Page 83 of Lethal Devotion
“I wasn’t, though.”
"But you could have been." She looks up, and I can see a mist in her green eyes. "And I would have been here, not knowing where you were, not knowing if you were coming back."
The pain in her voice cuts deeper than any bullet could. "Sienna?—"
"Do you know what that would have done to me?" She sets the washcloth aside and reaches for the antiseptic. "Do you know what it would have done to my son? He's already started to care about you, Damian. He asks about you when you're not here. He thinks you’re scary, sure, but… in the way the family guard dog is scary, I suppose. He trusts you.Itrust you. You can’t just leave without…"
She shakes her head, squeezing out some of the antiseptic onto a finger before she starts to dab at the wound. I can’t speak, the pain of her touching it is so intense, and that might be for the best. I don’t know what to say. Ineverknow what to say, and that’s why she deserves so much better than me.
One of many reasons.
“This was never supposed to be about caring,” I say tightly, when she stops for a moment, and I feel like I can breathe again. “This is about me protecting you. You didn’t need to know what I was doing tonight, Sienna. I was always going to come home, and I’ll let you know when the threat is handled and it’s safe. We’re not—this isn’t?—”
This isn’t a real marriage.I see her look up sharply, hear the words I didn’t finish saying, and her face closes off briefly. She straightens, reaching for the needle and thread to stitch up the wound.
“Fine,” she says, her voice flatter than before. “I get it, Damian. I do. Now, this is going to hurt.”
Not as much as losing you will.I should tell her that. But what’s the point? What comes after I say those words? Does she stay? How could she ever be happy, once the initial passion has worn off and she finds out the truth of what it’s like to be with a man like me? More nightslike this, more violence, more blood, more danger. She and her son exposed to a world they were never meant to be a part of. And me, a husband who will never know the exact right thing to say to keep her from getting an expression like the one she’s wearing right now, who will never be able to give her a world as soft and sweet and peaceful as the one she deserves.
Each stitch burns, and I focus on that, on the pain, and not how soft her fingers feel against my skin, how strangely good it feels to have her touching me like this, when no one has ever made me feel so cared for. No one has ever comforted me, or cared for me, when I’m in pain.
I could get used to it. I could rely on it. And I’ve always been told that’s the most dangerous thing a man like me could ever allow to happen.
Sienna ties off the stitches, smearing more antiseptic over the wound before reaching for the gauze and cutting off a piece large enough to cover it. Her movements are efficient, confident, and I wonder how she managed to learn how to do this.
“How do you know how to clean up a wound so well?” I ask curiously, and she glances up at me.
“Adam.” She bites her lip, laying the gauze over the wound. “Not stitching him up, obviously, but patching up cuts and scrapes. He’s a toddler, things like that happen, and well… waitressing and stripping don’t exactly offer health insurance.” She lets out a sharp breath. “And it doesn’t really pay enough to replace every piece of clothing that gets torn or messed up. So I learned to sew and patch it all. Skin isn’t the same as fabric, of course, but I think I did alright.”
I glance down at the stitches as she covers them. They’re surprisingly neat. It’ll scar, but that’s nothing new. “You did a good job,” I tell her, and I see a faint flush of pride on her face before she reaches for the tape.
“Thanks,” she says softly, and something twists in my chest at the thought of Sienna tending to her son’s scrapes and bruises, patching his clothes. She’s been taking care of him for years now with so little help, and here she is now, trying to take care of me.
She tapes the gauze in place, her fingers gentle against my skin, and I have to fight the urge to catch her hand and hold it there. To pull her closer, to bury my face in her neck and breathe her in, to let myself have this moment of softness in a life that's been nothing but hard edges and violence.
"There," she says, just before she straightens. "That should hold until it starts to heal."
And then she stands up, far too close to me, and the scent of her, vanilla and sandalwood and warm feminine skin, sweeps over me in an overwhelming, aching wave.
“Damian.” My name spills from her lips as if she hadn’t meant to say it. “I’m—” She draws in a slow breath. “I’m glad you’re alright. Mostly alright. If you hadn’t come home, I?—”
I reach up without thinking, pressing my fingers against her lips. I don’t want to hear what she might say, what she might confess. I don’t know if I can bear it, especially in this moment.
Her lips feel soft under my fingers, plush and full. I know what those lips feel like gliding over my body, pressed against mine, wrapped around my cock. And even though my body is throbbing with pain, my side a searing brand of it, my reaction to touching her is instant and unavoidable.
I’m hard in a second, aching for more, and when her tongue darts against my fingers, brushing the roughened skin there, heat that has nothing to do with my injuries sears through me.
I drop my hand, and lean down to press my mouth against hers.
Sienna lets out a soft, surprised gasp, her lips parting as she arches against me for the briefest second, her tongue gliding against mine, before she pulls back. “Damian, you’re hurt?—”
“I’m not too hurt for this.” I tangle one hand in her hair, drawing her mouth back to mine. All it takes is a touch for me to forget why I shouldn’t be doing this, why I should be telling her to go back to her room instead of sliding my tongue over her lower lip, urging her to open her mouth for me.
Just the feeling of her mouth on mine makes the pain vanish, all of it fading to insignificant background noise as Sienna’s lips part andher hands come up to press against my bare chest, her fingertips pressing gently into my skin as a soft moan slips from her lips. She’s careful not to touch anywhere that might hurt, but I can feel her body tensing, feel her soft gasps against my mouth as her desire builds.
I drop my hands to her waist, lifting her and setting her on the edge of the sink as I push the edge of her nightgown up her thighs, eager to touch her between them, to feel how wet I know she already is for me. Sienna makes a soft, protesting sound as I step between her legs, breaking the kiss again.
“Damian, you should be resting?—”
