Page 10 of Hooked on Trouble

He traced a line down my cheek to my chest, fanning his huge hand over my heart and breast. My nipples pebbled. I rocked forward again, needing friction, but this was his game, his rules, and he held me steady. “I won’t hurt you,” was all he said. He might have used his words sparingly, but they hit on target. He leaned in as if to kiss me—his wide lips too full, his narrow hips too close, the churning water too hot. “I promise,” he whispered.

I wasn’t one to share, to cry or whine or complain about my lot. Life was like poker: You got what you were dealt. Believing and sharing only led to disappointment.

But those eyes. That promise. I was a goner.

Confused and lost in the moment, I lifted my left wrist and looked at the rose tattoo over my pulse point. That was for my sister, but it was the feathers inked up my arm I found myself pointing to. “I got these for my grandmother. I only met her once. I was sixteen, and she showed up out of the blue at my house. She sat beside a fire and told me a person can only know who they are and where they’re going if they know where they’re from. She’d said if I stared at the moon too long, its energy would pull me into the sky. That the earth we take for granted grew from the back of a turtle.”

I sucked in a shuddering breath, entranced, reliving every word she spoke, once again greedy for knowledge—a history of my First Nations’ ancestry that was bigger than my small town and absentee parents and disappeared sister.

Eyes burning, I looked up at Nico. “She lived on the street and died a week ago, exposure to the cold. I can’t imagine what that would feel like, your blood turning to ice.” I shivered, still horrified over what she’d endured. “I never got a chance to thank her. To tell her what that visit meant to me.”

I didn’t dare mention what a mess I was at sixteen. That meeting her had changed my life in ways she’d never know. But that was more than I’d ever shared with a man. More than I’d even shared with my best friends. Then I told him about Rose. Not the toughest part, but enough.

He didn’t say he was sorry, didn’t look at me with pity. He pulled my arm to his lips and kissed the inked feathers, then the black and gray rose. The intimacy of the moment caught in my throat, my chest, reeling me in.

He pointed to part of the tribal piece on his left pec—two semicircles with repeated patterns like a candelabra. “This is enata, a Polynesian symbol of the sky guarding its people. I’ve had to help my mother raise my sister and brother, my father’s in jail, and my siblings attract trouble like bees to honey.”

I traced the lines, water dripping from my fingers down his broad chest. “You tell that story to all the girls?” I forced levity into my words, but even I could hear my uncertainty. My insecurity.

He shook his head, those blue eyes piercing. “No.”

The relief was instant. “Why me?”

“Don’t know. There’s something about you, Raven.”

He said my name low and deep, a quiet murmur that rumbled in my dark places, lighting them from within. Everything about him was big and safe and reassuring. He felt like…home.

Fresh tears pricked my eyes. “I don’t understand what I’m feeling.”

“Me neither.” He pressed his forehead to mine. “Is it okay?”

I nodded. “As long as you keep your promise.”

He kissed my shoulder, the dip at my throat, tender and sweet. “I’m a man of my word.”

The man is a fucking liar.

The memory scrapes at the scar tissue left in his wake, and heavy knocks thump on the bathroom door, bringing me back to the moment. Back to the awareness of Nico’s too-large presence once again thrust into my life.

The sound is followed by the fucking liar’s voice. “Raven, let me in. We need to talk.”

My heart accelerates, racing for cover. The air suddenly feels too warm, my throat too tight. Instead of pacing between the cream walls in this cramped room, I plant my feet firmly. “You are persona non grata in here. Not wanted. Go away.”

“I’m not leaving.”

Damn him and his stubborn self. Last time he forced me to talk to him, to share, I got steamrolled. But he’s best friends with Kolton and Sawyer. Not talking to him will be more challenging than having this discussion.

I yank the door open and face the Sexy Beast. “Talk.”

“Can I come in?”

I step back and he steps in, the small space smaller with his huge frame inside.

“I’m sorry,” he says as the door clicks shut behind him.

Tapping my toe, I cross my arms and study the pink tile around the oval mirror. I count the number of sticks poking out of the air freshener, the scent of eucalyptus permeating the room. Better to focus on that than the smells of man and musk and bad decisions that followed him in here.

When he realizes those two words won’t cut it, he inches closer. “I’m sorry. Really sorry. Our time in Aspen meant a lot to me. I think it was intense for both of us, and I should have called. Should have gotten in touch with you. But the stuff with my brother took over and other things went down. I couldn’t think straight. And part of me was ashamed.”