Page 578 of Hell Hath No Fury
He stays quiet a moment before asking with a whisper, “And you?”
Something in those two words sets a weight on my chest, my next breath not so easy to draw. “I’ll be fine.”
He leans closer, elbows resting on the edge of the high tub. “I didn’t ask how youwillbe, Beth. I asked how you arenow.”
I can’t look at him. Despite how his fucking gaze burns a hole in me, there’s no way I can look him in the eye and keep my shit together.
He doesn’t give me the choice.
Crackers reaches out with his right hand, pinching his forefinger and thumb on either side of my chin. He turns my head so that I face him, tipping my jaw higher when I refuse to lift my gaze. “Babe. Talk to me.”
Fuck him.“It’s not as though it matters,” I mumble. “What with everything else going on.”
His touch slides around my neck until his palm cups the side of my jaw, thumb rested beneath my chin. “It matters to me,” he states. “Iwantto hear your answer. I need to.”
“Why?” I brave a glance at his sincere face, immediately caught in his gaze.
“Because for once I want you to fuckin’ let me be there for you, Beth.” His thumb shifts, grazing the swell of my bottom lip. “You’re always there for me. I think it’s about time I returned the favor, don’t you?”
Fuck him. Fuck him and the fact it takes a fuckingtragedyfor him to finally say the things I’ve waited years to hear. I jerk my face free of his hold and turn my head away, staring at the goddamn wall as my tears silently build. I want to believe he cares—I do. But how do I know that it isn’t just some trauma response of his own? Save the damsel in distress. I want to know he’d do the same if he hadn’t just watched half Heather’s brains get blown across my face. If I hadn’t just sat and picked splinters out of a woman destroyed as a pawn in our club’s games.
“Beth. Tell me what the fuck I did wrong.”
His tone brokers no argument, yet I double down and twist in the tub to give him my back. Water sloshes around me, some of it splattering against the floor. I probably soaked his knees, but I couldn’t give a shit. “I don’t want to be your obligation,” I strain through a thick throat. “Don’t take care of me because you think you have to.”
“For fuck’s sake.” The stool screams across the floor, colliding with the skirting board.
I wait for his angry footsteps, the slam of the door. I get neither.
The water surges around me, my body pushed with the current before strong hands dive beneath my arms. Crackers hoists me to my ass, sitting me upright with my back still to him in the rapidly emptying tub before he alters his hold and clean hoists me out of the bath. “Hey!” My protest falls on deaf ears, his hands slipping across my wet skin as he lowers us both to the floor and promptly settles me in his lap. Bathwater runs off my body, soaking his jeans clear through and creating puddles on the floorboards.
He reaches beside us and grabs the towel, wrapping it around my shoulders and tucking it high beneath my chin. “Don’t fuckin’ move.”
It takes a moment to figure out what he does behind me until I catch a glimpse of his leather cut as he lays it over the edge of the basin, out of the way of the water.
He shuffles me on his lap until I sit side-on. “Listen to me, Beth, and you listen good.” He grabs hold of my jaw again and jerks my head to face him. “You arenotan obligation. You hear me?”
I nod within the confines of his hold, internally cursing the goddamn tears that brew yet again.
“You’ve never been an obligation or a task. Sure as fuck never been a ‘piece of meat.’” His gaze drops to my mouth, hold softening on my jaw. “You’re a promise. A promise of redemption at the end of a shitty day. A promise that good still exists in this damned world.” Crackers hesitates, capturing his bottom lip between his teeth briefly. “You’re my promise that no matter how shit things get, it’s worth dragging my ass out of bed every day.” I’m mesmerized by the curve of his lips, the crisp dip in his Cupid’s bow. “That’s why I tell you you’re too good for this place, babe. Not because I don’t want you here, but because I honestly think we can’t treat you how you deserve.”
“So, try,” I whisper, shuffling a little so I sit more face-on. “Give me what you think I deserve.”
He expels a sigh and drops his head, one eyebrow lifting briefly.
“What?” I duck my head, attempting to catch his eye. All I manage is to line our lips less than an inch apart. “What’s so absurd about that?”
He tilts his head, resting his forehead against mine.
I steady my breaths, waiting on his answer.
It doesn’t come. The gentle creep of his fingers against my collarbone, the lover’s touch as they inch higher, is all he gives. With his head still against mine, he continues the soft caress,exploring the exposed curves of my body where the towel has fallen away.
I ache to know why he clammed up, why he couldn’t answer my request. But I ache harder for more of what he does. Our sex isn’t soft and sweet when he lets me in. It’s hard and desperate. Borderline brutal.
This. The way he touches me as though seeing me for the first time is new. It’s new and it’s fucking confusing.
I don’t dare move in case he stops.
