by Maisey Yates
He swept her up into his arms then and carried her toward the house, holding her tightly against his chest. She clung to him, her fingers slick against his skin, greedy as they trailed over him.
“That’s who I am,” he said, taking her hand and pressing it against the scar left by the knife. “And that’s why I told you I wasn’t the right man for you. That’s why I told you to stay away from me.”
She shifted her hand, moving her fingertips along the scarred, raised flesh. The evidence of the day he’d been cut open and left to bleed. He’d considered lying down and dying. A damn low moment. He had been sentenced to life in prison, he’d thought. Why not let that sentence be a little shorter?
But his instincts, his body, hadn’t let him give up. No. He’d gotten back up. And hit the man who’d come after him. And then hit him again, and again.
No one had come for Levi after that.
She made a soft sound as she shifted, letting her fingers glide over to the edge of the bird’s wing. She traced the shape, its whole wingspan.
“No,” she said, shaking her head. “This is who you are. This,” she said. “This scar... You didn’t choose that. You didn’t choose to be born into a life of violence. You didn’t choose your father. You didn’t choose that time in prison. Didn’t choose to get in a fight that day and have your body cut open. You chose this. These wings. This design. Whatever it means to you, you chose that. And it’s more real than anything that was inflicted on you could ever be.”
He stopped her from talking then, captured her mouth with his and silenced her with the fierceness of his kiss.
He wanted everything she said to be real. He wanted her words to matter, as much as everything that had come before them. As much as every blow he’d witnessed, every blow he’d been subjected to, every vile insult.
He wanted her kiss to mean more than his past.
He smoothed his hands down her body, his touch filled with reverence, filled with awe.
This woman, so beautiful and sweet, would touch him. Would give herself to him.
Yes, he wanted to believe what she said. He did. But he could see no way to do that. Couldn’t find it in himself.
He could only be glad that somehow, he had found her.
He wanted to drown in her, as much as he had wanted to drown in the rain. To feel renewed. Clean. If only for a moment. She was like that spring rain. Restorative. Redemptive. More than he deserved, and essential in ways he wouldn’t let himself think about.
She moved her hands over his body, over his face, pressing kisses to the scar on his ribs, to the tattoo, lower. Until she took him into her mouth, her tongue swirling in a torturous pattern over the swollen head of his erection. He bucked up, gripping her hair even as a protest escaped his lips.
“Let me,” she said softly.
And then she returned her attention to him, this beautiful woman who had never done this for a man before. She lavished him with the kind of attention he didn’t deserve, not from anyone, least of all her.
But he wanted it, wanted her. He wanted this in a way he hadn’t wanted anything for longer than he could remember. He wanted, and it was because of her.
He wanted, and he would never forget her for it.
He wanted, and he would never forgive her for it.
She was hope. She was a promise of redemption he could never truly have.
She was faith, that’s what she was. Believing in something you couldn’t see or control. Until now, he had never wanted any part of something like that.
But here he was, drowning in it. In her.
A missing piece. To his life.
To his heart.
His vision began to blur, his body shaking, wracked with the need for release as Faith used her hands and her mouth on him. As she tempted him far beyond what he could handle.
He looked down at her, and their eyes met. He saw desire. Need.
And trust.
She trusted him. This beautiful angel trusted him like no one ever had.
And it pushed him right over the edge.
He didn’t pull away from her, and she didn’t stop, swallowing down his release before moving up to his mouth again, scattering kisses over his abs and his chest as she went. He claimed her lips, pressing his hands between her thighs, smoothing his fingers over her clit and pushing two deep inside her as he brought her to her own climax.
She clung to him, looking dazed, filled with wonder.
Yet again, because of him. She was a gift. Possibly the only gift he’d ever been given in all his life.
But Faith should have been a gift for another man. A man who knew how to treasure her.
Levi didn’t know how to do that.
But he knew how to hold on.
She clung to him, breathing hard, her fingernails digging into his shoulders. “I don’t want to go home,” she said softly.
“Then stay with me.”
She looked up at him, her face questioning.
“Yes,” he confirmed. “Stay with me.”
Thirteen
It was easy to let time slowly slip by, spending it in a bubble with Levi. It was a lot less easy for Faith to hide where she was spending all her nights and, frankly, half her days. If her brothers weren’t suspicious of her behavior, Poppy certainly was.
There was no way she could get her unusual comings and goings past the eagle eye of her sister-in-law, and Poppy was starting to give Faith some serious side eye whenever Faith came into the office late, or left a little early.
Faith knew the reckoning was coming. She was going to have to deal with whatever was between her and Levi, and soon. Because the fact of the matter was, whatever they had agreed on in the beginning, she no longer wanted this relationship to be temporary.
The two of them had lapsed into a perfect routine over the past few weeks. When she wasn’t at work, she was at his house, and often sketching.
Working sometimes late into the night while she watched him sleep, more and more ideas flowing through her mind.
She had begun to think of his new house like a bird’s nest.
To go with the bird that he’d tattooed on his body. A place for that soaring creature to call home. A home that rested effortlessly in the natural environment around it, and seemed to be made from the materials of the earth.
Of course, maybe she was pondering all of that to the detriment of her other work. And that was a problem. She felt...so removed from her life right now. From everything she was supposed to care about.
She cared about Levi.
About what lay on the other side of all of this. About the changes taking place inside of her.
She should care more about her upcoming interview with Architectural Digest. She should care more about a television spot she was soon going to be filming in the office. One that was intended as a way to boost the participation of young girls in male-dominated fields, like architecture.
Instead, Faith was fixating on her boyfriend.
Immediately, her heart fell.
He wasn’t her boyfriend. He was a man she had a temporary arrangement with, and she was becoming obsessed. She was becoming preoccupied.
Even so, she wasn’t sure she cared. Because she had never been preoccupied in her life. She had always been focused, on task. Maybe it was her turn to go off the trail for a little while.
Maybe it was okay.
You don’t have to be perfect.
Her mother’s words rang in her ears, even as Faith sat there at her desk. She wasn’t sure what perfect even looked like for her anymore and the realization left her feeling rocked.
Poppy was going to appear in a moment to film the television spot they were sending in, and Faith knew she needed to pull herself together.
She wasn’t sure if she could.
The door cracked o
pen and Poppy came in, a smile on her perfectly made-up face, her figure—and her growing baby bump—highlighted by the adorable retro wiggle dress she was wearing.
Poppy was always immaculate. The only time she had ever seemed frazzled in any regard was when she had been dealing with issues in her relationship with Isaiah. So maybe—maybe—Poppy would be the ally Faith needed.
Or at the very least, maybe she would be the person Faith could confide in. For all that they had married older men with their own issues, Hayley and Mia did not seem like they would be sympathetic to Faith’s situation.
It was all very “do as I say and do” not “do the kind of man that I do.”
“Are you ready?” Poppy asked.
Her skeptical expression said that she thought Faith was not ready. Though, Faith wasn’t sure why Poppy felt that way.
“I was going to say yes,” Faith said slowly. “But you clearly don’t think so.”
Poppy frowned. “You look very pale.”
“I am pale,” Faith said drily.
“Well,” Poppy said, patting her own glowing, decidedly not pale complexion, “compared to some, yes. But that isn’t what I meant. You need some blush. And lipstick with a color. I don’t support this millennial pink nonsense that makes your lips blend into the rest of your skin.”
“I’m not wearing lipstick.”
“Well, there’s your problem.”
Poppy opened the drawer where Faith normally kept her makeup, and that was when Faith realized her mistake. The makeup wasn’t there. Because she had taken the bag over to Levi’s.
Poppy narrowed her eyes. “Where is your makeup?”
Faith tapped her fingers on her desk. “Somewhere?”
“Honestly, Faith, I wouldn’t have been suspicious, except that was a dumbass answer.”
“It’s at Levi Tucker’s,” Faith said, deciding right in that moment that bold and brazen was what she would go for.
Everything was muddled inside her in part because she hadn’t been sure if she wanted to go all in here. Cash her chips in on this one, big terrible thing that might be the mistake to end all mistakes.
But she did. She wanted to.
She wanted to go all in on Levi.
That horrible ex-wife of his had done that. She had cashed in all her chips on a moment when she could take his money and have the life she wanted with absolutely no care about what it did to him.
Well, why couldn’t Faith do the opposite? Blow her life up for him. Why couldn’t she risk herself for him?
No one in his life ever had. Not his father, who was drunk and useless and evil. Not his mother, who had allowed the scars and pains from her past to blind her to her own son’s innocence.
Not his wife, who had been so poisoned by selfishness.
And Faith... What would she be protecting if she didn’t?
Her own sense of perfection. Of not having let anyone down.
None of that mattered. None of it was him.
“Because you were...working on a job?” Poppy asked, her expression skeptical, but a little hopeful.
Faith’s lips twitched.
“Some kind of job,” she responded, intentionally digging into the double entendre, intentionally meeting Poppy’s gaze. “So, there you have it.”
“Faith...” Poppy said. “I don’t... With a client?”
“I know,” Faith said. “I didn’t plan for it to go that way. But it did. And... I only meant for it to be temporary. That’s all. But... I love him.”
The moment she said it, she knew it was true. All her life she had been apart. All her life she had been separate. But in his arms, she belonged. With him, she had found something in herself she had never even known was missing.
“Your brothers...”
“They’re going to be mad. And they’re going to be afraid I’ll get hurt. I know. I’m afraid I’ll get hurt. Which is actually why I said something to you. Isaiah is not an easy man.”
Poppy at least laughed at that. “No,” she said. “He isn’t.”
“He’s worth it, isn’t he?”
Poppy breathed out slowly, then took a few steps toward Faith’s desk, sympathy and understanding crinkling her forehead. “Faith, I’ve loved your brother for more than ten years. And he was worth it all that time, even when he was in love with someone else.”
“Levi’s not in love with anyone else. But he’s...angry. I’m not sure if there’s any room inside him for any other emotion. I don’t know if he can let it go.”
“Have you told him that you love him?”
“No. You’re the first person I’ve told.”
“Why me?” Poppy asked.
“Well, first of all,” Faith said, “Isaiah won’t kill you.”
“No,” Poppy said.
“Second of all... I need to know what I should do. Because I’ve never loved anyone before and I’m terrified. And I don’t want him to be a mistake, and that has nothing to do with wanting to be perfect. And everything to do with wanting him. I’m not hiding it anymore. I’m not.”
“You never had to hide it. No one needed you to be perfect.”
“Maybe I needed it. I can’t let them down.” Faith shook her head. “I can’t let them down, Poppy. Isaiah and Joshua have poured everything into our business. I can’t... I can’t mess up.”
“They would never look at it that way,” Poppy said. “Isaiah loves you. So much. I know it’s hard for him to show it.”
“It’s easy for me to forget that he struggles, too. He seems confident.”
“He is,” Poppy said. “To his detriment sometimes. But he’s also just human. A man who fell in love. When he didn’t see it coming. So, he’s not going to throw stones at you for doing the same.”
“They’re going to be angry about who it is. Levi’s older than they are.”
Poppy shook her head. “And Isaiah is my foster sister’s ex-fiancé. We all have reasons things shouldn’t be. But they are. And sometimes you can’t fight it. Love doesn’t ask permission. Love gets in the cracks. And it expands. And it finds us sometimes when we least expect it.”
“So, you don’t judge me?”
“I’m going to judge you if you don’t put on some lipstick for the video. But I’m not going to judge you for falling in love with a difficult man who may or may not have the capacity to love you. Because I’ve been there.”
“And it worked out.”
“Yes,” Poppy said, putting her hand on her stomach. “It worked out.”
“And if it hadn’t?” Faith asked.
Poppy seemed to consider that for a while, her flawlessly lipsticked mouth contorting. “If it hadn’t, it would have still been worth it. In my case, I would still have the baby. And she would be worth it. But also... No matter what Isaiah was able to feel for me in the end, I never would have regretted loving him. In a perfect world, he would have always loved me. But the world isn’t perfect. It’s broken. I suspect it’s that way for your Levi, too.”
Faith nodded. “I guess the only question is...whether or not he’s too broken to heal.”
“And you won’t know that unless you try.”
“That sounds an awful lot like risk.”
“It is. But love is like that. It’s big, Faith. And you can’t hold on to fear. Not if you expect to carry around something so big and important as love. Now get some lipstick on.”
Fourteen
She was finished designing the house.
That day had been inevitable from the beginning. It was what they had been moving toward. It was, in fact, the point. But still, now that the day had arrived, Levi found himself reluctant to let go. He found himself trying to figure out ways he might convince her to stay. And then he questioned why he wanted that.
The entire point of hiring her, building this house, had b
een to establish himself in a new life. To put himself on a new path. The point had not been to get attached to his little architect.
He was on the verge of getting everything he wanted. Everything he needed.
She should have nothing to do with that.
And yet, he found himself fantasizing about bringing her into his home. Laying her down on that custom bed he didn’t really want or need.
He hadn’t seen the designs yet. In fact, part of him wanted to delay because after he approved the designs, Jonathan Bear would begin work on the construction aspects of the job. Likely, any further communications on the design would be between her and Jonathan.
Levi should be grateful that once this ended, it would end cold like that. For her sake.
He wasn’t.
It was a Sunday afternoon, and he knew that meant she had dinner with her parents later. But she hadn’t left yet. In fact, she was currently lying across the end of his bed, completely naked. She was on her stomach, with her legs bent at the knees and crossed at the ankles, held up in the air, kicking back and forth. Her hair had fallen in her face as she sketched earnestly, full lips pursed into a delicious O that made him think of how she’d wrapped them around his body only an hour or so earlier.
“Don’t you have to be at your parents’ place soon?” he asked.
She looked over at him, her expression enigmatic. “Yes.”
“But?” he pressed.
“I didn’t say ‘but.’”
“You didn’t have to,” he said, moving closer to the bed and bringing his hands down on her actual butt with a smack. “I heard it all the same.”
“Your concern is touching,” she said, shooting him the evil eye and rolling away from him. “It’s complicated.”
“I understand complicated family.” He just didn’t want to talk about complicated family. He wanted to get his hands all over her body again. But he could listen to her. For a few minutes.
“No,” she corrected. “You understand irredeemable, horrendous families. Mine is just complicated.”