Page 94 of Truck Stop Tempest

My nerves couldn’t take any more.

“He collected files on Erik Meyer, too. Recent transactions. Buying and selling children.”

“Stop.” I hugged my legs tighter. “I can’t hear any more. Not tonight.”

A warm arm came around me. Soft lips pressed against my head, lingering before he released a sigh. “Tucker has friends in the FBI. They’re meeting in the next day or two. Hell is going to rain down on that damn church, Tuuli. Your brother did a good thing.”

“He’s not my brother.” I wasn’t sure if that truth made me happy or sad.

“God, baby.” Like I weighed nothing, he pulled me across his lap, warming me with strong arms and the heady scent of his body wash. “This has got to be hard. What can I do?”

Tito never had to do anything but be present to make me feel better. A weakness on my part, or perhaps one of his super-strengths. “My whole life, Jeremy told me I was nothing. My only worth, my only purpose, was to make babies and to serve The Brotherhood. I never loved that man. But I always wondered why he hated me so much.”

“You deserved better.” He kissed my head. “So much better.”

Gah, thisman.

Shifting, I straddled his thighs and pushed the hood off his head. His raw beauty stole my breath, and for a moment, I could only stare, struck dumb by the empathy lighting his hard features.

He moaned. “It kills me to see you hurting.”

The heat of him between my legs was almost too much to bear. I raised a finger to his scar, tracing the outline. “Oh, Grim. Don’t you see? I’m not hurting. I’m not sad. I’m free.”

His hazel eyes widened, glassy and full of awe as if he’d discovered the eighth wonder of the world, as if he were proud. “There’s my brave, beautiful girl.”

He stroked my hair, smoothing the strands between his fingers. His gaze moved from my shoulder to my chest, then traveled in a slow, appreciative gander up my neck, pausing for a moment on my lips before settling, eye to eye, like a weary traveler who’d just returned home. “Can I kiss you?”

His pulse beat under my palms.

A kiss. What harm could it do?

I leaned closer, craving a taste, the full, soft flesh, the scratch of his stubble.

His minty breath drew me closer. “Please. One kiss.”

Temptation was a terrible, deceitful entity. I couldn’t give in. “Tell me something I don’t know about you. Something big.”

Groaning, he curled his fingers, gripping my butt cheeks.

I ached. God, how I ached, missing his skin, his strength, his heavy breaths and heady moans.

It was obvious he didn’t want to talk, so I upped the ante. “One confession. Two kisses.”

His head fell against the wall, rolling to the side. “The house fire I told you about.”

“Mmhmm,” I hummed, biting my bottom lip to keep from kissing the scar on his face.

“It was my fault. People died because of me.”

Before I could react, or respond, or register the weight of his words, Tito slammed his hand to the back of my head and stole those two promised kisses, the first fast and desperate, the second, slow, needy, relentless, begging. No more questions. Please. I’ve got nothing left to give.

Ages of pain seeped through that kiss.

I absorbed his brutal emotion, curling around him, melting against his tense muscles. He trembled beneath me. I tightened my grip.

On a gruff moan, he buried his face in my neck. “God, Tuuli.” A deep inhale. His arms snaked around me, fingers holding tight. “I’ve never said that out loud.”

Then my beastly man sucked in a hitched breath, and I knew he was fighting to hold his emotion at bay.

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