Chapter 23

It’s as if I’m living one of my nightmares: The beach. The blood in the water and sand. ~The murder.~ The man in his fitted suit, who is now walking toward me. I don’t move toward him or away. I stand my ground. I make him come to me, the questions he hasn’t answered, past and present, clawing at me, demanding they be heard. Pissing me the fuck off.

~He~ pisses me off.

He makes me want things, do things, be things.

He stops in front of me, and the space between us is the exact location where that monster raped me. “Why are you here, Kane?”

“You should have told me about the tattoo on the body.”

“Why? So you could handle this for me? Like you handled things for me that night?”

“Yes. So I could handle it like I did that night. You were drugged, Lilah. I was protecting you.”

“Were you?” I demand, cold rain now beginning a steady fall, soaking my face and hair. “Because what I remember is me lying in the sand, naked and exposed, and when I pushed to my feet to look for help, you were ~talking~ to that monster. Talking, Kane. He didn’t deserve conversation.”

“You think I wasn’t going to make him pay for what he did to you? You think I wasn’t going to kill him? I had him in a choke hold, trying to find out if he was a fool alone or for hire when you came at him.”

He means when I saw the knife in that monster’s belt that I knew he’d intended to kill me with, and I grabbed it. And I’d shoved it in his chest, over and over and over again. Twelve times that felt so damn good it was terrifying. “I didn’t feel like waiting on you to finish your chitchat with him,” I say. “And how do I know that’s what you were doing? No matter what question I ask, you never give me a straight answer. I don’t know what is real and what is a lie with you.”

“I’ve never lied to you, Lilah.”

“You think leaving out information isn’t a lie?” The rain explodes, an eruption of force, and I shout through it. “This is getting us nowhere. ~Go home~, Kane!” And I don’t wait for his reply. I start running for the house, my hair and clothes drenched by the time I yank open the sliding glass door and rush inside, but when I turn to shut the door behind me, Kane shoves his way in, sealing us inside. “I said go the fuck home, Kane.”

“Not yet,” he says, shackling my arm and walking into me as he pulls me closer, his hand releasing my arm to move to my spine, the other at the back of my head. “And in case you didn’t get that. Let me speak your language. Not ~fucking~ yet.” His mouth closes down on mine, and he is kissing me, his tongue stroking long against mine. The taste of him is familiar in a way no one else would understand. It’s dirty. It’s sexy. It’s that addictive danger that is Kane Mendez. It’s a man who I do know would have killed for me, and I wanted him to. Oh God. I wanted him to.

I shove on his chest, tearing our lips apart. “I hate you right now.”

“Show me,” he says, releasing me to shrug out of his wet jacket.

I could say no. I ~should~ say no. But he is the answer to the storm inside me that hasn’t been answered in far too long. And he owes that to me. I pull my shirt over my head and toss it away. Our gazes collide, that old burn between us igniting. We undress. No words. No questions. We just strip, and I am not beyond enjoying every last inch of his hot, hard body. I deserve this. He owes me this. He does the same. He watches me. Touches me without ever touching me. Possesses me in a way no other man ever has. But only with his clothes off. I will never allow him more than that again. Yet there is no denying that the understanding between us, the freedom to be who we are, that we cannot be with anyone else, still exists, and why wouldn’t it? We’ve killed together. That’s a special kind of screwed up. Bonnie and Clyde have nothing on us.

He reaches for me, but I’m already there, moving toward him, and when his fingers tangle in my damp hair, his tongue licking into my mouth, I let him taste how much I hate wanting him. How much I hate his secrets. How much I hate how good he feels. I’m still embracing that pissed-off feeling. I’m full of rage, and I grab his hair and pull. “I do hate you.”

“I know,” he says, his teeth nipping my lips, and not gently, a spike of pain and arousal shooting through me, and by the time I’ve recovered, I’m on my back on the couch, with his big body on top of me. “But you know what they say about hate,” he says, one of his hands on my breast, the other cupping my ass. “It’s a fine line and I can live with that.”

“I’m sure you can,” I say, pissed off all over again, but still arching into his touch. “Because then you get to keep your secrets.”

“And what about your secrets, Lilah?” he challenges, shifting us to our sides, and him between my legs. “What are your secrets?”

“I don’t have secrets,” I say, a bitter laugh that is about self-hate, not humor, escaping me. “I mean, except stabbing someone twelve times.”

He tangles fingers in my hair, pulling my head back and forcing me to look at him. “I would have killed him for you with no guilt. I would have made him suffer. Isn’t that what you want to hear? And my willingness to do it doesn’t make me a monster any more than you wanting me to do it or doing it yourself makes you one.”

“You’re justifying your actions and mine. That’s dangerous.”

“You like dangerous, Lilah. That’s the real problem, isn’t it? You don’t think you should. You don’t think you should want me and us like you do.”

“I shouldn’t. I can’t.”

“And yet here we are,” he says, and he doesn’t give me time to process those words or even allow them to produce a reaction. He presses inside me, driving into me, and angling us together. And before I know his intentions, he’s sitting up and taking me with him. I am now on top of him, straddling him, my fingers digging into his shoulders. And I know why. His message is: this was my choice. I want this. I want him. “Bastard,” I hiss.

His lips curve, his eyes raking over my breasts before they return to my face, and he declares, “Damn, I’ve missed you, Lilah Love.”

I lean into him, pressing my lips to his ear. “I hate you, Kane Mendez.”

He snags my hair again—he loves to grab my hair—and drags my head back, bringing my lips to his. “You haven’t convinced me yet.”

Our lips collide, and wildness erupts. Kissing. Touching. Moving together. I hate every moment. I need every moment. I don’t hide either of those things. For the first time since I last was with him, I let go. Because I can with him. Because the devil doesn’t judge your sins, he rewards you with pleasure. ~Oh God.~ So much pleasure, and when it’s over, when we collapse into each other, bodies trembling, I am limp. Completely limp, both emotionally and physically. I let Kane roll us to our sides, and I willingly rest pressed against him. Neither of us speaks, as if we know that when we do, it’s over.

I shut my eyes, but not to sleep. I force myself to finish the recall of the past I’ve already started. I picture myself over my attacker’s body, holding the bloody knife.

~Kane is by my side. “He’s dead, Lilah. Give me the knife.”~

~“Are you sure? Are you sure he’s dead?”~

~“Yes. Very sure.”~

He’d taken the knife from me then, and my gaze had landed on that Virgin Mary tattoo bleeding from her mouth. I’d known, then, that she was important. I know, now, that she is the answer to questions I don’t even know to ask.

“Tell me about the tattoos, Kane,” I say, breaking our silence.

“Lilah,” he breathes out, and I know that tone leads to his ridiculous reply of “I don’t know.”

“Of course you have no answer.” I push up and look at him. “Because you think giving me a damn orgasm will shut me up.”

“That has nothing to do with this or tonight.”

“I’ll say it again. Bullshit. People are dying and you know something you aren’t saying.”

I roll away from him and off the couch, walking to the chair nearby and grabbing the blanket there. Wrapping it around me, I turn to face him, and he’s sitting now. Naked, and unlike with Rich, I like him that way, which only makes me hate him and my decision to be with him tonight all the more. “Go home, Kane,” I say, saving the demands I plan to launch at him for a time when there’s more than a blanket my mother crocheted between us.

I expect him to argue, but he doesn’t. He stands up and pulls on his pants and shirt, which he doesn’t bother to button, his tie and jacket settled on his arm. “I’m leaving but I’m not gone.”

He starts for the door, and I let him go, watching, waiting, until he exits and the door shuts with a solid thud. They say the devil is in the details. I say the devil is guarding those details, and I’m going to find out why. And no matter how much I love to hate that man, I’m going to go after him and keep at him. I’m going to get my answers.