I watched Tanner as veins corded in his exposed neck. His tight muscles bulged as he held my arms. I worked my hand up and down, until I couldn’t keep just watching anymore. I licked along his neck, the taste of his skin making me moan. That was all it took for Tanner to lift me against the wall again, bringing my feet off the ground. His eyes on mine were hard and strong, with a determination I’d never seen in him before. Seeing him so wild and undone was all I needed to wrap my legs around him and bring my mouth to his. Tanner dominated my lips and tongue, groaning as my legs squeezed his waist tightly.
Tanner paused and met my eyes. He didn’t speak, but I read what he wanted in his gaze . . . what he was asking. “Yes,” I whispered and nodded my head. “Yes . . .”
Tanner immediately pushed against my entrance and slammed inside me in one hard thrust. His desperation was apparent by his long, guttural groan. I screamed as I flung my head back and a white-hot pain shocked through me. Tanner tucked his head into my neck, and I clawed at his skin. My eyes squeezed shut as he moved faster and faster within me. He filled me too full. He was everywhere, the White Prince smothering my soul. Tanner’s hips were relentless, thrusting into me so hard and fast that the pain I had felt diminished into fragmented shivers of pleasure. The moans and groans being stolen from our throats blended into a symphony that made an opera theater of the small barren safe house.
At the sound of a cry dripping from my lips, Tanner lifted his head from the crook of my neck and met my eyes. My breathing faltered at the sight. I fought to breathe entirely when his mouth took mine, but this time softer and more intense. The room shimmered as my eyes misted. So I closed them tightly and held on to his neck. Held on to his mouth through our kiss. I rolled my hips against his, chasing the climax that I felt building inside me. Tanner moved faster and harder until my head fell back and I was overtaken by him. By this moment and the bliss that rolled through me as strong as the sun on a summer’s day.
Tanner groaned, then thrust into me one last time, emptying himself inside me. His heavy breath washed over my shoulder, causing shivers to trickle down my spine. Our skins were slick and damp and covered in the blood that had been on Tanner’s arms and chest.
But I didn’t care. As I caught my breath, Tanner still hard inside me, I held tightly on to him as the room regained its stifling thick silence. But my heart didn’t stop racing. It couldn’t calm as the adrenaline died and the fact that I had been with Tanner hit home. I’d had sex with the infamous White Prince of Texas. For all intents and purposes, an enemy of the Quintana cartel. And Tanner Ayers, from the moment we had met, had been nothing but an adversary of mine.
Yet here we were. The princess and the prince of opposing kingdoms, unable to stay away from each other.
Tanner moved his head back with a heavy sigh. I straightened my shoulders—I wouldn’t let him see me nervous, though I was shaking like a dying fall leaf inside. Tanner’s face was streaked with blood. And as I dropped my eyes to his arm, an arm that was now shaking, I saw the bullet wound. Swallowing my trepidation, I whispered, “Your arm.”
Tanner didn’t look at his arm. He didn’t look away from me. His cheek was a deep red from my slap, and he had nail marks all over his arms and neck from where we’d fought and then fucked.
But Tanner remained silent. For once I wanted to hear words spoken from his mouth. I needed him to speak. Instead, he lifted one of his hands and brought it slowly to my face. His jaw was clenched, his teeth gritted. I held my breath, wondering what he was about to do, then he pushed a piece of my hair back over my shoulder. My heart flipped in my chest, swelling at his soft gesture. As though he couldn’t take away his hand, he trailed it down my cheek, my neck, then over my breasts until his hand fell away and dropped by his side. His eyes had tracked the entire path.
His intensity left me breathless. Then he moved, taking me with him. Tanner walked across the room, but I wasn’t paying attention to where we were going. I was solely focused on him. Focused on his face, on my racing heart, on trying to understand what had just happened.
The sound of water finally made me look up. Tanner had brought us into the small bathroom. Steam began to rise from the shower. We stepped under the spray, letting the water rinse the blood from our bodies, me still in Tanner’s arms. He put me down, then took the soap from the rack and started washing my skin. I let him, my heart in my throat at the sight of this man—this man I had fought with for weeks—taking care of me. He kneeled down and started washing my legs, my thighs, between my legs . . . then he stopped. His head snapped up. I stiffened. I knew what he must have seen. I stepped back, suddenly awash with embarrassment. But Tanner didn’t let me move. He kept tight hold of my leg. His face was stern, and there was tension in his eyes.
I held my head high. Tanner stared at me, the shower washing away the blood to reveal his face, the one I was sure was now imprinted in my brain. I couldn’t read what was going through his mind, but he pulled me closer again and delicately, almost reverently, began washing between my legs. My stomach flipped, but I pushed the feeling away. I wouldn’t allow myself to be too drawn in to this man. I had to stop any emotion rooting its way into this moment.
Tanner stood and looked down at me. I didn’t want him to say anything. I didn’t want to have a conversation about what I knew was on his mind, so, “My turn,” I said in a betraying fragile voice. Taking the soap from his hand, I moved it to his chest and started cleaning away the blood. This close I could see each of the tattoos in detail. So many tattoos of hate and prejudice drowning his skin. I couldn’t imagine harboring a hate that deep. It must consume his soul. Rip the joy from his life and darken any light or happiness that tries to push through. I ran the soap over his chest, his abs, and his stomach, and I saw them. Felt them. Scars. Tanner had scars everywhere, routes of raised skin like road maps under the tattoos that hid them from view. I didn’t show that I was aware of them. Instead I kept cleaning his body. And the more I cleaned, the more scars I discovered. Most were on his back and chest. Places where most people would not have seen them. I didn’t need to wonder who had given them to him. After what I’d seen in the hallway last night, I knew it must have been his father. I knew in my heart it was him. Tanner had stood there, a grown man, and let his father beat him. That had to come from years of being conditioned to do so. Years and years of beatings and abuse.
The wave of sympathy that crashed over me in that moment gutted me. Invisible hands took hold of my heart and squeezed it like a vise, an iron grip. I sneaked a peek at his face, at the stony expression he wore, eyes focused as he watched me clean him—my sympathy for him only deepened. Tanner Ayers was domineering, intimidating, and, frankly, terrifying in both looks and personality. He had been made into this—the epitome of a hateful man. Bigoted. Racist, capable of evil things. Carefully molded by his father and his men into the perfect Nazi killing machine.
But right now, in this moment, with the discovery of hidden scars and the gentleness he had toward me, I let myself wonder—if only for a fleeting moment—if there was someone else inside of him. The promise of the man he could have been if not for the Klan’s conditioning. If there was a man who could love and laugh and feel . . . if there was a man who could share his smile with the world.
“There,” I said, putting the soap back on the rack, breaking myself from the rabbit hole I had found myself falling down. “All clean.” Tanner reached over me and turned off the shower. He wrapped a towel around me, and I had to close my eyes to rid myself of the butterflies that had started to spread their wings in my stomach.
Tanner released me and put a towel around himself. We stood silently, still not knowing what to do. The aftermath of what had just happened was awkward, cloying. Unable to take the tension, I said, “Come.” I held out my hand, waiting for what Tanner would do. I could see, as clear as day, the war on his face as he stared down at the simple offer of my touch as though it were an open flame. I was about to lower it, burned, when, with a long
sigh, he reached out and slipped his large calloused hand into mine. The first touch felt so warm, warmer still when his fingers entwined with mine and he squeezed them tightly.
I led Tanner to the chair in front of the monitors. His attention immediately went to the screens as he lowered himself down. Reluctantly releasing his hand, I busied myself with getting the first aid kit together from where it had spilled over the desk and floor earlier. My skin heated again just from recalling how he’d pushed me back against the wall and kissed me . . . then took me . . .
Tanner didn’t even flinch when I pressed a cotton ball covered in peroxide to his wound. But he did turn his head from the monitors to watch me. I didn’t like the silence, or the weight of his stare and what it did to the rhythm of my heart. I didn’t like guessing what he was thinking. So I spoke to fill the awkwardness. “I used to do this for my father when I was younger.” I smiled at the memory, moving the bandages and gauzes to the table beside us. “When he still took matters into his own hands.” I shrugged. “Before he got older and decided his paid but loyal men should do his dirty deeds for him.” I dried the clean skin around the wounds. “It looks like the bullet went straight through.”
“How old are you?” he asked.
“Twenty. Just turned.” Tanner nodded. I wondered if he thought me too young. I didn’t feel it. “This life . . .” I said. “It makes you older than your years.” It bothered me that I was trying to explain myself to Tanner. But then he understood. Only people who walked the dangerous road this underbelly life awarded would ever understand.
Repeating the same process with the exit wound, I nodded at the screens. “You seem to be familiar with all of this.”
Tanner’s face was stone, but after a few tense seconds he said, “I was in the army. Communications.” I lifted my head to find him already watching me. Things started to make sense. It was how he was so stealthy in the forest. And how he knew to apprehend that man and kill him so efficiently. “When did you get out?”
“A while ago.”
I nodded my head and bandaged Tanner’s arm as best I could. “That should help. My father will get his physicians to treat you tomorrow when we are collected.”
I went to the closet where my father kept emergency clothes and took out a shirt and sweatpants for Tanner, and smaller versions for myself. In the bathroom, I put on the clothes and looked at myself in the mirror. I blew out a breath and checked myself over. I had stopped bleeding, at least. But I was sore.
I couldn’t seem to regret what I’d done. That it had been Tanner Ayers who had been my first. I was too tired and confused to even contemplate why that should be the case, why I wasn’t chastising myself for my stupidity.
Busying myself to take me from my confusion, I combed my hair, feeling bare and young without my makeup. Then I left the bathroom.
Tanner was lying on the pull-out bed opposite the monitors, his eyes glued to the screens. The gun he had taken from our attacker lay beside him. The emergency clothes were too small for his big frame, but they’d have to do.
I walked toward him. Tanner noticed me only when I was right in front him. I slipped into the small bed beside him and felt him tense. I lay down, staring up at the concrete ceiling.
“Why didn’t you say something?”
I didn’t need him to explain what he meant. It seemed my virginity—now lack thereof—was the elephant in the room. Running my hands over my face, I said, “Because I knew you’d stop if I did.” Tanner rolled over and met my eyes, searching for something in their depths. I took a deep breath and whispered, “And I wanted you.” I challenged him with a hard stare. I wouldn’t be made to feel like a child. I made my decision. It was my body, and my choice to make. It was one of the only choices I’d ever been given the chance to make.
Tanner’s nostrils flared, then, seemingly unable to stop himself, he leaned forward and wrapped his hand in my wet hair. He shifted his body over mine and kissed me. But this kiss was unhurried . . . and it scared me more than anything had in a very long time. I was the daughter of the biggest cartel boss in Mexico, maybe the world, had threats against my life every single day. Fear was a constant in my life, so much so that fear to me felt like a low hum rather than an electric shock. But Tanner Ayers, the Ku Klux Klan heir, kissing me with this much feeling and affection . . . it was the most terrifying thing I’d ever felt.
Because I felt it. I felt it all. All the right in this wrongful act. Felt his soft lips on mine, his mint taste on my tongue, and his heavy, scarred body holding me down.
The kiss grew and grew until Tanner had taken my shirt over my head and pulled my pants off my legs. When he was naked again too, I placed my hand on his cheek and, needing some sense of self-preservation, said, “You leave tomorrow.” Tanner looked away across the room at nothing, then nodded. “I am Mexican. You are KKK. You know we cannot mix.” Tanner gritted his teeth, but he nodded again. “Our fathers would kill us if they knew.” His expression was furious—I wasn’t sure if it was at that truth, my words, or the fact that he was here, willingly touching and sleeping with a woman from what he deemed an inferior race.
Tanner’s hand skirted along my cheek, and my heart beat faster like the turncoat it was around this forbidden man. His hand journeyed to my neck, then toward my breast. Before his fingers could reach their destination, I caught his wrist in my hand. Tanner’s tortured gaze collided with mine. The hunger I saw there, more heightened and intense than before, was my undoing. “Tonight,” I whispered, my voice shaking at the fact that I was stupidly going to allow this again. “All we have is tonight, in this room. Tomorrow you’ll be gone, and when our paths cross again they will be for business only. That should give you enough time to forget you ever betrayed your race for one night with me.” The truth of the words stung.
Tanner must have seen a crack in my armor, as his eyes narrowed. I wondered what he would say in defense. Instead, like the fortress he was, he nodded his head and said, “Done.”
Tanner’s wrist in my hand hung suspended in the air. I should have stopped it. I told myself it was degrading to give myself to such a man. But then I told myself that it was good that I had—Tanner would never forgive himself for this perceived act of weakness. I would be a chink in the Klan knight’s armor. One he could never repair. It gave me a sick kind of pleasure to know that I, a Mexican woman, had weakened him enough to abandon his beliefs and take me. That once hadn’t been enough.
But the truth was . . . I wanted him. Titles and families aside. Right now, I wanted this man. I couldn’t explain the madness of that truth, but it was the truth nonetheless. Exhaling, decision made, I lowered his hand to my breast. Tanner released a quick breath as he covered my flesh, the simple feel of it almost breaking me apart. Tanner glanced up at me for a second, then brought his lips to mine. Like before, they were desperate, as if he was more than aware, just as I was, that our time was finite. And he took me. He took me over and over again through the night, until we were retrieved the next day and the Ayerses left for America.
Tanner Ayers fucked me knowing exactly what that night was—the only night a white prince and cartel princess could have each other. No race, no culture, no hate, no business. Just two bodies, joining as one. But then it was over. And he was gone . . . until two months later, when he returned . . .
*****
Present day . . .
“Lita?”
I blinked, my attention snapping away from the mirror. My hands were joined at my stomach just to stop them from shaking. Hearing Charley’s voice, I took in a deep breath and blinked away the tears that were threatening to fall. Not a day went by that I didn’t think of that first night with Tanner. The night that changed it all. “Lita?” Charley said again. This time it was softer. The concern was clear in her voice.
Turning, I tried to smile at my best friend, but I could see she saw through the cracks. She took my hands and guided me off the pedestal that Carmen had set up before the mirror. The train of the
dress followed behind me. Charley sat on my couch. I sat down too and wiped my tears. “I’m being pathetic,” I said and laughed. “I have no idea what is wrong with me.”
“It’s me, Lita. You don’t have to be Adela Quintana right now. I know you. You can cry because you’re apprehensive. You don’t have to be the hardened princesa around me.”
I stared at Charley. I wanted to tell her everything. Get it all off my chest to someone other than Luis, who I felt had, in a way, turned against me. At least, he thought it was unwise to still hold on to hope for Tanner and me. But I couldn’t stop. No matter if all was lost, I would never give up on us. Even though all hope was gone.
I straightened my spine. “It’s just nerves.”
Charley rubbed my hands. She was kind like that, but very like me in the way she wanted more for herself than to be some man’s showpiece. In our world there weren’t many women like that. She was going to be my bridesmaid. My only one.
Charley pointed at my dress. “And should you be wearing that now? You get married tomorrow. You don’t want it to be damaged.”
I ran my hand down the white silk. “Selena, the designer, has just made the final adjustments. I dismissed her.” I shrugged. “I guess I just wanted to see myself in it without anyone else around.”
I could see the sympathy in Charley’s eyes. “It’s late. Has your father been to see you?”
I nodded. He had been two hours ago to tell me how proud he was. Your mother would have been so proud of you, Adela. So proud . . . like me. You’ve picked a good man, princesa, a good man . . .
But I hadn’t picked him. My father had. He had railroaded me into the relationship just like he railroaded me into everything else. Then, when my father had left, Diego had been by too, the excitement for tomorrow clear in his eyes. I can’t wait to have you tomorrow, Adelita. To have you under me . . . finally.