Chapter Twenty-Three
Ana
Luke’s stare is piercing, his blue eyes flecked with amber, his mood taut, his jawline sharp, his agitation palpable. He’s angry with me. I’m angry with him, too, of this there is no question. But he’s also standing in this doorway instead of walking out of the bedroom, and with that one little piece of knowledge, I find hope. And hope, I have learned over the years, can be the tool that builds you up to the highest tower in the sky, only to deliver elation or crushing pain.
I suck in a slow whisper of a breath, and I do not dare blink for fear he will vanish like stardust in the winds of a stormy night and if ever there was a stormy night, tonight is that night.
But I do blink and in that short flutter of my lashes, Luke is standing in front of me, pulling me close, his fingers tangling roughly in my hair. The feel of him next to me, his powerful thighs pressed to my thighs, his hands on my body are bittersweet when I do not know if this is a new beginning or the final ending.
“What are you doing to me, woman?” he demands, his voice a raspy, smoky tone, that draws me into his moody, dark spell.
“Not everything I want to,” I dare because I’m done talking in circles, and punching at all the wrong things.
His response is a grunt, just a grunt, and already his mouth is closing down on mine, torment, and passion a wicked mix on his tongue. But the torment isn’t new. The torment is a part of Luke, the part of himself that drives him to call himself Lucifer, the part that will always hate himself for what he became and how he lived. But I love him more than he hates himself and I kiss him with that message on my lips. There’s a message on his lips, one of hunger and demand. One that demands everything, but I fear he will never offer as much to me ever again.
This idea torments me, and I can do nothing but live in the moment.
I embrace our haze of urgency and passion as we tear at each other’s clothes. I am desperate to feel him inside me and I shove at his tee, even as he tears mine over my head, leaving my breasts naked and exposed to his hot gaze. In what feels like moments, I’m fully naked, he’s fully naked, and I’m pressed against the wall, and oh God yes, his fingers drag along the wet heat of my sex, preparing me, teasing me right where I need him.
“Holy hell,” he murmurs, lifting my leg, and then he’s burying himself to the deepest part of my body, pleasure sliding over his handsome features.
He is beautiful in these moments, the image of perfect masculine dominance, a warrior who is somehow more human and vulnerable than in any other moment. He thrusts into me, and I gasp, clinging to him, panting out his name. “Luke.”
He cups my breast, pinches my nipple in that delicious way he does just right, and sensations wash over me, settling low in my belly. My sex clenches around him, and I arch into his next pump, his next thrust. He catches my other leg, lifts me, and slides deeper, burying his face in my neck. I hold onto him, cling to him, move with him, and we fuck—that is what this is, but there is more to it for us. So much more beneath the surface.
This is raw and honest, real in every way. This is us. I’m not sure anything since we came together again has been before now.
The rub of his body against mine, the build of passion, comes too quickly. My sex clenches around him hard and fast, spasming with a wickedly intense orgasm. Luke follows me over the edge just as hard and fast, quaking, moaning in that rough, masculine way of his, until our bodies are still and he holds me there, fingers flexing on my back.
Seconds tick by and neither of us move or speak, almost as if we’re clinging to the intimacy, afraid of what comes next. But Luke can only hold both our weights so long, and we can only suspend time so long. Caving to the inevitable, he rotates us and sets me on the bathroom sink, pulling out of me but now away. He allows me a moment to right myself, providing a towel to do so, and then presses his hands on either side of my hips.
“All in,” he murmurs. “Good, bad, ugly. All in. Say it, Ana.”
Relief fills me at where this delivers us. “Yes. All in. Good, bad, ugly.”
“Don’t do that again,” he orders roughly.
“Never again,” I say, all too aware that he’s talking about bringing up his past and that I didn’t just hurt him, I hurt him deeply. “Don’t leave again,” I order. “Don’t do that again.”
“Never,” he promises. “I’m sorry you heard me say that to Adam. I was angry. I was—”
“Hurt,” I supply, cupping his jaw. “I’m sorry again.”
He covers my hands with his. “It’s done. You don’t need to keep saying that. Subject over and moving on. What you said about how we deal with all of this was true. These are not normal circumstances and we navigate them best together. I hate I left you alone.”
His cellphone rings in his pants on the floor. “Damn it,” he groans. “Could there be a worse time? You’d better get dressed.” He lifts me and helps me off the counter before reaching for his pants.
He answers with, “Yeah, Blake.” He listens a moment and punches the speaker button, before he sets his cell on the counter, already reaching for his pants as he says, “Blake has a message for you, Ana. Blake, she’s on the line.”
“Ana, Jake’s daughter, Olivia, left you a message on your voicemail. I’m going to play it for you.”
My eyes meet Luke’s, surprise and a question shared between us. “I’m listening,” I respond, a knot balling in my belly, dread over what I’m about to hear, what I might learn about Kurt, the only man I really knew as a father. I mean, I loved my real dad, but I was so young when he had his accident, almost as young when my mother had her heart attack.
A moment later, Olivia’s voice fills the air. “Ana,” she murmurs, a raspy note to her voice followed by a sniffle and sob. “I’m sorry. I’m struggling to hold it together and even think. I should have talked to you when you were at the house but I just wasn’t mentally present. Dad told me that the secrets he was forced to keep from you about killed him. He said that nothing is as it seems. I don’t know what that means. He wouldn’t tell me. He said that was for my own good, just like it was for your own good, but it doesn’t seem to me right now that the secrets were good for any of us. I wish there was more I could tell you but there isn’t. Just—well, I hope you hear this. Please stay safe.” She disconnects.
A vise closes on my throat and I’m swimming through the darkness of my mind, seeking light, seeking the truth that remains elusive.
“That’s it,” Blake says. “I’ll give you some time to process that unless you have anything for me now?”
“Not yet,” I reply. “I do need a minute.”
“You got it,” Blake confirms, “but sunrise is about an hour away, fifty-four minutes to be exact. I suggest you both start thinking about getting out of that house. The rest of the team is gathering in the kitchen.”
He disconnects. I rotate to face Luke fully, and I say what I feel in my own gut now. “Everything really wasn’t as it seemed, was it? You were right. This ties back to Kurt, but I refused to believe he was running a side gig with Kasey. That makes no sense to me. None. Zero. There’s a bigger picture here.” I try to step around him.
He catches my arm, his jaw flexing, his eyes sharp. “Ana?”
“I’m not mad at you. You got real with me and you know I respect that. I just need to think. I need to put real clothes on and do something. Together. We need to do something.”
“You know the truth is not going to be gentle, right?”
I think of those early morning drills Kurt put me through and I say, “No. No, it’s not. Because I’m done with all the games, in every possible way. Whoever killed Jake killed Kurt. I’d bet my life on it. And we’re going to make them pay.”