Page 32 of Irrevocably

Heat moves through me, my nipples hardening, a slickness between my legs. The relief of being able to say these things to him is dizzying. “My mother got cancer while she was pregnant with me, and instead of terminating the pregnancy, she had me. Afterwards, it ended up being too late to treat her and she died.” I take another heaving breath as he slips the blade beneath the threads holding the button on. “She died because she chose to have me instead.”

Lucien pauses for a second, stares down at me, his gaze burning, then he cuts the next button off. “You don’t think you’re good enough.” He moves the knife down to the next button. “You don’t think your mother’s sacrifice was worth it.”

“I’m trying to make it worth it,” I say fiercely. “She was brilliant and wanted to be a doctor. She was training to be one when I was born, and that’s why I have to get into med school. I’m trying to fix things. I have to do what she wasn’t able to.”

His gaze roams over my face as he cuts the next button and then the next, until my pyjama top is hanging open. “Pain is your punishment, then.” I shiver as he runs the tip of the knife down over my bare flesh, between my breasts and down to the waistband of my pyjama bottoms. “Your punishment for being born.”

To my horror, tears prickle at the back of my eyes and my throat feels tight. Is it punishment? Is that what I’m really doing when I cut? Hurting myself because my mother gave herself a death sentence when she had me?

Whatever it is, I don’t want to cry. It’s not supposed to go this way. It’s not supposed to be me on the verge of tears, spilling my guts to a predator.

I turn my head away, but Lucien grips my jaw and forces my gaze back to his. “I can give you punishment, Tinkerbell. I can make it hurt.”

I swallow, blinking fiercely, trying to force the tears away. “Why would you want to?” I demand, furious with myself. “Because you feel sorry for me?”

“To feel sorry for you, I’d have to care, and I don’t. Get that straight right now.” His fingers press against my jawbone. “But I’ve got some time and a knife, and you want me to fuck you. So why don’t I do both?”

Chapter Sixteen

LUCIEN

I mean it. I want to fuck her. I shouldn’t, but I do. And why not?

She wants me, I can see it in her eyes. They’re dark, full of pain and rage, and arousal, and it’s such a beautiful combination. She keeps pushing and pushing and pushing, as if she doesn’t know what I’m capable of and doesn’t care anyway, and there’s a part of me that almost admires that.

The things I’ve done would horrify her. My threat to cut pieces off her, well, I’ve done it before. Dealing out Enzo’s justice isn’t for the faint of heart. He had an underling, once, who was doing a deal for him and thought Enzo wouldn’t miss a little cash. Enzo did miss it. So I sent pieces of him back to his wife as a warning, and that’s just one example.

She shouldn’t push me, but she did, and it’s clear to me why. She wants the pain. She wants the hurt. She wants some relief from the pressure inside her, that makes her desperate for that A plus and that med school acceptance. That makes her desperate to make herself worth her mother’s death.

I don’t know why she told me those things. I asked the questions, because I was curious and it seemed a good a time as any to get more information about her. It’s always good to find more leverage. But she shouldn’t have given me the truth, because I’m not a man you want to entrust all your secret fears to. They become weapons in my hands. Everything becomes a weapon in my hands.

Does she know what she’s done? What she’s handed me? It’s not because she trusts me, so perhaps it’s more a confession. I’m her priest, the faceless stranger she can talk to who’ll deliver punishment and grant absolution.

Three Hail Marys, two Our Fathers, and one fuck against her bedroom door.

In the soft pink light, her pyjama top hangs open, revealing skin like mother-of-pearl, and she’s breathing fast, hard. Desperate. Her gaze is pinned to mine, my fingers against her jaw.

I want her, but I don’t fuck normal women. Only, occasionally, the groupies in Enzo’s house. I tell them what I want and they do it, and that’s all. It’s impersonal, but it’s clean. No messy emotional attachments involved. Everyone knows what they’re getting out of it.

But this woman is staring at me like she’s desperate for something only I can give her, and she’s the epitome of normal, no matter that she cuts herself at night. She has feelings, emotions, and they’re all so close to the surface. She spilled her guts to me, she made it personal, and I can’t afford to get involved in personal.

Especially not considering she’s a virgin. I mean, it was obvious she’d never been touched before the moment I put my hand around her throat on the beach. The kiss I gave her in the parking lot earlier, too, confirmed it. She didn’t know what she was doing – I had to show her. So she’s lying when she says she’s been fucked hundreds of times, lying through her teeth.

I should be dragging her into her father’s bedroom and making good on my threat to use her to get the information I need. Then afterwards, if I’m still hard, I’ll let my own goddamn hand give me a release. I don’t need her.

Yet … the way she’s looking at me makes the blood in my veins pump hard. None of the women in Enzo’s house look at me that way, none of them. They’re there for the money, that’s all, and they have certainly never poured out their soul to me as if I’m someone they trust.

She touched me. She put her small hand around my throat, and no one touches me like that, either. No one touches me at all. But she did, this virgin girl, and it’s me she wants. Me she’s looking at with desperation in her eyes. Me, the killer who slit a man’s throat in front of her.

Yes, I want her, and like I told her, I have time and a knife, and I can give her what she wants. I can give her pain, fuck her like she wants me to, but also take a little something for myself. It’s been a long time since I’ve had something I wanted, because I try not to want anything at all except the freedom I’m owed. But she’s gotten under my skin, and there’s only one way to deal with that.

She searches my face as if she’s looking for something, but if it’s softness or tenderness, she won’t find it. Though, that’s not what she wants, is it?

“Yes,” she says. “Please, Lucien.”

The way she says my name, all husky and edged with desperation, sends an electric shock straight down my spine. I like her begging me. I like hearing how badly she wants me.

I lean in, nuzzling at the side of her neck, inhaling the scent of her arousal. “How badly do you want me to fuck you?”