Chapter Nineteen
Brando
Cat didn’t understand.
I was so sure tomorrow night would end my suffering. I’d planned it out, could envision never feeling that empty again. Knowing my family was at peace.
Their urns ripped me apart. Three bodies amassed to practically nothing. My knees dug into the worn hotel carpet. I wasn’t mad at Cat for knocking down my walls. If the roles were reversed, I’d have done the same. In fact, when I thought of it that way, I didn’t even feel regret. I’d never want her to be where I was now. Desperate for a kill.
It was an ugly place to be, to be on the edge of nothing and knowing that’s all there would ever be.
“What do I do now?” I asked, my voice sounding foreign to my own ears. I didn’t know myself without revenge in my blood. I didn’t know myself without a way out.
“Now you mourn,” she said softly.
My eyes spun, and I pushed unsteadily to my feet. “Wrong. Now I drink.” I grabbed my wallet off the dresser and stuffed my pockets with that, along with my room key. I couldn’t look at her right now. I’d said goodbye. Now she was here. Begging me for forever. “I can’t do forever!” I shouted, wrenching the door open. I tried to close it, but she followed, stomping after me.
“You can’t, or you won’t?”
I’d never been upset with her, and the thread of anger in my chest made me feel fucking terrible. I made a move for my Charger, wanting to put some distance between us. But the moment I got close, I noticed my car was leaning at an odd angle. My eyes shot to the tires, and rage began to bloom in my chest. My cold eyes settled on her. “You popped my fucking tire?”
She crossed her arms over her chest, completely and utterly unperturbed by me and my rage. She was fucking cute, and she was fucking maddening, and she wanted to be mine. But I was fucked up. Didn’t she see that? My entire existence revolved around tomorrow night, and now that that was gone, what was there left? Certainly not the things she’d painted in her mind. Love, family, forever—I wasn’t allowed those things.
“No, I popped all four of your tires, actually.”
I gritted my teeth together and pinched the bridge of my nose. “Why the hell would you do that?”
“To stop you from becoming a soulless murderer, that’s why!” she screeched.
“News flash, sweetheart, I have no fucking soul.” I pulled out my cell to call a tow service, but she stomped forward and grabbed my phone, sending it careening into the oil-slicked asphalt.
“What did I fall in love with then? Your beard was fucking hot, but even that wasn’t enough to keep me coming back.” She shoved me against my car, sending my back into the metal.
My ribs screamed. I relished the pain. That made sense. “Why are you doing this?” I demanded, only feeling slightly bad when she flinched from my tone.
But Catherine Abbott had faced monsters. She wasn’t afraid of me. She stiffened her jaw. “Because I want your magic forever, Brando Hawkins. I want to marry it, and make babies with it, and I want to do it all with you. And I’m not letting you get in the way of that. This is the first time I’ve ever wanted a future with a man. It will be the last time, too. Chin up, Detective. We’re going to be really fucking happy together.”
“That so?” I glared down at her, fury and pain turning my blood toxic. But on the edge of my emotions, there was something else. Something akin to longing. I rarely longed, didn’t think it made sense. But right then, looking into her deep brown eyes thriving with her own cocktail of anger and longing, I wanted to be happy together. “Who say’s we’re allowed that?”
She shrugged, stepping closer to me. She pointed to the sky, she pointed to herself, and then she pointed to me. “We do.”
“You could do better. I’m not going to make you happy. I can’t even make myself happy.” I leaned close, the explosion that detonated between us had created a ruthless wildfire. It singed its way across my heart and turned what piece of it still existed into ash.
Love could be reborn in ash, the same way it could fizzle out.
She put her hands on my chest, her fingers trailing their way down my abdomen. She watched her fingers, following them as she touched me. “You don’t worry about your happiness. I’ll take care of it. You worry about mine.” She peered up at me, vulnerable softness melting her eyes.
My cock hardened in my jeans. I knew I had to do it. Knew I’d never know peace any other way. I crushed her lips with mine. I nodded as we kissed. “I want you to be happy,” I whispered, biting down on her plump bottom lip.
“Then exist. That’s all I need.” She threaded her fingers in my hair and kissed the love out of me. I settled my hands on her hips and turned us around, pinning her to my car. “You popped my tires? Really?” She smiled against my lips, so I kissed her even harder, turning her smile into a moan. I suckled on her sweet tongue, grinding my cock against her belly. She writhed against my car.
I didn’t care that we’re in the parking lot. I wasn’t doing her in my hotel room anyway. Not when my family was in there, and their killers were free.
I tore my lips free of hers and buried my face in her neck. “What if they don’t forgive me? What if they’re never at peace because I didn’t set them free?”
She reached down to palm my cock through my jeans. Heat flooded my groin as she stroked my shaft through the denim. “There’s nothing to forgive, but yourself.”
I returned my lips to hers, kissing the shit out of her in the parking lot, against my Charger, in my arms. She returned my kiss, matched my depths. Wanted them. I had a feeling this woman would go to the end of hell for me. But she already had. That wasn’t fair. To drag her to hell, to force her into any version of it. I had to keep my focus on something I could achieve. That was to make her happy. And for some twisted reason, I’m who her soul chose to find happiness in.
I knew because I found happiness in hers.
I slid my hand between our hips to cup her pussy through her jeans. Her heat radiated from her mound, burning me sweetly. I palmed her. “I want your pussy. Right now.”
“Right here?” she panted, arching into my hand. “What are we? Sixteen?”
I kissed along her jaw for her neck, pulling on her tender flesh with my teeth. I bit down, lost in her and never wanting to be found. “Right fucking here.” I pulled back enough to reach her button. I ripped it apart; I heard the gold buckle hit the asphalt. I pulled her zipper down and then shoved her jeans and panties down her hip. I kneeled on the ground. It was late. The moon shimmered on the top of the car and shone onto her. There weren’t many people around. I tugged her jeans down her legs and forced her shoes off, leaving her bare from the waist down. The sight of her pussy glistening in the moonlight undid me. I’d almost gave this up. I met her eyes. “I almost lost you.”
She cupped my face in her delicate fingers, the moon shining brightly on her tattoos. Her story. Her life. “You’ll never lose me.”
I rubbed my cheek against her palm. “Spread your legs.”
Her bare feet moved a few inches on the asphalt. I loved the look of her pale supple thighs against the dirty street. I licked up her inner thigh until I found her cunt, and then I buried my tongue between her slick, hot folds. Her taste melted on my tongue and I was rabid in seconds. I spread her thighs farther, licking my way up to her clit. I gathered it between my lips and sucked. I made love to her little pink clit until she was scrabbling at my scalp, until she was screaming at the top of her lungs in the middle of the night as the moon and stars shimmered off her onyx hair.
The woman was an illusion, a mirage in the distance I wanted so badly to make a reality. But tragedy turned my heart inside out. It made me believe I’d never know love again. It hardened a soul that wanted hers.
I stood and wrenched the back door to my Charger open. “Get in,” I ordered, watching her perfect pale ass as she crawled into my car. I sank down in the back seat and closed the door.
She immediately started working on my zipper. But I wanted her mouth. “Kiss me,” I demanded, devouring her mouth the moment she gave it to me. “I love you,” I promised, tasting her every inch.
“Uh-huh,” she mumbled drunkenly, still fighting with my zipper. She freed it and pulled it down. “Love you too.” She whimpered against my lips.
I loved how high she looked, how the glimmer in her eyes looked like insanity. I freed my cock and then grabbed her waist, lifting her body onto my lap. I lined my cock up with her tight heat, and then Catherine sank onto me slowly, taking me inch by inch into her. We didn’t move once she’d taken me all. Her tight, wet pussy trembled around me, and a shudder traveled over her. Her eyes rolled into the back of her skull and her fingers dug into my jaw where she held my face.
I wrapped an arm around her lower back and used my other hand to move her head close. I guided her head until her beautiful face was nestled in my neck. I settled that hand on her ass, and then I pulled out and then thrusted back into her. She cried out, a senseless magical scream. I fucked her as hard as I could. She held me tightly, not even trying to keep up this time.
I thrusted into her roughly, taking out my anger, taking out my loss. I’d lost so much, and for so long that’s all I was. A human body empty of emotion and full of loss. Until Catherine. My loss started to dissipate. And in its place, was this.
Passion.
Her entire body tightened when she orgasmed. Her inner muscles clamped down on my cock, keeping me in place as she trembled. She shouted in my ear, clutching the back of my head for dear life. I wanted her to rip my hair out at the roots. I drove into her deeper, growling when my scalp burned. Harder, deeper, filling her as much as I could.
She rose up and put her hands in her hair, riding my cock unabashedly. I cupped her breasts through her shirt, pinching her tight little nipples. Our thighs slapped together and the fog of our heat clouded the back windows. Our eyes locked. I didn’t hide what I felt. I let her see it.
Her eyes widened and then she closed them. A tear streamed down her cheek a moment before her second orgasm ripped through her. She contorted on my lap, pink lips open in a soundless gasp. I followed her into my own end, falling head over fucking heels in love with her. She collapsed onto my chest. I hugged her to me, our hearts pounding. The scent of her shampoo smelled like mine. She must’ve used my soap before she left to save me.
Something about that made me hug her harder.
“Turn your evidence over to the police. Let them do their job. And let yourself heal.” She kissed my neck tenderly. “Demons be damned. I’m keeping you.” Her lips skimmed my jaw and found my lips, making love to my mouth, this slow, tender kind of love.
I rubbed the globes of her ass, her smooth flesh heating my palms. “I think I’ll keep you, too. If for no other reason than this ass.” I spanked her, chuckling when she giggled.
“I’m torn. I love your beard, but I love your clean-shaven jaw too.” She moved on my lap, putting her head on my left. She kissed my scar tenderly. “Don’t hide your scar. It’s a battle wound. Shows how strong you are.”
A tidal wave of emotion crashed into my chest. I cleared my throat. “I hate looking at it. People see it and ask questions. Hiding it saves me the trouble of reliving that night all over again.”
She rose on my lap and sat back, her eyes bright. “Can I put a tattoo over it?”
“I can’t exactly be a functioning member of society with a neck tat, babe.”
She rolled her eyes. “You’re not a member of society anymore. You’re in love with me. Queen of the outcasts. I’ll sketch you something. Think about it?”
For her, I’d think about anything. “You can tattoo over it.”
She traced my ugly scar. “Something soft, but dark.” I watched her brain churn. “Maybe your family’s initials wrapped around a rose thorn? Work their letters into each thorn? Wrap the vine in agony, this dark swath of shadows. Turn the agony into light, rich purple, have that be the backdrop. I’ll always know the scar is there. You too. But covering it will give you a chance to breathe.”
I stared at her talented, beautiful face. “I love you, Catherine. So fucking much.”
She pressed her forehead against mine. Her smile this close was the best kind of magic. “I love you too, Brando. So fucking much.”
I didn’t see the two men lurking outside my hotel room until it was too late.
Because revenge clouded the mind. I hadn’t minded if Angus Joel and Monty Unger found me. Hell, I’d wanted them to, spending the last couple hours before Cat showed up laying down a trail of ash for them to follow right to me. I’d blow them away and then turn myself in.
But that was before Cat.
Before I changed my mind.
Before the bomb between us exploded and took everything with it.