Page 2 of Watch Me Burn
“Nice?” Her voice goes up. “No. You are not using the word ‘nice’ right now. I want details. And there better be some dirty ones in return for getting my ass out of bed this fucking early.”
My fingers touch my lips, where the memory of Damien’s kiss lingers. The fierce possession of it had given way to a soft declaration of his desire that weakens my knees even now. Then I touch my throat. The fresh fingerprint bruises beneath my turtleneck still throb, where my wolf’s hands gripped me as he punished me and made me his once again.
Two men. Two different kinds of desire. Two different ways of making me feel wanted.
“Hey.” Maren snaps her fingers in front of my face. “That dreamy look tells me it was definitely more than ‘nice.’”
“He’s complex.” I twist the cap on my water bottle, tightening and loosening it. “There are layers to him I wasn’t expecting.”
“Good layers or ogre onion layers?”
“Interesting layers.”
That moment in my kitchen comes flooding back. The way Damien moved when he grabbed Caleb, the icy menace in his voice when he threatened him. So similar to that day with Mr. Pearson at Elk Fest, like glimpsing a predator beneath his polished surface.
“So, did it end in a tangle of sweaty limbs and sticky bodily fluids? Please say yes, please say yes.”
I step around a fallen log. “No. We didn’t have sex.”
“That sucks.” Her face falls, then she studies my expression, and her mouth quirks up. “But you’ve got that just-got-laid glow. Are you lying to me, Luna Marie? Did you get some billionaire dick last night and just don’t want to share?”
“We didn’t have sex, Maren.” I pause, heat creeping up my neck. “He kissed me, but that’s it.”
She lets out a little squeal and grabs my arms. “That man has a mouth that looks like it should come with a warning label. Does he know how to kiss?”
“Yeah, he does.”
Jesus, does he know how to kiss.
“I fucking knew it. So, come on, spill. How was it? Scale of one to ‘holy shit, I need to change my panties.’”
I roll my eyes and sigh. “You’re the only woman I know who measures everything by how wet it makes her panties.”
She shrugs. “That’s how I judge the world. So?”
“It was… intense.”
“Intense like ‘I want to climb him like a tree’ or intense like ‘he’s trying to eat me alive’?”
“Both. But in a good way.”
“I’m so fucking jealous. So, are you going to see him again?”
“I don’t know.” I avoid her gaze, instead choosing to watch Ghost sniff at something in the underbrush as we slow our pace a little. “I mean, I like him, but I have so much going on right now, and I’m not sure I’m ready for a relationship.”
Maren pauses in her stride to give me a pointed look. “Lu, I’m not asking if you’re going to marry him, for Christ’s sake. But how about a little fun? It’s been over a year since you broke up with shithead Caleb. And Damien is fucking hot. What more do you need?”
I can’t believe Caleb had the gall to show up here last night. Then there’s the way he went from his smarmy attempt at being remorseful to grabbing and threatening me. Not that I expected any less after the way our relationship ended.
“It’s complicated.”
“Everything’s complicated when you overthink it.” Maren huffs as she steps over a puddle. “Which you usually do. But sometimes you just have to say, ‘Fuck it,’ and… fuck it.”
If she only knew how much I fuck these days. How every night for almost two months, I’ve been claimed by a man whose face I’ve never seen, whose name I don’t know, and whose touch sets me on fire in ways I never imagined were possible.
A man who’s also a serial killer.
That’s way too much truth for a morning hike. Caleb seems like a safer topic.
