His heart ached for her. She’d endured so much and had done it alone. How could she not be defeated and despondent and at the end of her limit? Her luck was in the red, her strife ceaseless. She had a never-ending shortage of anything good in her life.
Yet here she was, asking him about us and the future. She hadn’t given up, and it left him awestruck and overwrought with admiration.
“I think the antidote is derived from Amazon plants.” She told him Badell’s father had been a pharmacist and what little she knew about the team of indigenous doctors. “They’re experts in medicinal botany.”
“They’re also surgeons?” He stepped toward her and touched her shirt over the scar.
“Yes. Tiago won’t tell me what organs were damaged or removed, or how the sickness is related to the injury, or if—” She sucked in a hard breath, her expression blank. “Or if I can bear children. But hey, at least I don’t have periods.”
Her smile was hapless and heartbreaking, so utterly void of humor it tore him apart.
“I want you to do something for me.” He held her face in his hands and forced her to look at him.
She sawed her teeth together, and a glimmer of fight lit her eyes.
“Tonight,” he said, “I want you to not be so damn tough. Let it go. Give it to me. Let me be your strength.”
“Tate—”
“One night, Lucia. Everyone needs someone. Even me. Tonight, I’m yours. Your someone.”
“My person?” she whispered.
“Yeah.”
It was a sluggish, circumspect unraveling, her entire body shuddering, fighting the turmoil that rose behind her eyes. She visibly wrestled with it, battling an inner storm he couldn’t comprehend. But when she finally gave in, he was there, his arms around her, his lips in her hair, and his whispered words swaddling her in truths. You’re resilient and brave. I respect you. You’re not alone. I’m here for you.
She wept quietly, gracefully, and with every tear, he felt her muscles loosen and her joints give until she was pliable and spent and maybe even relieved.
As her tears slowed, he chased them with his lips, kissing them away one by one. He’d never been so moved, so absorbed in the emotions of a woman. He loved Camila, but she didn’t need him. She’d never needed him. Not like this.
And that wasn’t all. The taste of Lucia’s tears, the provocative scent of her skin, the directness in her questions, the glimpse of vulnerability beneath her strong exterior—it turned him on like nothing else. This woman was everything he never knew he was attracted to.
When her eyes dried, he leaned back and inspected her exquisite face for signs of pain. “How do you feel?”
“Better.” She placed a hand on his bare chest and idly stroked the muscle there. “Thank you.”
“Your stomach?”
“Settled.”
“Eat.” He placed the sandwich in her hand and stepped back.
She nibbled on the bread, ate a strawberry, and after a few more bites, she tore into the pork with voracity.
Satisfied, he rested his fingers in his pockets and caught her gaze. “You have questions about Camila and me. Ask them.”
CHAPTER 16
The last bite of the sandwich stuck in Lucia’s throat under the force of Tate’s stare. The intensity in his ice blue eyes, assertive growl in his voice, stillness in his confident posture—everything about his pushy, take-charge style made her blood throb and heat in places that had no business reacting at all.
He towered over her, a head taller and shoulders twice as wide. His expression was that of a man restraining his need, one who seemed to have everlasting patience. He adjusted his fingers in his pockets, shifting the front of his jeans to accommodate that huge, relentless erection—an erection that had been tenting his zipper since she removed her clothes.
Chemistry was an effortless thing between them. Last night at the club left no doubt in her mind about that. But this was more than sex.
He’d washed her panties.
Kissed her tears.
Held her as she’d cried.
Offered to be her person for one night.
And he loved her sister.
Her gaze faltered, bouncing around the room until it collided with his once again.
You have questions about Camila and me. Ask them.
“Does Matias know?” She swallowed down the last of the tea and slid off the counter.
“Know what?” He caught her arm, steadying her.
“That you love her?”
“Yes.”
And Tate was still alive? Maybe Matias wasn’t threatened by him, though that seemed impossible. Tate would have a shameless effect on any woman he set his sights on, including her lovesick sister.
Lucia was thoroughly intimidated in the shadow of his powerful body and plundering gaze, but she also felt protected. And lucky. Without him here, she would’ve spent tonight like every other night—starving, homesick, heartsick, sick sick, and so terribly alone.
His hair was a sexy mess of short blond spikes. Black roses tattooed one muscled arm, the rest of his upper body a landscape of unmarked skin and ripples of definition. Though he wore a deep scowl and seemed to enjoy staring her down in a condescending way, he was also tender and possessive.
He was a man to love. If Camila hadn’t already belonged to Matias, she would’ve given her heart to Tate without hesitation.
“Was it hard to…?” Did she want to ask this? She sat on the mattress on the floor and pulled the shirt down to cover her thighs. “Was it hard to have sex with Camila then let her go?”
“I wouldn’t know.”
“You mean…?” Her heart thundered. “You haven’t…?”
“I’ve never so much as kissed her.” With a sigh, he sat beside her and stretched his legs along the floor in front of them. “When I met your sister, I’d just spent ten weeks with Van. I wanted her instantly, but I was…” He wiped a hand down his mouth, his fingers lingering on his barely-there beard, his expression pensive. “I needed time to come to terms with what happened in that attic. We both did. I lived like a monk for the next two years, waiting for her and… Maybe I was waiting for myself. To feel worthy of her. To feel like a man again.” He dropped his hand on his lap. “When I was finished waiting, the very night I decided to go after her, Matias showed up.” He laughed a sharp sound that wasn’t a laugh at all. “I knew then that I didn’t have a chance in hell with her.”
He must’ve had superhuman staying power. To wait for Camila like that only to lose her in the end? Lucia commended his patience.
“You haven’t tried to move on?” she asked. “With another woman?”
“For the last four years, I’ve fucked everything that moved.”
An ice-cold jolt knifed straight through her chest. Is that what she was to him? Something that moved? “How’s that working for you?”
“It’s…” He stared at his dusty brown boots, his brows knitting. Then he huffed another non-laugh. “It’s been utterly joyless.” He turned toward her, head cocked and eyes squinting. “You asked if it was hard to have sex then let her go. Are you worried about that? With us?”
Us.
She looked away, an involuntary reflex she immediately regretted and forced her gaze back to his. “Am I worried because we had sex? Because I might not want to let go of something you found utterly joyless?”
“We didn’t just have sex. We had great fucking sex.” His perfect lips formed the words with natural seduction, making her shiver all over. “You enjoyed it as much as I did.”
Her nipples hardened beneath the shirt. He zeroed in on her chest, and something flickered in his eyes.
“If I could make you happy…” He unlaced his boots and pulled them off. Then his socks. “Even if it’s just a fleeting happiness…” His hands went to his jeans, unzipping and shucking them off. “I’ll do whatever it takes.”
“A pity fuck won’t make me—”
She was pinned beneath him
on the mattress before her next breath. He was so heavy and solidly built his weight was alarming.
“Does this feel like pity?” He grabbed her hand and shoved it between them, molding her fingers around his cock.
Trapped in his tight briefs, his swollen length angled toward his hip, so damn thick and long the cotton barely contained it. It definitely didn’t feel like pity. He felt ruthless.
“Don’t ever mistake my desire for you as a mercy.” He ground himself against her hand. “I don’t care if you’re sick, sweetheart. I intend to exhaust my need for you until you forget where you are and how many breaths you have left. How’s that for a nice guy?”
It was arousing, electrifying, stimulating and lubricating the deepest, hungriest part of her.
“I’ve never come as hard as I did when I was inside you.” His breathing sped up, his lips parting and brushing against hers as he rocked his hips in the V of her thighs. “I know you felt it—the crazy consuming shock of it. I’m going to take you there again and again, until you never want to let go.”