Ripper(90)

Gray was standing in the doorway to the shower. He’d gotten rid of his shirt and his jeans hung low on his hips. My eyes caught on the tattoo on his chest. Torso really. It covered his left pec and wound around his body. My demon with the dragon tattoo.

“What made you pick the dragon?” Somehow it fit him. I couldn’t imagine him getting drunk one night and stumbling into a tattoo parlor and picking something random. It wasn’t random at all. That dragon seemed to be a piece of him.

His eyes were on my breasts, heat pouring off him, but he was still as he replied. “I didn’t. I had no choice in the matter. I turned thirteen and when I went to sleep that night, I was taken by my father to the Hell plane. It was the first time I met him, the first time I had to go there. When I went home, I had this tat. Well, I had the beginnings of it.”

He really went to the Hell plane. His father was really a Hell Lord. I knew it on an intellectual level, but seeing that tat reminded me that even Hell had its beauty.

His jaw had tightened, his body stiffening the minute he told me the truth. I’d shed my shame the night before in telling him my story, but Gray still had his. If it was anything like mine, he hadn’t really earned it.

I walked up to him, feeling awfully proprietary. We’d had a crappy morning and my first instinct was to pull away. Or it should have been. I always pulled away, but I didn’t want to be anything but close to Gray. I ran my fingers along the dragon. There was something visceral about the tat and I gasped a little when I could have sworn the thing moved.

Gray caught my hand and held it there. “Don’t. He likes it. He likes it as much as I do.”

“He?” Now that my hand was still, I could feel something. The dragon was warmer than Gray’s skin and there was a restlessness to it, as though the skin was vibrating under my touch. Was it alive?

Gray’s eyes had that slight tinge of red to them that let me know his demonic half was being stimulated. “It feels good, baby, but I know it shouldn’t. You have to move your hand. I like it too much.”

“Why is it wrong?” It might feel good to him, but I kind of liked the sensation, too. Odd at first, but then it almost seemed to hum against my palm in a pleasant way.

“It’s part of my demonic life. Kelsey, when I was thirteen it was small. It grew with me and it wasn’t like I sat in some chair and had it added to. It’s my family mark. My father touched me and then I had this thing on me. I never changed before that day, never had the strength or power.”

Likely hadn’t been immortal. His father had somehow turned on his demonic genes. It might account for his human nature. If his father hadn’t shown an interest, he might never have been more than a slightly stronger than normal human.

His father cared for him. Normally, that would be a good thing, but a Hell Lord’s love was probably fairly obsessive.

“So it’s alive?” I didn’t move my hand.

“I don’t know. I try not to think about it, but since I met you, I feel it more and more.” His eyes closed. “It feels so fucking good to have you touch me.”

Not just him. He meant he liked it when I touched it. “Let go of my hand.”

His eyes came open and I saw the pain there. He lifted his hand. “Of course.”

He didn’t understand anything at all. I ran my fingers along the tat, tracing the lines of the dragon as it hummed against my skin. There was something ferocious about it, but I wasn’t scared. It was a part of Gray and that meant it somehow belonged to me. I petted it.

The damn thing practically purred for me.

When I looked up, Gray’s eyes were flashing red and I saw the beginnings of his fangs.

“I don’t want you to go tonight. Do you know what I do want?”

Oh, I know what he wanted. He wanted me safe, but there was more to it. Deep down, he wanted me to stay home and wait for him, to be the sweet woman who gave up all the danger because she trusted her man to save the world. The caveman inside wanted me tending his elegant cave, serving him dinner, waiting for him in bed.

I wasn’t that girl. I would never be that girl, but if I could fight my instincts, maybe he could do the same.

And maybe there were two sides to the man. Maybe I was talking to the wrong side. I’d seen the human side of Gray. He kept the other side hidden so well it was easy to forget it existed, but could he ever be happy never feeding that part of his soul? Could he be at peace with a woman who didn’t accept all of him?

I dropped to my knees in front of him.

“What are you doing?” Gray’s voice had gone guttural.

When I glanced up, his eyes flashed red and his hands were trembling. “I’m taking care of you. All of you.”