Avenge: #3 Romanian Mob Chronicles (11 page)

The slight tremble in my hands gave away my nerves, but I pressed on, unlooping his belt with an ease I didn’t feel, my chest squeezing a little tighter when I opened his pants. I moved the material down slowly, marveling at how warm his skin felt against my hand and then pausing to brush against the coarse hairs that covered his stomach, lower.

After a pause and a breath, I followed that trail, the sensation different against my hands than it had been against my body. I moved slowly, deliberately, but stopped when I heard his exhale and looked up at him with wide eyes.

His jaw was clenched tight, his hands wrapped in tight fists, but, I realized, this wasn’t an expression of anger. He was battling for control, and the expression on his face, one that clearly showed both his need and his patience, was there because of me. My chest swelled, the unfamiliar feminine power that now coursed through me giving me bravery that I so often lacked.

I moved again, let my fingers pass through the nest of coarse hair until my knuckle grazed the thick root of his hardness. I trailed that knuckle down his shaft, barely touching his hot, smooth skin, but fascinated nonetheless by the way he felt, the skin thin and lined with an intricate network of veins, all of his shaft seeming to pulse in time with his heartbeat.

Back and forth I went, covering a little more of him with each pass, becoming bolder in my exploration with each passing second. On the last pass, I reached out and circled a finger around his rounded head, smiling faintly when he twitched and then smiling brighter when I saw a pearl of wetness leak from him.

Before I stopped to think, I caught that drop in the curve of my finger and then lifted my hand to my mouth and snaked out my tongue to grab it. The clean salty flavor, strong but not overwhelming, hit my taste buds just as the sound of Anton’s low moan hit my ears.

“You’re teasing me, Lily,” he gruffed out.

“No, I—” I started, alarm filling me suddenly.

“I like it,” he said, cutting me off. “Continue.”

I almost preened under his approval, and was even further emboldened by his words.

Reaching out for him again, I readied myself for the feel of him against my hand, but was again surprised by the sensation, the mix of strength and softness unlike anything I’d ever felt. I teased him again, moving from root to tip and back again, and then I shifted my fingers so that I brushed his underside, the tight flesh there pulsing, whether from his desire or my attention, I couldn’t say.

Then I dropped my finger lower, down the smoothness of his perfectly shaped sac, touching with only the faintest brushes at first and then gently gripping him in my palm, testing the heavy warm weight of him, suddenly anxious to feel the seed he carried there inside me, though I couldn’t say why.

What had started as a seduction of him quickly wrapped me in its pull, and my own heart began to pound erratically, the tingling tightness there spreading to settle, a low, needy warmth that coiled in my belly. As that warmth, the pulsing throb that had my walls clenching, increased, so did my touches of Anton.

I released his sac and gripped his root, moving one hand and then the other up his shaft and then back down, stopping to gather the pearls of moisture that flowed freely from him now, each one a tiny little treasure, proof that he desired me.

On and on I went, Anton’s cock now a deep, angry red and steel-solid in my hands.

“Tighter,” he muttered, his voice thick, almost unintelligible.

I glanced at him, saw the inferno of passion in his eyes, and said, “Show me.”

He let out a grimaced smile and then closed his hands over mine, squeezing tight, far tighter than I ever would have. Then he stroked up and then down his shaft, movements growing ever faster.

I followed, mimicking his motions when he dropped his hand and I was rewarded with low-moaned breaths that showed me how much he liked what I was doing. So I continued, mind marveling at the fact that this powerful man was responding because of me.

“Lily…”

He said my name on a thick moan, and I looked up to meet his eyes, saw the warning there.

I stroked faster, and then faster, and after a low grunt, I watched, fascinated as first one, then another, then another jet of pearly white fluid exploded from him. The first landed against my shirtless side, the other hit my forearm, and the last few splashed against my wrist, searing hot and leaving me as satisfied as my own climax would have.

Anton flexed in my palm and then started to soften, and when he wrapped a hand on either side of my face and pulled me in for a kiss, I let him go, desperate to taste him, touch him again. I shook my head when he broke away, but he put a calming hand on my shoulder.

“Wait here,” he said.

Then he was gone, I assumed off to my bathroom, a fact that was confirmed when I heard the water turn on. A few moments later, he returned with a wet cloth in hand and proceeded to clean me. But even after every trace of him was gone, I still felt him against my skin, replayed the erotic image of me touching him, every pant, every breath, every drop of his hot seed hitting me sending my desire higher.

But then something occurred to me.

“Umm, you, ah, finished. So I guess…”

“Finished?” he asked, to which I nodded. “I haven’t started.”

His words again set my blood on fire with need, and I watched with anticipation as he removed the remainder of his clothes, quickly got me out of mine, and then pulled me into an embrace, his muscles against my softer form creating an amazing sensation.

Then, sweet and gentle but with an undeniable passion, he laid me on the bed and then lay behind me, snuggling close to me, though our closeness only served to emphasize the smallness of the mattress.

“I’ll get you a bigger bed,” he said.

Part of me was elated at the words and the implication that we would be spending more time in bed together, but the other put a damper on my good mood, reminded me that us doing so was unlikely.

But for the moment, I focused on this, the feel of the solid bands of his arms around me, his hard chest against my back, soft cock nestled between my ass cheeks as if it belonged.

“Now,” he whispered, his chest heaving with his words, “where were we?”

I laughed despite myself, but the sound was cut off when he grazed his lips against my neck, then dropped lower to kiss my shoulder. His grip wasn’t punishing, was anything but, but he held me firmly, allowing me little room to move. I was at his mercy, could only lie there and receive whatever pleasure he chose to give.

And give he did.

One arm was locked around my waist, hand splayed against my stomach to hold me to him. But the other was free and he used it, seemingly touching me everywhere at once, hand not staying still long enough to give me the satisfaction that I craved. Rough fingertips grazed down my side, over my thighs, then back up again to my collarbones, and after that, a leisurely exploration of my breasts, where he touched everything but my nipples, which were hard little points of desire that stood erect, begging for his attention.

I grabbed his wrist, tried to pull his hand toward the aching tips of my breasts, but he simply chuckled and pulled away.

My protest died in my throat, though, when he skimmed his fingers down my body fast and buried his big hand between my thighs. There was a moment of shyness. I hadn’t yet gotten used to someone, him, touching me so intimately, especially not as he watched me with his rich, dark eyes, leaving no doubt that he was aware of my every reaction as he stroked me.

But the shyness scattered to the wind with the brush of his finger against my clit. Then he edged one thick finger inside me, another, stretching me until I was almost but not quite uncomfortably full.

“So tight,” he whispered as he began to move in and out.

My thighs fell open, and I groped for him, wrapping my fingers around his wrist, and began to rock my hips in time with strokes, eliciting low, panted moans that I only belatedly realized were mine. He moved a little harder, a little faster, but not hard enough for my liking.

I tried to get closer, but he latched his hand onto my hip and held me in place. I thought I would scream from frustration, the pleasure gathering inside me but just out of reach. And then it wasn’t, my body breaking out in heated shivers that built and built until I screamed out my climax, the sensations shooting through me like bolts of lightning.

He kept his pace until I calmed, and I looked at him through hooded eyes, some of the shyness returning. When he pulled his fingers out of me, I sighed and then sighed again when he placed a chaste kiss on my forehead. Then, he sat back, eyes meeting mine.

“So, um, are you finished now?” I asked.

He moved forward, pushing me back with his broad body until I lay flat, him floating over me.

“I haven’t even started,” he whispered as he sheathed himself quickly and then began to slide inside me.

A
nton

“
Y
ou’re leaving
?” she asked.

I grabbed her hand, entwined my fingers with hers, and held our hands up in the semidarkness of the new night.

“Yes. I have…work,” I replied.

She looked at me then, her eyes dark, and she nodded. “I’ll see you later?” she asked.

“Yes,” I said.

Then I kissed her, stood, and dressed quickly, wanting to linger but not allowing myself to do so. I left her apartment without looking back, but I stood outside until I heard the door lock snap and then went to my car. She’d put on a convincing enough face, but something about that scene with Christoph nagged at me. He was my next stop.

I considered going home first, but didn’t want to prolong this, so I headed to the club, nodding at a couple of familiar faces but not slowing down until I reached Christoph. He’d been drinking but seemed lucid enough.

“I was just about to call you, Anton,” he said, slumping down in his chair.

“Here I am,” I said.

“Good. I have something for you, but you first.”

“Do you have a problem with the nurse?” I said, for some reason choosing not to use her name. It felt wrong somehow to utter her name in his presence.

Christoph laughed as he regarded me. “So you like her? You fuck her yet?”

“Is there a problem, Christoph?” I said, my face muscles tense with my frown.

“You are,” he said, wagging a finger at me.

Anyone else, and I would have had him in a chokehold, but I held back, stared at him until he was quiet. When I had his attention, I said, “Bring any issues with her to me.”

He lifted a brow and tilted his head, seeming surprised. “You’re giving me an order?”

“Think of it as a friendly request,” I said, struggling to keep my voice from reflecting my rage, but still hopeful that I could avoid escalating things between us, though I would if he left me no choice. There would be no compromise.

Not about her.

“Huh. A friendly request. Speaking of,” he said, shifting subjects, “I need you to handle someone.”

“Who and why?”

“Does it matter?”

I saw my error immediately. Implicit in the question was disobedience, the kind that his father wouldn’t have tolerated, the kind that Christoph Junior couldn’t either if he hoped to survive as leader.

“No,” I said finally, the word like sawdust in my throat.

“Good,” he said, and then he gave me the name.

“I’ll take care of it,” I said. “And the nurse?”

He shrugged. “I’ll bring any problems with her to you.”

L
ily

I
’d tossed
and turned all night.

I’d done the same countless nights before, had come to expect these sleepless nights. The cause, though, that was the new thing. I’d called to check on Christoph, and Adela said he was fine. I was free for the afternoon, which meant I had time to do something I dreaded.

I dressed slowly and took the long way, opting to skip the second bus and walk to the center. The inevitable couldn’t be avoided, but I was in no hurry to see him.

It was strange, a feeling I’d never thought I’d have. Visiting Braden, seeing what he had become, was fuel for my soul, had given me purpose, a reason for being, for more than half my life.

Until him.

Being with Anton was a revelation, one that had shaken everything I knew and everything I believed to its very foundation. He had changed me, for good or for ill I couldn’t say, but he’d done it all the same. And he’d made me think of something beyond Braden.

Beyond vengeance.

I stopped at the crosswalk, waiting for the light to change. When it flipped to green and the Walk sign flashed, it occurred to me that Anton had done much the same thing. A switch had been flipped, and like that, everything that had seemed important, everything that had mattered, had fallen away.

A voice in my mind whispered my shame. Told me that I’d let sex, the unnamable but undeniable pull that drove me toward him, allow me to toss aside my goals, the justice, the vengeance, that my brother deserved.

Worse yet, I’d had done so for a person like the man who had broken Braden, done so for the child of the man who had ruined my life before it had even begun.

Anton told no lies about who he was, what he did, and I respected that. But that respect didn’t transcend the hypocrisy of it all. He was one of the ones I was meant to destroy, that I had dedicated my life to destroying.

And I had capitulated, fully and totally.

As much as I wished otherwise, as much as I knew Braden would never have forsaken me as I was him, that didn’t change the facts.

I loved him.

Loved him enough to go back on my word.

And now I had to tell my brother, hope that wherever he was, he would forgive me.

L
ily

T
he parking lot
was half empty when I arrived, and though that could have been testament to the hour, I knew it wasn’t that. This lot was always half empty, this center a place for those forgotten, cast aside. How many years had I walked through those doors, stood in silent judgment of the people who left their loved ones here, been so proud of myself because at least I came to visit?

I wasn’t judging today.

My breath hitched as I walked through the doors, my mind reeling with the weight of what I was about to do.

“You’re early this week,” the orderly said with his lascivious smile.

The anger that bubbled in my throat was more a reflection of my own guilt and not my anger toward him, but I was too close to the edge, too ragged to respond. So I ignored him, continued down the hall with my resolve intact.

Braden lay there, silent, watchful like he had been for more than a decade, and for the first time I envied his tranquility. It was terrible, yet another sign of my weakness, but I felt it nonetheless, was jealous because my brother didn’t have to betray me as I was him.

As I got closer, I frowned, seeing spittle that had pooled and dried at the corners of his mouth, his uncombed hair, his entire physical body an embodiment of my own failures.

I wet a cloth, letting it run under the almost scalding water until it was warm, welcoming the burn against my hand. It was no less than I deserved.

Then I returned to him and wiped his face, pleased when some clean skin was revealed. Even now, after all these years, Braden was still handsome, and if I’d closed my eyes I would have easily envisioned the bright smile that had covered his face, how loved and protected he’d made me feel. How he was the only one who had ever made me feel that way.

Our father had tried to be there for us after our mother died. That was what Braden had told me, anyway.

I barely remembered the man. He’d always been on the periphery, a shadowy figure that sometimes came home but always left again and then finally one day didn’t come back at all.

I was five, maybe six, when Braden sat me down and told me that the man I called Daddy on those occasions I saw him wouldn’t be coming home anymore. It was terrible, shameful, to think of my reaction, how I hadn’t had much of one at all.

But I hadn’t. Daddy was gone, and I’d been sad, but only because Braden had seemed so. His absence didn’t hurt me, didn’t even cause a ripple, because Braden was still there, my family, my rock. He’d been my best friend, my entire world, even after almost all of him had been taken from me.

Until Anton.

I stopped, returned the cloth to the sink, and sat beside Braden and grasped his hand. No time to delay, not any longer.

“I’m sorry, Braden. I failed you.”

I stopped, looked up at him, searching for any hint of reaction.

There was none.

Braden couldn’t help me out of this, would give me no respite, so I squeezed his hand, and continued.

“You always told me to be brave. Be strong. To trust myself. I never was, you know? I faked it, always pretended because I wanted to make you proud. Would you be proud of me now, Brade?” I asked, the imploring tone of my voice only softened by the tears that had started to fall.

I looked to him again, and was again confronted with that same serene silence that had been his response for so many years.

I shook my head.

“I don’t think you would be. You deserved better—you deserved justice. But I won’t be able to get it for you.”

I lowered my head, the shame making it almost impossible to keep it lifted. My voice dropped to match my posture. “I can’t do it, Braden. I tried, and I wanted to, but I couldn’t.”

I exhaled, let my brother’s hand go. It wouldn’t be right to touch him when I was telling him of how I’d wronged him.

“I’m sorry. I hope wherever you are, you can hear me. I hope that you’ll forgive me.”

The last word was barely audible, but I prayed he had heard me anyway.

I sat with Braden for a few hours more. Then I left.

My confessions for the day were only beginning.