Page 90 of Her Passionate Hero

“Hunter?”

“I’m here, mi Amor, I have you.”

“That’s my favorite,” she sighed. Her foot was rubbing against his calf. He knew what that meant. If he looked down, her knee would be next to his thigh, her legs parted. He needed to think of something else. Anything else.

“What’s your favorite?”

“I love it when you call me my love,” she breathed the words into his ears, and it went straight to his cock. He was struggling to keep his body poised those few inches above hers, not touching. Not lying on, not pressing into…

Then she licked the side of his neck.

“Alia, you don’t know what you’re doing.”

“I know we won’t go too far.”

He swept his hand down, determined to do the right thing. He grabbed the terry cloth of the robe so he could wrap it back around her. But by God, he would at least look before he covered her up. A shapely leg that went forever, silky white skin he wanted to explore, touch and taste. When he touched her thigh, she jolted as if lightning had struck her body. Hunter felt the change in the texture of the skin underneath his fingertips. Silk turned ragged as he found line after line after line of scar tissue.

“No,” Alia sounded agonized, but she didn’t move. No other word escaped her lips. He looked up into her blue eyes wide with fear. What was she scared of? He eased off the couch and knelt beside it, cupping her face.

“It’s going to be all right.” Then awareness exploded through his brain, and his heart ached. He knew reassuring her was the most important thing. “Alia, Cariña, it doesn’t matter.”

Fuck, that was the wrong thing to say because it sure as fuck did matter. His woman had been hurting so desperately that somehow cutting herself was the only way she could find solace. Goddamn right, it mattered.

Aliana must have seen it on his face because she whimpered and pressed herself back against the couch, tears welling in her eyes.

“No, Baby, no. You’ve misunderstood. I’m not mad, at least not at you. I just ache at the thought you were hurting so badly, you had to do this to yourself.” He rested his palm on the five inch by six-inch patch of scarred flesh on her right thigh. He could tell the scars were years old, but still, he wanted to somehow warm the spot. Heal it. Make it feel better.

“It’s ugly.”

“No, it’s not,” he defended immediately.

She covered his hand with her own. “Yes, it is, I’ve looked at it for years. It’s horrible,” her voice sounded like her throat was filled with broken glass.

He looked down again, getting a flash of lace black panties underneath the robe. At any other time that would have been delightful, but not now. He moved his hand and really looked at the lacerated flesh. His brain didn’t register scars, it just didn’t, every single precise cut indicated a story, a wound on her soul. Was she healed? Could he help?

He bent his head and feathered kiss after kiss on her scarred skin, all the while she stroked his hair and whispered his name. Finally, he looked up.

“Can you tell me? Was this going on while I was living here?”

She shook her head, blonde hair flying everywhere.

“When?”

“My senior year.”

“Can you tell me?”

She closed her eyes and sighed, then opened them again. She looked at him, really looked at him. “You understand, don’t you? How come?”

“A friend of mine’s younger brother did it. The kid had words cut into the back of his hands when he showed up at graduation, so Ollie explained it.”

“Oh. Is he okay now?”

“I don’t know. Ollie was discharged, and we didn’t keep in touch. Can you tell me what started it?” He needed to know. Had to know. “Was it because I stopped writing letters?”

She leaned forward, “Oh Hunter, God no. This had nothing to do with you. This was me. Something went wrong. I broke. Junior year things escalated at school,” she swallowed and looked away.

“What happened?”