Luke's Absolution (The Colloway Brothers #3)

by K. L. Kreig

  As if what he said weren’t the most important three words ever said to another person in the history of life, my incorrigible man intentionally slows his movements, but keeps his mouth pressed to me, traveling back up the opposite side. I feel like it takes him an hour. All the while, I’m freaking out inside, trying to think of every word that could rhyme with love: glove, dove, above, shove.

  There aren’t many, at least that I can think of in the time it takes him to hum cockily, “You heard me, fireball. Don’t pretend you didn’t.” My breath catches when his teeth clamp my lobe gently, tugging it through like he did my lip earlier.

  “God, Luke…” We’re both now perfectly still, except for our erratic breathing and my racing mind.

  His lips hover at my ear as he pours his heart out and tears of pure joy flow. (Mine, of course). “I love you, Addy Catherine Monroe. I love every fucking thing about you. I love your clever wit and your wicked tongue. I love your crazy and your messy and your stubborn. I love your mad kitchen skills and your lack of movie knowledge. I love your big heart, your loyalty, and your blinding inner beauty.”

  I’m almost full-on sobbing now when he draws back and looks deep into my watery, blurry eyes. “I love the way your fire burns bright in your eyes and in the very depths of your being. But mostly I love how you get me, see me, know me. Know exactly what I need. I love how my soul feels at rest around you and only you and how everything that was dull before is brilliantly colorful now. And I love that you make me feel I can actually be good enough for someone like you even when I know I’m not.”

  It’s hard to swallow. All the words I want to say back are stuck in the middle of my throat. He reaches up, wiping my trails of happiness away, and as we stare at each other, I’m sure I’ve never seen another person as vulnerable as Luke is right now.

  I let a ghost of smile curve my lips. “So you love me, huh?”

  Luke’s eyes momentarily flare before he throws his head back and laughs. “Oh, Addy, I think we need to find something to do with that smart mouth of yours.”

  Before I know it, I’m being thrown over his shoulder and carted off like I’m being kidnapped by a medieval warrior to be used as his sex slave for the night. Ooohhh…I hope there are ropes involved.

  Chapter 34

  I deposit her in the middle of the master bedroom, which, luckily for me contains a four-poster bed. The king-sized bed takes up the majority of the room, but that’s okay. It has everything I need. A bed, a chair, but mostly her.

  She wants to submit; I’ll make her submit. Happily. And then I’ll make her admit she loves me—I absolutely did not mistake that as I filleted myself open to the first woman in my entire life less than sixty seconds ago. I’d better make her submission worth my while because after I’m done here, she’ll either beg for it again or she’ll never offer again. I’ll be perfectly fine with either as long as I have her.

  She watches me as I walk to the bed and pull some of the long wispy translucent fabric pieces that hang down from the frame to make it look more sensual, I guess. Fuck all if I know. What I do know is they’ll be perfect for what I have in mind later.

  “What—”

  “No talking, fireball,” I growl, stalking to the bathroom where I open drawers until I find a few things that will work. Actually, they’ll work very well.

  I shake my head as I walk back into the bedroom where Addy’s gaze darts between mine and what’s in my hands, now looking like an innocent little gazelle caught in the crosshairs by one very hungry king of the jungle. That metaphor couldn’t possibly be truer.

  Fuck, I want her with an urgency I’m not sure I’ve felt yet, even after she denied me for two straight weeks.

  “What—”

  “Was I not clear before, Addy?” I ask casually as I pull the maroon velvet captain’s chair from the corner, positioning it perfectly toward the bed.

  She opens her mouth to speak again and I cut her off, moving until I’m only inches from her, my finger to her lips. “Ah. Ah. I know this will be hard for you, fireball, but no talking actually means to close those beautiful lips of yours and don’t let any noise escape. Moans, screams, and begging notwithstanding, of course,” I smirk.

  Her eyes widen right before I witness her intoxicating surrender. She wants this and I crave it from her. I love her lip every other place, except here. For some reason, I have this overwhelming need to control her in the bedroom, probably because I know she won’t let me outside of it. Her submission takes work every fucking time, yet there’s nothing like the high of her total surrender.

  “Baby, I love your sweet submission,” I croon right before I take her mouth in a knee-buckling kiss. “I love that you trust me. I love you,” I whisper, knowing she won’t say it back since I’ve instructed her not to speak.

  She stays silent as I leave her, walking back toward the chair. I know it’s hard for her; she’s working that bottom lip so hard, she may take off the first layer of skin. I see love swirling in her eyes as plainly as I feel it in my own chest, though I know I’ll have to pull the words from her just like I do everything else. She’s a constant challenge, but I’m very much onto her.

  I set my things on the small nightstand I’ve pulled next to me and sit in the chair, legs spread wide. My jeans are so fucking tight right now, my cock is being strangled and is begging for mercy. He’s going to have to wait for a while; I have other plans.

  “Unbutton your dress. Slow, Addy. So fucking slow your fingers ache.”

  Her chest heaves and flushes as she silently obeys, bringing her hands up to the tiny white round disks. She does as I ask and it takes a good minute for the fabric to finally part.

  “Take it off,” I rasp, adjusting my throbbing dick. Licking her lips, her eyes track my hand before they sweep back up. She pushes the garment off her shoulders and straightens her arms, the cloth dropping to the floor in a heap.

  “My God.” I’m in awe. She stands before me in the same pink lingerie set she had on the night I walked into her room before dinner with Gray and Livia. I didn’t get enough time to admire her then and I don’t have the patience for it now either, but Hot. Damn. My woman puts Victoria’s Secret models to shame.

  “Lose the bra.”

  She does, without hesitation.

  “Sit on the edge of the bed, fireball. Rest your feet on the frame.” She slips off her shoes and once she’s positioned, I give my next instruction. “Spread your legs. Wider.”

  “Fuck,” I mumble. Her dark, wet tunnel glistens under the see-through lace and I want nothing more than to bury my face in it and eat her until she screams, but I don’t.

  “Fingers in your pussy, sweetheart.”

  She starts to tunnel them underneath the top, but that’s not what I want. “No, move aside the crotch so I can see what you’re doing. I want to see how creamy you are for me.”

  A harsh breath escapes when she does what I ask. I watch her fingers disappear inside before the shiny digits slide up to circle her clit.

  “Slow, baby. Nice and slow.”

  “Luke…” she whispers in restrained agony.

  “Play with your nipples. Pinch them hard like I would.” She immediately obeys, moaning as she twists and pulls, her fingers disappearing again as she re-lubricates. I can smell the musky tang of her pussy from here. My mouth waters and my cock aches.

  Fuck. Pre-cum now soaks my boxers. I’m hard as fucking titanium and my balls are drawn painfully tight. “Addy, baby, you turn me on so goddamn much,” I croak.

  She works herself up slowly, just like I want and I can tell the second she needs more. Her motions become faster, jerkier. I watch that delicious flush spread on her fair skin and the pulse in her neck race.

  “Is your little clit hard, baby?”

  “Yes.” She’s breathless and needy and poised on ecstasy’s very sweet edge, her beautiful eyes silently begging me for permission to go over.

  “Fuck yes, Addy. Get yourself off. Let go so I can fuck you
. Love you.” Her head falls back on a moan until I bark, “Eyes on me, fireball. Eyes on mine the whole time.”

  I unzip my constricting denim and pull out my throbbing cock, stroking it as I watch, needing the blessed relief, but restraining myself from coming outside of her sweet pussy. I have to give Addy credit; her eyes never leave mine the entire time until she enters that blissful place between time and space.

  In all my days I will never forget the sight of the love of my life fingering herself to orgasm at my command. I will forever remember her breathy moans and my name on her lips when her body arched and convulsed in euphoria. And I will go to my grave never forgetting how her complete and total surrender shredded every beast I carried into this room with me, replacing them with nothing but her.

  I fucking love her. I will never love another.

  Chapter 35

  I’m floating back from my happy, bright place when I’m being lifted from the bed and flipped onto my stomach. Before I know what’s happening my wrists are secured behind my back and being bound together with scratchy fabric, probably the one from the bedframe.

  “Feel okay?”

  I nod.

  Then my hips are being jerked up so I’m now lying on my cheek with my ass in the air, my panties roughly being pulled down my legs. I gasp as something cold and wet is poured on my lower back and drizzled in and down my crack, dripping through my slit onto the bed cover. Luke massages what I now know is the oil he brought from the bathroom into my ass, pushing it into my back hole, filling me, lubricating me.

  “Luke,” I moan, rocking back against him, his finger slipping in further. I know I’m not supposed to talk, but shit. I can’t keep anything else inside. I want everything he’s going to do to me, and then some.

  “Silence, Addy,” he growls. It’s tight, restrained, almost feral.

  When his hands fall away, I want to cry, until I feel something flat and smooth caress my ass cheek seconds before it leaves and returns with a crack, startling me more than anything. The hairbrush. I want to ask questions, but I don’t. Luke needs this. I need this. He does it again harder this time, stinging my skin.

  “Fuck, you’re beautiful, baby.” Fire and desperate need spread throughout each cell as he smacks then soothes with his palm time and time again, before breaching my empty sex with something hard and unyielding. It doesn’t feel as good as he does, yet I can’t deny that more wetness now coats my thighs. He pushes it in and out, cursing as he fucks me slowly with the smooth, thick foreign object while he adds a finger to my asshole. He increases the speed until I’m on the doorstep and then he slows, removing everything.

  Bastard.

  I whimper at the loss, mindless, needing to come again until I hear a hum and feel an abrasive, vibrating surface touch my aching, needy clit. The electric toothbrush. It feels coarse and alien and so fucking good the moan I’ve trapped in the back of my throat almost flies free. Holy balls, who knew a few household items from the bathroom could elicit such mind-blowing pleasure?

  “Come, Addy. This time under my touch.” He drops his faux vibrator and strums my clit with his fingers. Faster and faster until my vision darkens and pleasure coalesces with pain when he pinches my nerve endings hard, sending me soaring into subspace. This time, I can’t hold it in. I moan, I scream, I try to squirm away, but Luke holds me steady as my limbs tremble with the force of my climax.

  “My God, you’re so responsive, baby. I fucking love it.” Then he’s driving inside me, his front molding to my back when he pulls me upright, my arms pinned between us. His hands palm my heavy breasts, rolling my nipples to tight points between deft fingers. My clit throbs with each strong tug, with each painful tweak. Luke is an incredibly talented lover, attentive, always pushing me to my limits. The things he does to my body feel too damn good.

  “I’m in love with you, fireball,” he declares in my ear between dominating, forceful stabs. “You’re mine. Mine.”

  “I’m yours,” I breathe, another orgasm building right behind the last. I can see it, taste it. I reach for it.

  “You love me.”

  “I do,” I admit. “I do.”

  “Tell me. Say the words. I need them, Addy.” The hand he now has wrapped loosely around my neck turns my face toward him. “Fall with me, fireball.”

  “I already have, Luke. I love you,” I cry, unable to hold in my heart’s confession that’s been itching to spill. “I love you, I love you. I’m in love with you, Luke.”

  Luke captures the last few words, kissing me slow and deep and long. He slows his thrusts and gently leans me back down, untying my binds and rubbing my wrists and shoulders. “Hands flat on the mattress above your head, baby,” he gruffs. I readily comply.

  Resuming his sensual assault, he spreads my cheeks wide. His fingers find their way again to my backside, dipping in. I go with it, encourage it. His other hand reaches around to rub my sensitized clit and I’m overcome with so many sensations I can hardly process them, barely hearing Luke’s husky declaration, “I love watching my cock slide into you. Best fucking visual ever,” before I fall headlong off the cliff into the warm ocean waters once again. Luke follows almost immediately. His body tenses and he swells and pulses as he releases deep inside me on a low grunt before falling on top of me. His pants join mine while we ride the last of our glorious high.

  A few minutes later, after he cleans me with a hot cloth, we’re lying on top of the comforter, buck naked, exhausted, and wrapped around each other. I would be cold if it wasn’t for the fact Luke is like his own portable heater.

  I have no idea how long we’ve been gone, but I’m in no hurry to get back. I’m sure it will be completely evident to everyone, including Luke’s mother, that we were doing more than enjoying the beauty of the lake. Ugh.

  “You’re staying here tonight,” he stubbornly announces.

  “Luke—”

  “No, Addy. I’m not giving in on this. I need you in my bed, in my arms. Last night was torture without you.”

  I tilt my head up to see him watching me.

  “Please, baby. I need you here.” I know you do. My weak resolve slithers away when he runs his finger down my cheek. It melts into nothingness every time he touches me and he damn well knows it.

  “But your mom.”

  “Are you kidding me? My mom would probably drive to your dad’s and pick up your shit herself.” He laughs. “She’s trying to marry us all off as fast as possible so she can fill this house with hordes of grandkids. It’s fine. We can stay here in the guest house if it makes you feel better.”

  I don’t answer (and I definitely don’t let myself think about his marriage comment as if I didn’t hear hope rip a few more seams), but I know this is the end of the conversation, because Luke has won again. Damn stubborn man has just gotten everything he’s been bugging me about for the last week.

  “What happened today?”

  “What do you mean?”

  I prop myself up on my elbow and glare down at him. “Luke,” I chastise.

  He gazes at me thoughtfully for so long I don’t think he’s going to speak. “I love you so much, Addy.” The devotion I hear in his tone undoes me as his reverent eyes scour my face. No one has looked at me the way he does. “I wish I could adequately describe how you’ve brought life back to me. Just being with you quiets my demons and brings peace to my soul. Don’t cry, baby,” he whispers, wiping away my happy tears.

  His love is palpable, squeezing my heart. I’ve never felt anything like it. “I love you so much,” I rasp. Love seems like an inadequate verb. The emotions rattling around inside me are burning and all consuming. Livia was right. The person I’ve been looking for all this time is right in front of me and I don’t plan on ever letting him go.

  Drawing me down, he worships my mouth for long minutes before tucking me back in the crook of his arm. Then he starts talking softly, each word more pained than the one before it.

  “It’s hard for me to come back here. It reminds
me how good things used to be and how quickly they turned to shit in the span of fifteen fucking minutes. When I was growing up, our family was always tight-knit and happy. I loved my parents and my brothers. My mom stayed home and took care of the house and us kids while my dad worked hard building his company. We were well off. We were the envy of all of our friends. We went to church every Sunday. We gave to needy kids at Christmas. We took nice vacations. We were the all-American family. I thought my life couldn’t get any fucking better.”

  I clutch him tightly as he pauses, understanding how hard it is to purge your deepest secrets and feelings. “I had my whole life laid out since I was in middle school. I had acumen for math, like all my brothers actually, and together we planned to take over my father’s company someday. Hell, he talked to us about it regularly when he found out we were interested. I started learning what a P&L and balance sheet were when I was in seventh grade. We saw how hard he worked, but we also saw what hard work got you. Money, a big house, a beautiful wife, respect.

  “I loved my dad, Addy. He was my fucking hero. He could do no wrong. He taught me to ride a bike. To fish, drive, change the oil in my car. He let me help fix things around the house, so I learned how to be handy. Let me have my first drink of beer on New Year’s Even when I was thirteen. Hell, he even gave me condoms. He was smart, he was handy, he was handsome. He was like a fucking God to me, which in retrospect was probably my fault. I thought he was perfect until I found out he wasn’t. He was just human after all.”

  I prod him when he goes silent for too long. “What did he do?” I ask quietly, although I have a pretty damn good idea where this is now going and it breaks my heart.

  “He cheated on my mom. Had a kid with someone else. I have a fucking half sister running around in the world somewhere who doesn’t know us and we don’t know her. I think about her all the time and wonder what her life is like. If she’s happy. If she feels lost because she never knew her real dad, even though he was a cheating bastard.”