Page 137 of Sinful Desires
Hated that I hadn’t ripped that man’s spine out when I saw her body jolt from the hit. Hated that she’d let Nicholas hold her. Hated that I’d fucking let it happen.
Hated that she’d dragged me backhere. To this place. To this past. To this beach where the ghosts never fucking left.
And most of all, I hated the way I’d come anyway. And worse, I’d comewillingly. Back to the gates of the only hell I’d never meant to see again.
Because she was here.
Where she goes, my heart follows.
Always has.
Scarlett Harper didn’t know what she’d done to me. She didn’t know that I would burn down oceans to keep her safe. That I would keep crawling back to her flame, even as it scorched through every bone in my body.
I still hated it though.
Hated the way she made me feel. That raw, chaotic thing inside my chest that I couldn’t cage. Couldn’t silence.
Not when she was near.
Not when I could still taste her name in the back of my throat.
Her gold necklace sat heavily against my skin tonight. Heavier than usual. Pressed to my collarbone, like it wanted to crush the breath out of me.
Four years ago, the night we’d met, I had a gun and nothing left to lose. I thought I was done. Ready to be smoke. Dust.
Then she’d stumbled into my night, drunk and divine, eyes glazed and glowing, mouth asking questions I never wanted answered.
Mon étoile dans l’obscurité.
The only light in a city that never ran out of darkness.
She still burned. Still blinded me.
And I let her.
With her bratty tone, her frostbite glares, the spoiled little tilt of her chin when she didn’t get her way.
The pretty girl was born to rule and burn, and I’d drop to my knees without a second thought if it meant she’d look at me when she did it.
“I still don’t know why you do this to yourself. I think an eight-pack is enough. What are you trying to be? The Hulk?”
Speaking of my favorite little devil.
The corner of my mouth tugged up, a breath of something close to amusement slipping through the heat. I stood, sweat slicking down my naked chest and back, and turned the chain so the star fell against my spine, out of sight.
She couldn’t see it. Not yet.
“That’s my punishment. For saying yes to working for you.”
She pouted. Her eyes drifted down my chest.
And then she touched me.
Her fingertip traced each ridge of muscle, slow and soft, as if she didn’t know she was handling a man barely holding himself together.
I let her. Because her touch was a drug I couldn’t quit, and pain was the only high I trusted.
“Am I that horrible of a client, soldier?”
