Say It's Forever, page 16
SIXTEEN
SALEM
My throat locked with anticipation as I rested high on my knees.
Held.
Enthralled.
Enraptured.
Caught in a violent storm that had come from out of nowhere. A tsunami that had hit unaware.
Where both of us would drown.
Where I had become a piece of the torment written in the bold strokes of paint that covered every surface of his studio.
A piece of the agony weaved into the canvas.
The thickened air strained in and out of my lungs as I remained as still as I could. A picture for him to see. An element for him to piece together.
To carve and shape and mold me into an abhorrent beauty that matched his walls.
The man stood by the door.
His massive shoulders heaved with each harsh, hot breath that rocked from his wide, wide chest.
A monster.
A wraith.
A tower.
A fortress.
A dark, dark sanctuary where I wanted to disappear.
I was still struck by the images.
By the suggestions that swirled and whispered and screamed from the walls.
As if they were alive and crying out to be heard.
The chaos that littered this bad boy’s mind was written in blacks and whites and reds.
But I’d recognized it before, hadn’t I? Hell, I’d had the intuition that the paintings out in his living room had been more than personal the first night we’d met.
He was an artist, but I hadn’t been quite prepared then for what that really meant.
“You matter, Salem. You matter. Look at you, darlin’.”
There was the charm all mixed up with the disorder that was at the heart of this man.
My chest squeezed and the blood thundered through my veins.
“Beauty. The meaning of it.” The words fell on a harsh exhale from his lips, and the air that was barely skating up my throat died right there when he slowly toed off the dress shoes he wore.
Obsidian eyes flashed like a rush of the darkest night, rough as they devoured me from across the space.
Without looking away, he leaned down and peeled the socks from his feet.
I gulped, then I was nearly passing out when he ticked through the buttons on his shirt and peeled that off, too.
The man was nothing but wide, wide shoulders. Muscle everywhere, bulky on his arms and chest, his abdomen packed, tapering down and narrow at the waist.
Most all of his skin was covered in ink that seemed to scream the same as the walls, though it remained indistinct in the minimal light cast down from the rafters.
But I could make out enough to get the intonation.
The pure intimidation.
Menace and peril and life.
The mountain of a man stood there for a moment, then he took a step forward.
Energy rushed across the floor.
He approached like a phantom. Like a painting that had come to life.
It covered me whole and caressed me in shadows.
I was right. This man was definitely, definitely dangerous.
There was no question about it then.
And still, I remained there, held in his gaze, feeling the safest I’d ever felt.
I thought he was coming for me, only he slipped by on his bare feet.
Desire rippled through on his wake.
God, that was sexy, too.
Jud Lawson was an anomaly.
Conflict and peace.
Harmony and dissention.
A blinding light in the longest night.
Stealer of heart and sanity and good sense.
Because remaining there on the ground like an offering?
Posing for him?
There was no question I’d lost my mind.
His aura rippled through the room as he moved over to the wall that I faced. He pulled an easel closer, and the canvas he set on it looked like it’d been painted over a thousand times. He knelt to open a few jars of paint.
He picked up a brush and studied me.
I trembled beneath his watch.
“Beauty,” he rumbled. “Second I saw you out in the rain. Thought I had to be imagining things. Hallucinating.”
“I was terrified,” I admitted, our voices dancing through the condensed air.
Louder than they should be.
The thrumming of our hearts was palpable.
Frantic beats that echoed against the other.
A smirk ticked at the corner of his sexy mouth, then it slipped when he glanced at me then to the canvas. He began to paint. Quick, sweeping strokes, as if the images fell from him without thought. “I felt your fear, Salem. I felt your desperation. Wonder if I felt it then, that we were bound to be more than strangers. Wonder if I knew you were supposed to be on the back of my bike that night. Wonder if I knew you were going to become something that mattered in my life.”
I struggled to remain still, to swallow, to breathe. But the walls spun and gathered. Jud didn’t move, but it felt as if the walls had enclosed and pushed us closer.
He kept sweeping his brush over the canvas in long, frenzied strokes.
“I’m so tired of being afraid.” The confession slipped free. “I’m so tired of running.”
Those walls shook around me. A warning they might crumble and fall.
I had to remember. Remember to be careful.
Trust no one.
But it was getting harder and harder to do.
Beneath his beard, his jaw clenched. “I want to erase that for you, Salem. Gather up every scar you have and paint it something new.”
“Some of the scars cannot be healed, Jud.”
It was an admission from my soul. Where the sorrow railed and reigned.
He blinked, caught in his own storm. “And I want to hold that, too. Don’t deserve it, but I want it.”
“How do you not deserve it?”
And I guessed that’s why I’d followed him here after I’d been so angry with him. So disappointed. The truth I’d seen in the well of his eyes—it was grief that had sent him running.
A hard scoff climbed his thick throat. Disgust rolled out with the sound. “Don’t you see it yet?”
“I see a man who’s in pain and doesn’t let anyone around him know.”
“Only you.”
“Me.” I couldn’t tell if I was claiming it or if it was a question.
Desire lapped.
I could taste it.
Sweet in the air.
I inhaled it into my lungs, felt it rush my veins and fill my belly.
From where I was perched on my knees, my hips involuntarily bucked, begging for him.
I shouldn’t.
But there was a brand-new need burning inside me.
It was only going to hurt.
But my hand was pressing lower on my abdomen, thoughts hitting me so fast, the memory of that kiss, those hands, how good it would feel to just give in.
A growl reverberated the air.
Those black eyes flashed.
Pitch.
Darkened with lust.
His tongue swept across his lips.
“Salem.” It was a warning.
“You asked me when I felt the most beautiful. You wanted me to show you how I feel when you look at me. This, Jud. I feel this. I feel desired. I feel wanted. I feel real.”
No longer mist.
My trembling fingertips barely slipped under the band of my underwear, and the plea rasped from my mouth. “I want you to want me. The way I want you.”
There I went, begging for the pain.
But I couldn’t stop.
Not when he was watching me that way.
“Enchantress. What do you think you’re doin’ to me?”
A soft sound of rebuttal stole from between my lips. “It’s me who’s intoxicated, Jud. Me who doesn’t know what hit her.”
The brush slipped from his fingers and clinked against the floor.
Slowly, Jud edged my direction.
A dark tower.
A ferocious warrior.
A wicked savior.
I wanted him to be.
To stand for me.
For us.
But I could never ask that of him.
He came forward on those bare feet until he was reaching out and tipping my chin up with the crook of his index finger. “Darlin’, I’m no good. Don’t you see?”
Shadows played over his hard, rugged face.
“I do see, Jud. I see a man who is kind and good and gentle and fierce. I see a man who’s haunted. Haunted like me.”
The pad of his thumb traced my lips.
My stomach tightened and my hips bucked again.
He was close enough that I could make out some of the shapes on his torso. They were so much like the images painted on the walls.
Demons and angels. War and life. Grief and destruction. Toiling seas and crumbling mountains.
But there were four bold letters stamped on his left side that I had the urge to touch.
GRIM.
My spirit trembled, as wildly as my fingers when I gave in and reached out to trace the word.
The proclamation.
I closed my eyes as if I were reading it in Braille, and the man shook beneath my touch.
Shame lanced through his being.
“Who I really am, Salem.”
My brow pinched. “What does that mean?”
“It means I’ve done horrible things.”
Everything shivered.
My heart and my soul and the night.
This was bad. It was clear in the confession of his eyes that it was bad.
The ghosts in his eyes weren’t just pretend.
Though, like a fool, I pressed, lifted my gaze to his hard, harsh beauty. “But it’s in the past?”
Because I couldn’t believe this man was cruel. That he was vile and depraved. Capable of inflicting pain.
“Just because it’s in the past doesn’t mean it’s not who I am. Doesn’t mean it doesn’t live on inside me.”
Jud still held me by the chin, and I took that hand in both of mine and pressed his massive palm to my cheek. Felt the comfort that radiated from his warm skin. The tenderness. The kindness. The care he’d shown. “You’re a good man, Jud.”
A grunt scraped up his throat, and he slowly climbed down onto his knees in front of me, still towering there as he slipped his hand to the side of my neck where my pulse raged and down over the thunder of my heart.
His palm was splayed wide as he moved farther down to run over my breasts.
A needy gasp raked up my throat.
“Nah, darlin’. I’m not. Because if I was, I wouldn’t be doing this.”
His mouth followed the path.
My chin.
My neck.
The sensitive skin between my breasts.
Shivers raced, and I all out shook.
He inhaled as he went, but it was me who was inundated with his aura.
It filled my lungs.
Filled my veins.
Citrus and cinnamon and spice.
I got drugged on that late fall night.
He kept angling down until he was kissing over my stomach, and my chest was heaving as my fingers tangled in the long pieces of his hair.
“You should really tell me to stop this, darlin’, because I’m about to taste this sweet pussy, and I’m afraid once I do, I’m not ever gonna want to stop.”
Lust burned.
Flames licked across my flesh.
I should be afraid of the fire, but my fingers only fisted tighter.
“A friend wouldn’t make me wait.” The words raked from my mouth on a frantic tease, a bid and a plea.
Because, oh god, I wanted this man’s mouth on me.
He rumbled a laugh.
It vibrated me all the way through.
Tingles scattered.
Jud edged back and met my eye, his massive hands holding me around the waist. “You wanna come, baby?”
My nod was rabid.
“Did you touch yourself that night? When I was texting you?”
My tongue stroked my dried lips. “Yes.”
“This is what I was imagining, darlin’. Feasting on you. Were you thinking the same?”
“Yes.”
From where he knelt, he picked me up like I didn’t weigh anything and resituated me so that I was sitting.
Surprise jutted from my lungs, and my hands shot behind me to keep me upright.
My knees parted, my core drenched.
Jud ran two fingers over my underwear. “So wet.”
There it was.
The whirlwind.
The push and the pull.
This deep, intense, terrifying man up against the sexy cockiness this boy wore like a brand.
“I need this, Jud.”
I didn’t think I’d ever needed anything the way I needed this right then.
He hooked his fingers in my underwear and slowly dragged them down my legs.
A hiss left his mouth.
“Black-fuckin’-magic.”
His big hands gripped me by the outside of the thighs, eyes devouring before he tugged me closer and dove right in.
His tongue parted me.
Licking and sucking and eating me up the way he’d kissed me this week.
It wasn’t even in the realm of soft or sweet.
It was an annihilation.
Complete obliteration.
His tongue whipped me into a frenzy.
My hips bucked and my fingers yanked. “Jud. Yes. God. I need you.”
“You have me, darlin’. Know what you need.” The words vibrated. Shivers raced. He lifted my ass from the floor, and he shifted course and kissed down the backs of my thighs, over my bottom, and licked into my cleft.
A moan ripped from my mouth. “Jud.” He chuckled a low sound, and I wiggled in his massive hold. “Please.”
The air shifted when those eyes met mine, the intensity something bigger than I could fathom. “Told you, I have you, Salem. I have you.”
Then he was slowly setting my bottom back on the floor, and he reached up and pressed two big fingers into my mouth.
I sucked and moaned around them.
“Good girl.”
I all out shook when he pulled them away, the man never looking away as he pushed them deep into my center.
A gasp wheezed out.
His fingers were almost more than I could take. There was no question then—this man was going to ruin me. Still, I begged, “Please.”
He started to drive them, fucking them in and out. He dipped down and sucked my clit, pulled it between his teeth, but he was lapping and stroking and swirling his tongue.
It took all of a minute, and I split.
Broke apart in his beautiful, menacing hands.
That energy raced, rushed my flesh in a landslide of bliss.
A flashfire.
Combustion.
A charge that shot me to an unknown place. Where I couldn’t see. Where I couldn’t think. Where it was only me and this contradiction of a man.
A man I wanted, yet some piece of me warned I should fear.
But I didn’t.
I succumbed. I gave. I let pleasure win out.
He led me through, his fingers slowing as the orgasm rippled and shivered and gusted through my body.
Wave after wave.
Rapture.
Revelry.
I was sure I’d never felt so good as right then.
He nuzzled his nose into my belly as I slowly came down.
But neither of us touched the ground.
We hovered there, our gazes tangled before Jud curled his hand around the back of my neck and jerked me to the demand of his kiss.
His tongue power.
His mouth truth.
He kissed me until lightheadedness swept over me again.
Until I couldn’t breathe, and my fingers were in his hair, his beard, burrowing into his shoulders and raking down his thick, muscled back.
Our chests were mashed together as our teeth and spirits clanged.
Desperate for this connection.
The energy whipped.
A tornado that swept up everything in its path.
My nails scraped down his chest.
Lower.
Desperate.
More.
His muscles flexed and bowed. “Careful, darlin’.”
“I’m pretty sure I left careful with my car the night I climbed onto the back of your bike.”
A wicked chuckle rumbled deep in his throat. I lapped it, like my tongue could gather the taste of it. I kissed down his pecs and his abdomen as I struggled with his belt.
Jud grunted, and those big hands found the sides of my face. “Salem.”
“Let me touch you.” It wheezed from my frantic lips, lips that kissed lower as I finally got the buckle free and jerked at the button and zipper.
My hands slipped to his cut waist, and that need was spiraling through me like compulsion.
Necessity.
“I see it, too, Jud, when I look at you. Beauty. The definition of it.” At his flesh, I rumbled the same confession he’d given me as I frantically pushed at his pants. “It hurts to look at you, I want you so bad.”
He pushed up high on his knees. “Fuck, darlin’, what are you trying to do to me?”
“A little of what you’ve been doing to me.”
I finally got his pants down his massive thighs and shoved his underwear down, too, and…whoa…
A shudder ripped through my being.
Jud chuckled again, and he reached out and traced his thumb over my bottom lip since my mouth was hanging open. “You see what you do to me now, Salem? You think it’s you who’s been lying in want? Been dyin’ to get lost in you.”
The man was giant. Thick and long and fat. Hot and hard and dripping at the tip.
He also wasn’t shy. “Let’s see what that hot little mouth can do, yeah?”
A fever ignited in my core, and every part of me clenched in want. A moan got free as I braced my hands on his hips and stretched my mouth around him.
I took in as much as I could as I moved to grip him at the base.
Jud bucked deeper. “Yes, darlin’. Just like that.”
I sucked him. Licked him.
He tightened both hands in my hair, and the man began to guide me in a hard, desperate rhythm.
