I don’t even need to look up to know he’s back. I can feel his presence fill the room. It’s sexy, it’s musky, and it’s wild. His hands and face are smeared with blood and his eyes are crazy. Ravenous. My heart stops beating for a moment as my panties spontaneously combust. I’m fully aware that whatever he was out doing wasn’t a simple walk in the woods with the boys, but his dark and dangerous swagger is turning me on.

“You,” he says, making a beeline towards me without even addressing anyone else in the room. “Come on.”

I’m covered in Clutch’s blood, my hair full of gravel and dust, still wearing my clothes from the night before. Apparently, we both have a thing for each other dirty.

He picks me up effortlessly and tosses me over his shoulder before I can even realize what’s happening.

“Gavin!” Morgan calls out, popping out her hip seductively, “How’d it go?”

He doesn’t even stop to respond.

Too little too late, bitch, I think.

The man is on a mission, and I’m not about to complain. Down into the basement we go, his leather boots echoing through the long corridor, my heart beating faster with every step.

Wordlessly he puts the key in the lock and turns the doorknob.

He tosses me on the bed like a rag doll, pulling my jeans down and sliding my panties to the side. I’m soaked to the core and he slides a finger in me, pressing hard on my G-spot as he twists it around.

“Oh,” is all I can come up with.

He’s unzipping his pants, pulling them down to his ankles, his rock-hard cock pointed straight at me and he doesn’t even hesitate, just presses it to my lower lips, pulling me into him in one urgent thrust. His fingers dig into my back, pressing our bodies closer and closer together until he can’t get any deeper.

He’s biting on my neck, landing hot wet kisses behind my ears and my toes curl. The drag of his calloused lip across my collarbone pulses through my core, needy and all-consuming.

He doesn’t say a word, but the way he’s taking me speaks for itself. Raw, hard, like he owns me, like being inside me is the only thing he needs in the world right now. My back arches below him as I grip the sheets.

I feel the trembling in my thighs. I can’t hold off any longer. I close my eyes and let it flow through my body, my walls colliding around his cock and he just pushes deeper. I cum so hard that my ears are ringing. There is nothing in the world but the two of us and lust flowing through my veins. This hot pulsing dick that knows exactly how to rub me the right way.

Sweat is dripping from his forehead and his moans become louder.

He presses his mouth to my lips and I can tell by the way he’s holding me onto his dick, locking us together with his bloodstained hands, that he’s exploding inside of me, filling me with his cum.

“You’re perfect, Sloan,” he growls into my ear.

He doesn’t pull out, doesn’t let go, just runs his hands through my hair as he studies my face. I’m blissed out, high off of adrenaline from the day’s events and feeling closer to him than I ever imagined. I don’t care about the blood on his face. I don’t care where he was or what he was doing. At the end of the day, he’s here with me.

He only wants me.

I feel a tear begin rolling down my cheek and he just wipes it away, smiling at me, knowing.

“Let’s go take a shower,” he suggests. I don’t want to move. I could fall asleep like this right here, holding on to him and this moment forever, but he pulls out of me and takes me by the hand into the little attached bathroom with white subway tile lining the walls.

Reality hits me that I have no idea where I am.

This underground apartment, it’s a strange place. It’s sterile. It’s minimalist. There’s no natural light. The doors are steel and the air is unusually cold.

“Is this where you live?” I ask.

It’s not a bad place. I can tell the furniture is expensive and, aside from the trail of muddy clothes we are littering the bathroom floor with, it’s insanely clean. It’s just not him, just not the kind of place I’d expect a wild mountain man like him to live.

“For now,” he says. He draws the water, steam filling the bathroom, and begins to pull my shirt off over my head.

Stripping after sex is sensual in its own right. It’s as if he’s caring for me as he takes me down to nothing.

I’m purposely avoiding the mirror on the wall. I know my hair is full of twigs and dirt and Clutch’s blood has dried all over my clothes.

“You look so sexy all wild like that,” he laughs. I just smile and help him get out of his clothes.

We step into the shower, the rush of warm water relaxing every muscle in my body. His hands are all over me, lathering me in soap, his scent, and I just let him do what he feels like he needs to, enjoying the care and attention, savoring a moment where I don’t have to think about anything.

His touch is so natural, so nurturing. I rest my head on his perfect chest while the water beats down over us, never wanting to let go. He traces his fingers over my upper arm, and I snap back to reality.

“What’s wrong?” he asks, gripping it tighter as I try to pull away.

The bird of paradise tattoo does a good job of hiding the wreckage of my past on the surface, but the huge scar is still there if you look for it, if you feel for it.

“Nothing.” I shrug. “Just self-conscious, I guess.” I hate telling him a halfway lie, and maybe someday I can let him into that part of my world, but I’m not ready for that. I just want to enjoy whatever this is without having to think about the fact that it has to come to an end.

“You don’t have to be,” he says, looking in my eyes, and I believe him. I believe the person he thinks I am is so pristine and perfect that she could do no wrong. I don’t know how to explain to him that I’m not that person.

I press my lips to his in an attempt to show him what I need right now. Just him and silence.

He turns the water off behind me, stepping out, wrapping me in a giant towel.

“I have to leave,” he says, sadly. “I don’t want to, but I have some club business to wrap up.”

“I understand.” I shrug. “I really don’t want you to go, but I understand.”

“Are you going to be ok?” he asks. “I mean, with everything today…” He trails off.

“I’m going to be fine.”

“Help yourself to anything you want. You’re safe here.”

“When are you going to be back?” I ask. Right now, all I want to do is curl up beside him in bed and feel his strong arms around me as we fall asleep.

“I don’t know,” he says, shaking his head. “I’m sorry.”

He finishes toweling off and we go into the bedroom. I sit on the edge of the bed studying every inked line on his body, every little scar, every muscle, mole, hair, every part of him, searing it in my brain so that no matter what happens, I never forget.

I watch as he dresses, watch as he picks his pistol up off the nightstand and tucks it into his waistband. Watch as he slips into his cut.

I have so many questions and my brain is just now processing everything that had happened over the course of the day, hitting me like a ton of bricks. It’s midnight. Where could he possibly be going?

“You have to be at the hospital in the morning?” he asks.

“No.”

“Alright, please don’t go anywhere.”

“I don’t have any clothes,” I say with a smile. “I’m not exactly in the best position to run off.”“Naked and full of my cum, just like I want you always.” He pulls back the covers on the bed, motioning for me to slide in. He tucks the blankets tightly around me, as if that would keep me from leaving if I really wanted to.

He kisses me on the lips, and I can feel my arousal growing strong again. I don’t know what happened today. I don’t know what changed in me tonight. I just know that I’m forever transformed.