hair, and kisses me back eagerly, I know she’s as ready for this to happen as I am.
I just can’t say that aloud, or I’ll be eating a fist sandwich.
We get to the suite via a private underground elevator reserved for wealthy guests who like to stay incognito and can pay for the privilege. As soon as the elevator doors close behind us, I take her mouth again, pushing her against the wall and pressing my hips into hers so she knows exactly what she’s about to get.
She pushes me away, gasping. “Wait! I’m not mentally prepared for this!”
“I’ll give you two seconds. Go.”
“Quinn—”
When I kiss her again, she moans into my mouth. The sound sends such a hot jolt of lust through my veins, I can’t help but kiss her harder as I hold her against my body.
She pounds a fist weakly against my chest.
“Quinn, God, please, I need a minute to—”
“The last thing you need right now is time to think,” I interrupt. “You’ve got the next fifty years of your life to do that.”
The elevator dings. The doors slide open to reveal the enormous suite. I swing her up into my arms, ignoring her little yelp of surprise, and growl, “If you don’t want me to fuck you, just say no.”
Bypassing the foyer, living room, and dining room, I head straight to the master bedroom. It’s as opulent as the rest of the suite, decorated in subtle shades of cream and blue. One entire wall of the room is floor-to-ceiling windows, showcasing a magnificent view of Boston Commons and downtown. The city lights twinkle against the gathering twilight. The sky is a magnificent shade of violet blue above a golden horizon, but I don’t see any of it.
All I see is the woman in my arms, clinging to me in fear and desire.
She’s scared, but she wants me.
She hates herself for it, but she wants me.
She’s disoriented from the abrupt change in her life from this morning, she’s worried about her niece and furious with her brother, she’s horrified to find herself married again when she was so against the idea that she had it tattooed right onto her skin, but still…
She wants me.
And that’s exactly what I’m going to make her focus on for the rest of the night.
I stride up to the king-size bed, drop her onto it, and start tearing off my bowtie.
“Say no if you want me to stop.” I toss the tie to the floor and rip open my shirt.
Buttons pop. So do her eyes.
I throw the shirt aside, kick off my shoes, and climb onto the bed, kneeling over her with my hands planted on either side of her head.
Breathing shallowly, she lies beneath me with her hands pressed flat against my chest. She’s still wearing the veil. It’s spread out all around her head like a lacy halo.
She says faintly, “I don’t want you to stop. But you should know that—”
I kiss her before she can finish the sentence.
She fights it for a moment, then melts into it, sliding her hands up my chest and over my shoulders. She pulls me down against her body with a sigh.
And I’m all in. One thousand percent. My body has been aching for this, begging for this, and I won’t waste a single second. There’s more than a good chance she’ll tell me to fuck off in the morning, but tonight, she’s all mine.
I kiss her until she’s making little mewling noises in the back of her throat and grinding her pelvis against me, then I kiss my way down her neck to her chest. As I nuzzle her breasts, she digs her fingers into my hair and exhales a breath so deep, it sounds as if she’s been holding it her entire life.
She whispers haltingly, “I’ve…I’ve only ever been with one man. And he wasn’t exactly interested in getting me ready to…what I’m saying is…I don’t want you to think…I mean, I’m probably not very good at this.”
I pause to lift my head and look at her. “You think you could disappoint me?”
When she nods, looking ashamed, I almost groan. I rise to my elbows, take her face in my hands, and gaze into her eyes.
My voice husky, I say, “Viper. My lovely, lethal wife. You’re fucking perfect, inside and out. Don’t ever worry about disappointing me. You couldn’t. Even when you’re homicidal or hurling insults, you take my breath away.”
She swallows hard. Her voice comes out small. “Yes, but you’re strange.”
I drop my forehead to her neck and start softly laughing.
She smacks me lightly on the back. “Shut up.”
“Oh, lass, what you do to me.”
I kiss her again, deeply but not hard, letting her relax into it. Bending her knee, she slides her leg up against mine and flexes her hips. I don’t think she has any idea how responsive she is, because she’d probably force herself to stop if she did.
“I need you out of this dress,” I whisper, forcibly rolling her onto her stomach.
“Wait.”
I mutter, “Not this again,” and tug on the zipper. The fabric parts under my hands. Reyna stiffens at the same time, saying in a higher voice, “Quinn, please, wait—”
But it’s too late.
I’ve already seen it.
The tattoo is large and vivid, snaking all the way down her spine from her nape to the small of her back. It’s a twisting, thorny vine of red roses and delicate black leaves, branching out from the center in all directions.
It’s staggeringly breathtaking, not only for the intricacy and artistry of the ink, but also for the stalk from which each flower blooms.
A scar.
Her entire back is covered in raised white scars, each a finger’s width and about as long.
Horrified, I whisper, “Reyna.”
Her voice low but steady, she says, “He liked to use a whip.”
I can’t catch my breath. I’m so stunned and sick at the realization of what she must have gone through, what she suffered at his hands, that I can barely see straight.
“Jesus Christ. Jesus fucking bloody Christ!”
“That’s not helping me feel any better.”
I roll her over and pull her up, sitting back on my heels on the bed so we’re facing each other. Taking her face in my shaking hands, I say, “I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry.”
She looks at me askance. “Thank you for that, but it’s not like you could’ve done anything. I didn’t know you then.”
“No. Fuck.” I groan, kissing her. “I’m sorry for every stupid, arrogant thing I’ve said and done since we met. For every time I was rude. For how I’ve acted. For—fuck!—I don’t even know what! For being a man! But most of all for forcing you to marry me. Jesus Christ. What have I done. What have I fucking done?”
I leap from the bed, holding my head in my hands.
She sits on the bed and silently watches me pace back and forth for a moment. Then she stands, pulls the veil out of her hair, tosses it to the floor, and steps out of the dress. It slithers down her legs and pools at her feet, sighing softly as it settles against the carpet.
She stands in front of me naked except for a simple pair of white cotton panties.
And more fucking scars.
On her stomach. Across her ribs. Under both breasts. Her arms and legs are smooth and so are her chest and neck, but the rest of her body is marked with the ghosts of her past, a hundred mementos of suffering.
It’s like looking at tombstones in a graveyard.
I’ve never cried in my adult life, but I think I’m about to break that record.
Watching my face with shining eyes, she says softly, “Don’t you dare look at me with pity. I’m not a victim. I’m a survivor. I’m alive. There are millions of other women just like me who weren’t so lucky.”
I exhale a disbelieving breath. “Lucky.”
“Yes,” she says vehemently. “And grateful. And determined I’ll never waste another second of this life I won. So get your Irish ass over here and fuck me, or I’ll divorce you so fast, it’ll make your head spin.”
Later on, I’ll look back and realize this is the exact moment I fell in love with her.
But for now, I simply obey my viper’s command and take her back down to the bed.
