Page 87 of Deep End

Lukas, who’s slowly coming awake. He kisses the curve of my neck, ticklish against my tender skin.Beard burns, I think. He left those behind last night, and I’m going to have to do something about that before anyone sees me in a swimsuit—but that’s not until twenty-four hours from now.

“You always smell so good.” It’s a low murmur that purrs through his chest, directly into my bones. He inhales deeply, doesn’t loosen his grip.

The opposite, really.

“I smell like you.” I’m boneless. Lazy, as though coming out from centuries of hibernation. “And the stuff we did.”

“Exactly my point.” Another soft nuzzle. His arms tighten around my torso, crossed, pulling me deeper even though there’s no air left to fill. “Do you always thrash around in your sleep?”

“I thrash around?”

I feel his nod against my nape, followed by a light kiss, followed by a scrape of teeth, followed by a mumbled “Had to restrain you.”

“I had no idea.” Josh never mentioned it. “It does explain the state of my bed every morning, though.” I attempt to turn. Lukas won’t allow it, but I feel how hard and warm he is against the lower curve of my ass. He doesn’t seem impatient about it—nothing about the way he’s holding me broadcasts anything but a hug, but . . . Are we going to have sex again? Do I want to have sex with him ag—

Yes.

Undisputedly,yes.

Before, though, I should clean up. “May I go to the restroom?” I ask jokingly.

He pretends to think it through. “If you must,” he says, a low, put-upon rumble that has me laughing, and him kissing my cheek again, and then, after a too-lingering moment, letting go. I sit up on the edge of the bed, facing away from him, and—

Ouch.

I twist my fists into the sheets, because ithurts. There’s a sharp ache right behind my belly button, and where my thighs meet my abdomen. Muscles worked too hard and too long.

I hide the flinch in my step and close the door behind me, cheeks burning. The thing is, I’dhatefor Lukas to decide to hold back nexttime. I need him to spare me no quarter and never hesitate. But when I look at my naked body in the mirror, I nearly gasp. I trace the map of what we did last night on my skin like it’s a pilgrimage: the red abrasions of his stubble; the bluish bruises on the edge of my left breast; a purple coin blooming on my hip bone; chapped, swollen lips.

Wrecked.

I look absolutelywrecked. I look like I’m something that belongs to Lukas, something he handled with strength, somethingusedin precisely the way I asked for in that damn list. No more, no less. Brought to the edge and no further.

Warm satisfaction blossoms in my stomach.Thisis it, the feeling I’ve been chasing. Not just the orgasms and the pleasure, but this sense of compatibility. My needs, met by Lukas’s.We match, I think. The relief of knowing that the things I want are complementary to someone else’s almost overwhelms me.

When I collect myself enough to go back, I find Lukas right outside, leaning against the wall. He put on a pair of gray joggers, and holds a glass of water in one hand, a gel capsule in the other.

I recognize it from decades of muscle soreness: Advil.

So much for hidinganythingfrom him.

I make no comment and swallow it. He looks at my naked body, at what he’s done to me, like I’m some kind of Olympic medal. Hungry, proud, eager. Other things I can’t disentangle from the intensity of his focus.

His hand lifts to brush against the bruise on the side of my breast. “Is this the point where you look contrite and say that you’re sorry?” I ask neutrally. Truth is, I’m afraid.What if he regrets it? What if I’m too much?

He says nothing. His thumb presses into the mark at my waist—a perfect match. Lock and key. “Should I apologize about these, too?”

I huff a small laugh. “You don’tsoundapologetic.”

“Because I’m not.” He shrugs, and it hits me like a freight train, howattractivehe is—not because of the muscles and the bone structure, notin general, but tome. Because of who he is, and who I am. “You love to be hurt, Scarlett. Just enough pain that you won’t eventhinkabout not doing what I ask.” He leans down. His skin is rough against my cheek. “I love giving that to you, and I’m going to for as long as you’ll let me.”

I shiver.Notin fear.

“Drink all of that,” he orders, and after the glass is drained, he picks me up and sets me on the edge of the bed.

“I should leave before your roommates wake up.”

His lips tighten, displeased, but he nods and plucks my top from the floor. “Arms up,” he instructs. I obey, trying to remember the last time someone dressed me. It feels nice.

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