Page 57 of Damned
Chapter Twenty-Five
She loves me. Despite me. She still loves me.
He didn’t know how she could, not after what he’d done to her. But Kruze couldn’t help inhaling Bree’s sweet lips. More than anything, he needed her back in his life. She was his reason to breathe. The guilt of their past encounter was a hard beast to tame. Ruthlessly, it trampled his heart with hooves forged by the years of self-hatred he’d already instilled in his soul. Self-flagellation for leaving Julianna behind licked over his shoulders and up the back of his neck. Kee-rist, he’d turned running away into an art. First Juliana, then Bree, and all those other women. There was no way he deserved another chance, and Kruze knew it.
But with every lick and nibble of Bree’s tongue and teeth on his skin, he was damned if he’d let her go. That was him, a sinner caught between heaven and hell, damned for too many past transgressions to count, now fighting for the only forgiveness in the universe that mattered—Bree’s.
But she gave too freely! As she’d given her body to him in the past, so was she making the same mistake tonight. Yet he craved every glimpse of the heart she was willing to share. Like a dying man who’d been lost too long in the desert, Kruze craved every single droplet of moisture that fell from her mouth, every tear from her eyes, and every truth from her tongue. If he was the darkest, cruelest hour of night, Bree was the bright light of a brand-new day. She was sunshine, the promise of life, and she loved him.
Like a beggar, he was torn between the brash, crude half of himself and his gentler half, the part that was desperate to love this woman with his full heart. He was the father who craved his child, the man who adored that child’s mother. Surely Bree knew. Surely after all these years of them living separate lives, searching for their better halves, she recognized him for what he was—a loser who would die for her. But a damned loser nonetheless.
In that instant of clarity, Kruze faced his blackest, dearest memory and let it go. She would hold him back no more. He let the love he’d once had for another, the long-lost and long-dead Juliana, slip into the shadows where she belonged. Where she already was. Juliana would never be again. Her time had come and gone, their time together as well. She’d been a flash of what was good and right in the world, but Bree…
Bree was so much more. She was the air Kruze sucked into his lungs, so he could kiss her longer and better. She was the honey on his lips, giving him the energy to love her more. She was the end of the road where all his past dalliances had led. She was the homesick ache in his heart and the gaping, empty wound in his soul, his past, worst mistake, the sin that drove him now.
Bree was mercy. She was life. And she was right then stripping her sweatshirt off over her head, freeing her lovely breasts, that fell like plump gifts onto his chest. Kruze went insane with pleasure. He hefted both her breasts in his needy palms, the weight of them delightful, the feel of her skin warm, living silk. His greedy mouth latched onto the tip of one breast, suckling and tugging until, finally, she arched her back and stretched the heavenly morsel into a tight, hard bud. A throaty, rich growl of need and want exploded out of her, a symphony to his ears.
Kruze let her elongated nipple pop from his slick lips. Leaning forward, he planted kisses over the pillowy tops of her breasts, into the valley between them, and up her neck. Goosebumps prickled to life at every touch of his mouth. Bree was magic in his hands. Writhing, moaning magic that worked his body like the beautiful enchantress she’d been in Paris.
“I’m c-c-cold,” she whispered, her teeth chattering.
And he was an idiot for letting his mind wander through prose and fairytale land, while she lay exposed and freezing. Kee-rist! He was not Prince Charming material. Reaching for the blanket he’d tossed aside, he ordered his goddess, “Pants off.”
“Yours too,” Bree demanded, as she slid to his side, kicked off her shoes, and scrambled out of her jeans. “If I’m going to freeze my ass off, so are you.”
He wanted to obey, but that damned screwdriver wound sent a stabbing reminder to his cortex that he was not up to calisthenics tonight. That he could still bleed to death and leave Bree behind, by dying this time. Dying when he had everything to live for. The thought turned Kruze into a very sober man, one who had everything to lose.
“I… I…” he stuttered, used to being in charge, capable, a driven, competent male. Yet he’d failed her again. When Bree said she loved him, he’d said nothing. Not ‘thank-you’, ‘I love you, too’, nor anything else. It was time to be the man she thought she loved.
Grunting because the pain in his side was now a blazing, red-hot poker, Kruze unbuttoned his shirt and undid the snaps on his jeans. The bandage was still in place, but getting undressed would be damned difficult. Maybe this wasn’t such a great idea.
By then Bree was beautifully naked, and he was a half-dressed fool. Kruze tugged the blanket over her back when she crawled to his side.
“You need help with those pants, big guy?” she asked. There she was again, the incredibly sexy woman he’d made love with in Paris. All Bree needed to complete the transformation was red hair, and he’d believe they’d stepped back in time.
“Yeah, I, uh…” Kruze gestured apologetically down the length of his still mostly-clad body. “Are you sure—?”
He couldn’t finish giving her a way out, not with her tongue in his mouth and her delicious, warm, wet body now under the blanket and planted directly over his hips. She was his crack cocaine, and he was her helpless addict. Kruze closed his eyes at the way her fingers now sheathed his cock. She’d already shoved his jeans down to his thighs as if she owned him. A man should be so lucky to be owned by this woman.
As Bree worked her hand up and down, her fingers magically tight and warm, Kruze licked, kissed, and nibbled every bare piece of her skin he could reach. Her lips. Her chin and neck. Those magnificent breasts.
There’d been an animalistic, feral magnetism between them since the first time they’d met. It was stronger tonight. More demanding. He already had a tight hold on her bare ass with one hand, and his blood was boiling. He needed to slow this freight train down or he’d finish first, and that was not how a guy made a woman feel beautiful or treasured.
“W-w-wait up,” he mumbled around her eager tongue and lips, his heart racing as she moaned into his mouth.
“Wait, nothing,” she answered, as, with a ragged cry, she impaled herself right where he needed her to be. He hissed at the sheer pleasure of her heat. Bree’s knees locked onto his sides. Her core gripped his cock with an amazingly strong stranglehold. This was it. She was primed and ready to explode. So soon. Almost as soon as Kruze. Her body had a tight grip on him. Kee-rist, yes. This was it. He was heaven bound, his body bucking into hers in a rhythm as old as time.
*****
She’d wanted this man since he’d surprised her at the Morristown Community Center. Aw hell, Bree knew better. She’d wanted him since she’d first laid eyes on him on that quaint side street in Paris. Kruze Sinclair was all alpha male, with a splash of cocky pirate thrown in for good measure. If this moment was all he had to give, she’d take it and treasure it for the rest of her life. Because she was head-over-heels in love with him, and love didn’t make demands or threaten or pout. It just gave and gave until—
Effervescent warmth roared through her bare body. She was a dripping wet bottle of champagne, uncorked and ready to explode. From her toes to the top of her head, the power of this coming together took control. Her blanket was long gone. Her clothes, too. Only Kruze’s big, capable hands covered her ass now. He was all she needed. Her knees clenched his waist as he thrust his hips into her pelvic cradle. She eased off, remembering his wound. But wonder of wonders, here they were again, burning together. The fire was so sweet, it brought tears to her eyes.
“Give it up, Bree. Give it to me,” he groaned, thrusting that drool-worthy cock of his deeper into her body. Pumping harder. Kruze was not a small man, and she hadn’t been with anyone since Paris. There was always some pain, some tearing during intercourse. So be it. She’d be sore tomorrow.
Closing her eyes, she rode him like the wild animal he was, her breasts bouncing and their flesh slapping together. Her heart had never truly let him go, and her body was remembering him. How to adjust to his girth and width. How to swallow every last inch. Her muscles clamped down on Kruze, striving to give as good as she was getting.
With a gush, Bree arched her core into him, grinding together with heat and love. She let the fire take her. Let her heart go with it. That was all she had to give, the ultimate feminine sacrifice of body and soul. And she was flying, shot into the universe on the fiery wings of love.
