Page 55 of Blurred Red Lines
“Quiero hacerte el amor lentamente, Cereza.” Pulling me up by my shoulders, he wrapped one arm under my ass and cradled the other around my head, lifting me into the shower and under the steamy stream of water.
For half an hour, we soaped, washed, caressed, kissed, and touched each other. The one thing we didn’t do was speak. In any other situation, I may’ve felt awkward and used by the silence. But as he stared hard into my eyes, allowing me to wash his injuries, clean them, and inspect his bruises, I knew words weren’t needed. Something shifted in that shower as we built a level of trust and crossed an invisible line.
Tracing the cuts marring his skin, I trailed my fingers across his back, once again taking note of the massive canvas that told a very personal story I wasn’t privy to. I knew if he wanted me to know, he’d tell me himself, but curiosity tore at me. Deciding not to ruin the peaceful moment between us, I continued my inspection and nestled in front of him, his body ready for me.
Wrapping my legs around Val’s waist, my mouth rounded for a silent scream as he plunged inside, thrusting as he cradled my face. The water from overhead poured into it, spilling from the corners the moment we both tumbled over the edge.
With a soundless union, I realized that life as I knew it was over.
* * *
As the sunbroke over the horizon, I listened to Val’s steady heartbeat, my ear pressed firmly against his heart. We lay in the full-sized bed he’d been sleeping in since we arrived at the new safe house, our limbs tangled around each other, my cheek draped across another intricate tattoo scrawled across the width of his chest. It depicted skulls and knives and words in Spanish I didn’t understand. It was gruesome and fascinating.
“How did you make it out of there?”
His arm tightened around me. “What do you mean?”
My eyes followed my fingertip as it traced a line down his stomach toward his navel. “Mateo said it was a bomb, Val. Nothing withstood the blast, but you. How in the hell did you walk away from that?”
I’d been afraid to ask the question up until now. Seeing him standing at the door in one piece had been enough at the time to quell any need for explanation, but lying next to him, the reality of what could have happened crushed me under its weight.
“Do you really want to know?”
“Is that a rhetorical question?”
“Would you’ve been upset if I hadn’t made it back?”
Dipping my finger into the crevice of his belly button, I shrugged with mock indifference. “I wouldn’t say upset, but arguing with myself isn’t nearly as entertaining.”
My cheek bounced as his chest rumbled with low laughter. “Cereza, that mouth of yours, sometimes I wonder if…” He trailed off as if he’d spoken out of turn, his voice abruptly shutting down.
Lifting my head, I balanced my chin on his breastbone, staring into conflicted pools of molten chocolate. “Something wrong?”
Shaking his head, he sat up and leaned over the bed, fumbling with the few clothes we’d discarded in the adjoining bathroom. Watching the intricate movement of his body as he twisted, and the way each defined muscle in his back contracted and tightened with the reaction of another, my skin flushed with rising heat. Sitting up, I tugged the sheet up to my neck and held it with a death grip.
My emotions swung on a pendulum, one minute screaming for his touch, the next, petrified and ashamed because I wanted it. No sane woman would willingly crawl in bed with a criminal. A confessed murderer. A drug trafficker. A man capable of unspeakable things.
“Hey,” Val ran a rough hand across my jaw and settled at the back of my neck. “Where’d you go?”
“Huh?”
“You spaced out there for a minute.”
Val and I were explosive. Unable to keep our hands off each other, when we joined forces, the moment was enough to shake the foundation of anyone’s psyche. Which is exactly why I had to get away from him. I promised myself I’d never blindly fall for another man, and I was falling hard for Val Carrera.
“I’m fine,” I assured him with a half-hearted smile. “Just tired.”
It wasn’t a complete lie.
I watched as he settled back into bed, immediately wrapping his arms back around me in a protective hold. The instant feeling of security confused me, but I pushed it aside and focused on his tightly clenched fist.
“What’s that?”
A slow grin spread across his face. It was the same devastating grin I’d watched for every time he’d walk into the cantina and sat at the far barstool on the left corner. “Protection.”
Rolling my eyes, I pushed away from his hold. “Again? Jesus, Danger…are you part machine?”
His eyes crinkled as a low chuckle rose to full-chested laughter. Grabbing me around the waist, I barely had time to think before he had me on my back, pinned underneath him as his knees rested on the outside of my thighs. With one palm pressed into the mattress by my head, he held his fisted hand high above my forehead.
