“Stupid.” A wet laugh bursts from inside me. “Barbies are stupid.”
“They are.” A chuckle vibrates his body beside me. “She’s stubborn like you.”
“I’m not stubborn.”
He turns his head and looks at me, and I feel the heat of his gaze on my skin. The flutters in my belly have my hand curling tighter around his.
“As an ox.”
The sudden release of his hand as he stands flounders the lightness of the moment. Panic whirs in the pit of my stomach as he walks away from me. My mistake haunts me in his actions. It’s pathetic, but that’s my punishment for leaving him.
Darkness engulfs the room, and as the sound of his movements and his shadow get closer, so do the clunk of his shoes and the ripples of his clothes dropping to the floor.
The bed dips and instead of lying where he was before, he parts my legs and slots himself between them with his head on my belly. His hands bracketing either side of my chest, he nuzzles my flesh. It’s so different from the last time we were like this.
My belly was full then, and our little girl would kick at his weight and the sound of his voice. He’d poke her and she’d poke back.
Resting my hands on his crown, I brush through his thick hair. When I close my eyes, I relish the feel of the coarse strands. And all I can imagine is a little girl with his thick, dark hair and my messy curls. I can feel the warmth of her smile as her light honeyed eyes shine for me.
Her skin is fairer than mine, like her daddy’s, but it has the same olive undertone as mine.
Her smile is easy, and I can’t contain my own.
We made her. She’s the perfect melange of the two of us.
Peace and pride fill my heart, and a thought strikes me.
“She needs a name.”
Pressing his face deeper into my tummy, he remains silent.
“She was here. She was real. She deserves a name.”
Nodding, he slips a hand beneath the shirt and strokes my belly. His fingertips find the fuzzy silk of my scars, and without a single word, he traces them like they are a Braille story he’s trying to decipher.
He traces my flaws like he’s writing a love letter. And slipping my hands to his back, I do the same.
I love you, cariño.
I love you so, so much.
I script my endless love for him in light, feathery strokes as I smile to the image of our little girl.
“Carina.” Because she is beloved and pure. She is the dearest thing to ever be.
Like her father, she is my heart and my soul. She brought me a love I could never have imagined.
“Carina,” Christopher whispers softly, the roll of the R as beautiful as when he utters my name. “Carina Kit Sinclair. It’s perfect.”
My heart sighs at his words, remembering my parting request to my best friend. “Just like her.”
“A perfect name for a perfect girl.”
Yes. So much yes. So, so much.
Tears stream down my temples, and not a single one is tinged with sadness. I can’t contain my smile at the sound of Christopher murmuring our daughter’s name. And the more I smile, the more she smiles until she’s laughing.
Carina doesn’t have my laugh at all. She has her daddy’s wicked, soul-deep laugh. It’s infectious and warming. It sparkles in my ears and fills me with a hope I haven’t felt in too long.
It reminds me of why we are what we are, and why we do what we do. Because something as incredible as her deserves a magnificent world. A better world.
Drifting my hands to my hips, I grasp the hem of the shirt. It’s dark; we’re nothing but two shadows in the pitch-black. I might not be ready to show him my scars, but the feel of his hand on my belly is healing. And I want more of it. His touch is a balm so soothing that it’s addictive. I’m greedy for it.
Christopher’s breaths hitch and deepen as I slip the shirt up, over my tummy. He waits a moment, until he’s certain I’m okay, before he rests his head back on me. His lips press to my belly button again and again. His hands roam my skin, but not once does he push for more. He loves me with reverent touches and worshipful kisses.
Eventually the quiet is invaded by the chorus of voices outside our room. Everyone is here, and although I’m happy to have us all under the same roof, I can’t help but feel like we’re doing the wrong thing.
“I don’t want to leave,” I murmur into the dark. “I don’t want to tuck my tail between my legs and run.”
“We’re not running.”
“Aren’t we? I want to stay. I want to fight. Beside you.”
“There’s too many eyes on us here.”
“There’s always eyes on us wherever we go.”
“This is different. If we stay here, someone will end up getting killed.” His voice is weary and pensive. For a time, we both lie in silence, skin-to-skin. My hands tangled in his hair. His hold on me tight.
My full heart aches for him, because he is one man carrying the weight of a legacy.
This is what it’ll be like. Day after day after day.
I understand his mother’s words now. That day I had no idea of everything that we would go through. The heartbreak we’d endure. The losses we’d suffer…
“If you want to stay, we’ll stay. But we’ll be suffocated here. We’re on our own unless we do what we’re told.”
“We’re never on our own. Can’t you hear them out there? They’re here for you.”
“Belles…”
“You’re friends and brothers. We’re tied to them by more than secrets and duty. There’s life and blood…and love.”
Pressing a hard kiss to the middle of my tummy, he lifts himself, gently dragging the shirt back down before standing.
It’s not the action itself that makes my heart melt for him, it’s the thought and feeling behind it.
Christopher isn’t an easy person. He has a front, a mask, that everyone sees. He’s private and aloof, his looks draw people in, and for the most part he humours them. He smiles and listens.
He listens—that’s probably what people admire the most. But inside there is always a storm. There’s a complex web of secrets and rules. Duty and power. Boundaries and vision.
He has so much strength and control within himself. He wears it like armour reinforced with his pride.
Others think it’s ego. They see it as righteousness, but I’ve seen it for what it really is—solid, unwavering fortitude. Vigour.
He might belong in history, but that one compassionate, human action…it makes him mine. Body, heart, and soul.
Pushing myself up, when he turns all the lamps on with one switch, I meet him at the chest of drawers where he’s picking out fresh clothes.
Taking his hand, I turn him to face me. “I need something from you.”
A soft smirk tips his face with a quirk of his brow.
“No, not sex…not at this time.”
The sulky confused look on his face grows serious when my gaze lowers to his chest.
Closing his hand around my rings, he steps closer. “You want them back?”
“Yes.”
“Earn them.”
Closing the space between us, I rake my fingers up his chest. From his boxers up the light trail of hair to his belly button. I trace soft velvety skin covering steel muscle. Dips and grooves.
My legs get weaker as his heat steeps with mine. Water fills my mouth with his delicious leathery scent filling my lungs.
As his hands drop to my arse, pressing me to him, a wanton sigh rushes from my lips. He’s hard in every possible way, and my body softens to mould perfectly to his. My wet pussy aches with need. It takes absolutely everything in me to ignore it.
Rolling onto my tiptoes, I stretch to take his lips. They’re rough, chapped from the constant worrying of his teeth. But they’re the best thing I’ve ever kissed. Plump and sharply sculpted like a cubist painting or sculpture.
His deep, guttural groan as I pull it into my mouth makes me shudder. My bod
y threatens to give as his hands work my arse cheeks, holding me flush to him as he flexes his hips into me.
How does he always do this to me?
The heat of his erection pulses between us. A beacon to my lust and desire.
Like they need one.
Christopher undoes me without trying. He’s my kryptonite. The one thing that trumps my sense and sensibilities.
Cupping his face, I lick into his mouth, kissing him deeper and harder until I’m sure he’s going to push me up against the wall and fuck me so hard I won’t be able to finish what I started.
Focus, Arabella.
With every lick and swirl of my tongue, I drink him in. Everything around us fades into nothingness as I trace my hand down his neck to his chest. I close it tight around the rings. They’re weighty and warm, and before he catches on to me, I yank on the worn, thinned rope. It gives on the first hard tug, and with the jolt of it, his teeth bite down on my lip, breaking skin.
The hot metallic tang invades my mouth and our kiss. I fully expect him to pull away, but he kisses me harder. The bruising grip of his hands makes my insides pulse with a magnitude of need that might kill me even as my heart gallops, thundering in my chest like a thousand hooves pounding the earth. My lungs kindle like a house of dry logs set on fire.
The ground beneath my feet disappears, and before I can gather my bearings, my back flattens on a cold, hard surface. Without a second thought, I wrap my legs around Christopher’s hips. His dick, bulging steel, presses to my bare pussy and…
Holy fucking shit!
It’s my undoing. My body is wracking with want for possession. My cunt clenches in desperation for his cock.
But my hand…my hand is so heavy, the skin blistering with the urgency to replace its missing piece.
“I don’t need to earn them,” I say, my voice far too breathy to convey the impact I was going for as I thread the rings back on my finger. My eyes never leaving his, I lay my hand flat on his chest. The hammering of his heart pounds into my flesh. “They’re mine.”
Just as surely as he is mine and I am his. Beyond every possible world. Beyond time and space.
He’s my husband. My king. My god.
Christopher Sinclair is mine.
“You’re mine.”
Jaw clenching, nostrils flaring, he grabs my face as he presses me so hard to the wardrobe that I’m sure the mirror will crack.
His lips come down on mine hard and unyielding, so hungry that I think I might die as he thrusts and grinds into me.
He bites and sucks and licks at my bleeding lip like it’s a source of life. Every nudge of his erection on my clit makes it harder for me to contain my moans and need.
I want him inside me. I want to feel his cum fill me so completely that it spills down my legs. I want everything he has to give. Hard, fast, punishingly.
Licking down my throat, he releases my face. Grabbing one of my arms and stretching it above me, he closes my hand around the top moulding of the wardrobe.
“Hold on.” He does the same to my other arm.
My arms burn as he loosens my legs around his waist. Reaching between us, he pulls his cock out, wedging at my entrance. “Shhhh…” His command turns into a gasp as he thrusts deep into me.
God, he’s ripping me apart.
Tears spring to my eyes as he pulls out and slams inside me again. He’s so big that I have to ask myself how he fits every time.
He doesn’t stop or relent until he is buried deep to the hilt in my cunt. My body is shaking and against its physical limits… “I want more. Harder, Christopher. Harder.”
“Fuck!” He gives me what I want with curses and groans, praises and gasps. He fills me again and again, harder and harder, until we’re both wracking with pure rapture coursing through us.
The rings cut into my finger as my arms grow tight and achy with his deep strokes. Pumping into me relentlessly, Christopher trails his hands up my arms, closing his hands around mine as he lowers his mouth on mine.
He fucks my body as he makes love to my soul. Fiercely, ruthlessly, incessantly. And he doesn’t stop until it detonates over his. Shaking, burning…filled to the brim and overflowing.
Chapter 30
Arabella
The road is dark with what’s left of the night. We’re officially in the North, and snow piles on the side of the motorway. The tarmac itself is covered in slush, and at the speed we’re going, my heart is in my throat while my insides feel like they haven’t left London yet.
The air is sharp and cold, even with the thick hoodie I’m wearing over my own clothes. Thank goodness Cassie thought to stop by the Sinclair house to pick up some of the things I left. I’d already be frozen half to death if I only had a shirt to wear because Christopher was adamant we weren’t going back to Georgina’s. Apparently, it was a stupid risk for the sake of clothes.
For the sake of clothes.
Maybe he expected me to go around the arctic temperatures up here in his clothes. Sometimes his stubborn logic really makes him look like a plank.
Maybe it’s female logic, like taking a break and refuelling in case we get stuck in a snow block. It wouldn’t be a first in the sweeping hills overlooking Windermere. Hills we have to wind our way through to get to Herald’s Hold.
After much pressing during the first couple of hours, we stopped a few times along the way. With energy reserves depleting, everyone is getting rattier, snapping at the slightest things. Even Freddie’s lost his humour.
Something’s going down.
I can feel it. My insides are pulsing with anxious trepidation. There’s an ominous cloud hanging over our heads. Not a single one of us can see through it. We’re all blind to what’s around the corner. My guilt blooms as I ask myself, What was the point in anything I’ve done?
I have no more insight than they do now. I’m just as blind as they are.
That’s what it’s all come down to—blind leading the blind.
My body’s aching and my nerves are getting the better of me, twisting and knotting my stomach to the point that the mere smell of the black coffee in my hand is making me nauseous.
“You’re safe. You know that, don’t you?” Christopher squeezes my thigh, not moving his focus from the road.
“Yeah.” Slotting the cup into the middle console, I try to breathe through the combination of Red Bull and pickled onion Monster Munch crisps.
“I promise we won’t stay here long.” Taking a swift winding exit with a slight skid, he grabs the steering wheel with both hands.
Fuck my life.
“This place…” I hate it.
“I know.”
“Do you?”
“Arabella…”
“They drowned you. You could’ve died.” I’ve refused to return since.
“Hardly—” His hard retort is jarred to a sudden stop together with the car. The lightweight chassis of Freddie’s sleek Merc skids forward, barely missing Murphy’s Range.
In the silence of the aftermath, all I can do is grab hold of the arm Christopher has stretched across me.
“Jesus fucking Christ, what the fuck?” He checks me over, his hand reaching for the glovebox but retreating the minute Freddie bursts out of the Range. Fleur is pressed to him like he’s performing the Heimlich on her.
He looks petrified as she projectiles into the dilapidated undergrowth on the side of the road.
The security vehicle following behind us pulls to a stop beside the Merc. I keep waiting for the other cars to pull up the bend behind us, but there’s nothing. Nothing but fraught silence fills the luxury interior, his body tensing as Murphy jumps out of the Range and runs back towards us.
Obvious worry clouds his normally shut-off expression. That on its own is enough to tell me something is seriously wrong, but together with Christopher’s tightening muscles…
“Where are Casper and Leo? Why aren’t they behind us?”
Shit, Georgina and Cassie…
My mind goes st
raight to the worst-case scenario. Visions of another attack. Another car wreck. More blood and more loss.
I can’t control my breathing as Christopher lowers his window to allow Murphy to inform us of what’s happening.
“Slight change of plan.” Murphy leans into the car. “We’re being followed.”
Reaching for Christopher instinctively, I try to find some modicum of calm or strength in his warmth. His roped forearm is coiled tight though, and it does nothing to soothe my worry.
“The guys have been monitoring the situation. We thought we lost them down by Lancaster, but they managed to catch up again.”
“Casper? Leo?” My heart thunders in my chest at the sound of their names, my stomach twisting like a hurricane. I’m a living, breathing storm of panic and fear. At the same time, I’m ready to do what it takes to ensure this doesn’t become another battle we lose. I refuse to part with any more people I love. I refuse to give any more of myself to these bastards hunting us down for righting their wrongs. Or at least trying to.
We’re nothing but targets on an open field. Our enemies are using us as bait.
How ridiculously clever.
Dragging myself from my dire thoughts, I concentrate on the conversation between Christopher and Murphy.
They’re hardly in their thirties, yet they both look worldly. They both bear being-deep scars that mature their smooth features into something fierce and intense. Their lines are sharp, their features piercing. So different, yet so similar.
“Casper and Leo are handling the straggler situation.”
Punching into overdrive, my heart pounds the feeling out of my chest, and my whole body goes from cold to straight-up freezing.
Murphy raps the roof with his knuckles as he stands tall, searching around us for any source of danger. “I think it would be safer to swap you into one of the Defenders. Mr. Hamilton dri—”
“You can call him Fred.”
Scorch (Virtues & Lies Book 2) Page 22