I don’t let her finish. I press my lips to hers and everything fades into the background but the way she leans in, the way she clutches at my wrists as I nudge the seam of her mouth with the tip of my tongue asking her to let me in. She does, and she tastes of coffee and something sweet I’ll never find anywhere else. I press her backward against the bed and cover her body with mine, never once breaking our connection. My leg rests between her thighs, and I press my cock against the side of her hip. Through the thin material, she’ll know I want her.
I drag my mouth from hers and nibble at the delicate skin under her jaw.
She moans. “Rick.”
“Tell me to stop, and I’ll stop.”
She meets my eyes, trails a fingertip down my cheek. I shaved this morning, and my scar stands out in stark relief against my pale skin. I want her tosee me.I want her to look at me without flinching. Unlike Renata who could barely look at me when she visited the hospital.
“Tell me something first,” she says, her finger lingering near the corner of my mouth.
“What is it?” My hands itch to undress her. I want to touch. I want to taste. I want to feel and save it all up to replay when I’m at my lowest.
“Would you still be here, if I were just anyone?”
The question hurts, and I want to hurt her back. “Yes.”
She raises onto her elbows, skims her lips over mine. “Thank you for telling me the truth.”
“Move your laptop or we’ll break it.” I lean away from her, and she scoots off the bed and places her laptop onto the dresser. Her small suitcase is still open on the chair, clothing piled in the middle. She didn’t unpack, though I wish she had.
She adds the cardigan to the pile and steps close to the bed. “It’s been a long time for me. I dated a guy at the Times before Talia called me from rehab. Since I picked her up, there hasn’t been anyone.”
I pull my t-shirt over my head. “I haven’t been with anyone since my wife left me. You can see why.”
If I had thought this through, I would have asked for this in the dark where she couldn’t see. Devyn hadn’t turned the lamplight on, but there’s a small window in her room that lets in just enough light to see by. When the boom pinned me down, the impact broke my bones and tore my skin. I had several skin grafts, and my side and back look like a quilt. The scars are there, stiches that held my skin together. More stitches from surgery to repair my broken bones, evidence of my hip replacement.
She sits next to me and reaches out. “Can I?”
I shrug. “It’s a mood killer, isn’t it?”
Lightly, she smooths her fingers over the bumps, over the patchwork that saved my life. “It’s beautiful.”
It’s the last thing I thought she’d say.
“How long were you pinned under it?”
“Three hours.”
“And you lived.”
“There are days I wish I hadn’t.”
“Why do you say that?”
I scoff. “Seriously? You’re asking me? I can rarely move without pain. I sleep in the wrong position for five seconds and I need hours with a masseuse. I’m prone to headaches, and winters like this are hell on my bones. I lost my wife, my friends, my life. I can’t look at myself in the mirror without hating what I see.”
She rests a hand on my shoulder and presses her other hand to my cheek, forcing me to meet her eyes. “Have you seen someone addicted to Sweet?”
“No. What the hell does that have to do with anything?”
“It’s the most terrible thing you will ever see in your life, and that’s including your reflection. The addiction controls you until you can think of nothing else. If you deny your body of it because you can’t afford it or you can’t find a dealer, you slowly go crazy. You pick and tear at your skin because physical pain feels better than the mental withdrawal. You don’t want to eat, you don’t sleep. You stop caring about being clean. There are sick people out there, Rick. People who prey on addicts, men who like to beat on women, rape them. These womenbegfor it because they need Sweet. You have no idea how lucky you are. No idea. Talia...she doesn’t talk to me about what she did for Sweet before the police busted her. She tells her therapist who tries to comfort her saying addiction is a disease and that it’s okay. But it’s not okay. It’s not okay because it shouldn’t be around in the first place.”
Fury simmers around her, and I want to reach out and touch it.
She sucks in an angry breath, and she traces the scar that destroys my face. “You are still beautiful, and it’s a shame you can’t see it.”
I don’t have time to blink before she’s on me, her mouth fused to mine, my arms full of the fury that could burn me and kill me just as easily as it could thaw me and save my life. I shove my hands up her tank top. She’s not wearing a bra, and I fill my hands with her breasts. Her skin is so soft, her breasts heavy and full, her nipples already hardening under my touch.