Shattered King(97)

When she’d wrung me dry, I slowed down, trying to catch my breath. The aftershocks she was still feeling worked against the head of my now sensitive cock, making me groan.

I kissed the side of her neck and rolled us both to our sides. I was still inside her, her soft ass fitting snug against my lap. “You good, baby?”

“More than good,” she said quietly.

I came up on an elbow, gripped her chin, leaned in, and kissed her slow and deep. “I’m never letting you go,” I murmured against her lips.

She stared up at me, eyes wide, searching mine. Then she offered up a wobbly smile that I felt in the center of my chest.

I slid her gorgeous red hair off her shoulder, went back down beside her, kissed her shoulder, then curled back around her. She was still scared; she couldn’t hide shit from me, and that fucking cut. All I could do was wait and hope she figured it out, that I wasn’t going anywhere.

Pierce was dead, that sick motherfucker was gone for good, and as much as I’d wanted to be the one to put him in the ground, it was better this way. I couldn’t risk going down a second time. Losing Lulu all over again.

But I swore to fucking Christ, if anyone so much as looked at her the wrong way, let alone touched her or hurt her—I’d kill them.

Lulu

An incessant, repetitive noise dragged me from my deep sleep. I felt Hunter lean into me. I dragged my eyes open and watched him reach across for his phone on the nightstand, and roll to his back.

“What?” He listened for a second. “Where? . . . Be there in thirty.” Then he disconnected.

I lifted up on my elbows. “What’s going on?”

“Gotta go.”

My stomach did an unhappy roll. “But it’s the middle of the night.”

He was already out of bed, pulling on jeans. He opened one of the dresser drawers, pulled out a black long-sleeved T-shirt, and dragged it over his head. Then he went to the closet. I heard a beeping noise before he came back out. He had a set of handcuffs poking out of his pocket and a gun shoved down the waistband of his jeans.

“That was Jude. He’s been tracking something. He’s located it, but needs back up.”

I shoved my hair back from my face and shot up into a sitting position. “Why do you need a gun?”

He was pulling on a jacket and paused at my words.

“Babe.” He came toward me. “You know why.”

I did. All too well.

“It’s just a precaution. There’s nothing to worry about.”

If there was nothing to worry about, he wouldn’t be wearing a gun. “Is this a retrieval, this job?”

“Lulu . . .”

“So you’re going to break into some criminal’s place and steal whatever it is back?”

That muscle in his jaw jumped. “Yes,” he said, not sugarcoating it.

I sat up fully. He’d told me some of what he did, but we’d never gone into great detail. I had my suspicions. I knew it was dangerous, knew he skimmed the line where the law was concerned, and I’d tried not to dwell on it, to not let it get to me. But now, again faced with it, there was no hiding from the truth. It was in front of me sticking out of the waistband of his jeans. “That must make you a lot of enemies,” I said, mouth so dry I had trouble swallowing.

He came around to my side of the bed, planted one hand in the mattress, and leaned in. “I told you, you have nothing to worry about.”

I didn’t miss that he hadn’t answered my question.

“I don’t want you to go.” I hated myself for saying it for being so damn needy, but I had a bad feeling.

He cupped my jaw in his hand and slid his thumb up to my ear and back. “This is my job, Lulu. I’m trying to be honest with you here, about what I do. You need to find a way of dealing with it.”

My hand went to his abs and I gripped his shirt, scowling up at him. “Is that right?”

He cursed. “We’ll talk more when I get home.”

I fisted the fabric tighter, didn’t want to let him go. “Hang on a minute . . .”

“Gotta go, babe.”

Shit. “Right.”

His fingers threaded through my hair, and he fisted it, tilted my head back, and kissed me. It wasn’t a goodbye kiss; it was a “we’ll-finish-this-later” kiss. Hard and deep and wet with lots of tongue. Then he pulled back and I was forced to let him go.

He shoved on his boots, then moved back, dragged the covers down, kissed my bare hip then pulled them back up, tucking them around me.

And walked out the door.

I heard the beep of the alarm then the front door close behind him.

Goddammit.

I lay there for a few minutes before I pulled back the covers and climbed out of bed. Slipping on Hunter’s shirt, I buttoned it up and rolled back the sleeves. No way would I get back to sleep now, not with the way my belly churned, the way my heart pounded. I’d had more nights than I could remember feeling like this, curled up in whatever shitty apartment Josh and I were living in, afraid the door would be busted in at any moment, that Pierce would find us.