“I –” Nick stopped. “I just – I don’t want her to have to handle it.”
“Ah. Right.” Luke leaned back in the booth, his upper body massive. “So is your girl the kind that’s all wrapped in bubble wrap and cotton wool? Can’t deal with anything bad and needs to be coddled? That’s your girl?”
Nick stiffened. “Hey, watch your fucking mouth, Rhodes. You don’t know what Mia’s been through in her life.”
“No. I don’t.” Luke drank some beer, kept his eyes pinned on Nick’s angry face. “But it sounds to me like you think she can’t deal with hard shit… like she’s some little princess who needs to be protected from harsh reality.”
“I think the exact opposite, actually,” Nick retorted. “Her life’s been damn hard, and she’s known lots of hurt and loss, and she’s come through it all with nothing but grace and strength. So don’t you fucking make her sound like some spoiled little bitch who shrieks and whines when she chips a nail. That ain’t Mia, man, and don’t you even hint that it is. Not ever again.”
“OK. So if all that’s true, then why do you think that she can’t handle this?”
“It’s not that I don’t think she can,” Nick said slowly. “It’s more that – I don’t want her to have to.”
Luke rolled his blue eyes. “Oh. So you’re not super-protective. You’re just a sexist jerk protecting the little lady from ugly stuff.”
“Luke.” In that single word, Luke heard nothing but warning. “Don’t.”
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t push me. Not where Mia’s concerned.”
“I’m not trying to push you. I’m trying to get you to tell me the truth.”
“The truth.” Nick ran his hand through his hair in frustration. “Fine. Here it is: the truth is that I’ve been a dickhead to Mia in more ways than I can count, and she’s had the generosity and sweetness to forgive me every single time. Over and over, that woman has forgiven me, sometimes when I least deserved it.”
He paused.
“Ohhhh-kaaay,” Luke said, totally lost now. “And?”
“And.” Nick exhaled. “I feel like… like I’ve already asked so much of her in terms of loyalty and seeing past my flaws. And…” His voice trailed off now.
“Wait.” Luke couldn’t believe what he thought Nick was saying. “Are you saying that losing your leg is something that Mia’s going to have to… forgive? That it’s yet another personal flaw or mistake on your part that she’s going to have to learn to let go of, and live with?”
“I –” Nick stammered. “Well, when you put it that way –”
“What other way is there to put it?” Luke demanded. “You’re saying that you’ve hurt this woman time and again, and that she’s been hurt in her life time and again, and she’s managed to forgive it all and move on. And you’re somehow tying all of this to your leg, so what you’re saying is that it’s one more damn thing for Mia to forgive.” He paused. “Unless I’ve totally gotten it wrong?”
“Uh, no.” Nick sighed. “No, you’ve gotten it totally right.”
“Yeah, I thought so.” Luke shook his head. “Jesus, Nick!”
“I know, I know.”
“Do you know? You really know what you’re saying?”
“Yeah.”
“Which is?”
“Which is that I feel like I’ve done something to her by losing my leg. Like I’ve betrayed her somehow. Let her down… again.”
“Which is utter bullshit.”
Nick was silent.
“Nick?”
“I’m not the same man that she fell in love with, Luke,” Nick said abruptly. “You know how physical I was, how strong.”
“Yeah.”
“And now.” He stared down at his leg in despair. “Now I’m – not.”
“You still have two arms to hold her close, Nick. You still have your lips to kiss her. And – sorry to be crude – but you’re still packin’ whatever the hell God gave you between your legs.”
Startled, Nick looked up and blinked. “Uh… well. Yeah. True.”
“You can physically love her the same, Nick, and Christ knows you can love her the same with your heart. That hasn’t changed, right? How you feel about her wasn’t taken along with your leg?”
“No. No fucking way.”
“So you really think that Mia sees you so differently?” Luke asked quietly. “That she actually only sees what’s not there, not who you are? That she sees what’s missing, not what stayed?”
Nick fell silent. Then:
“I don’t know.”
“You need to ask her.”
“I know.”
“Good. So when will you?”
“Tonight?”
“Why are you saying it like it’s a question?”
Nick cracked a smile at that. “Tonight. I’m talking to Mia tonight.”
“Good.” Luke glanced at his watch. “So. What the hell are you waiting for?”
“A taxi.”
“Call one,” Luke commanded. “Get your ass home and talk to your woman, Nick. This is one conversation that needs to take place – no more waiting.”
Nick nodded and dug his cell out of his jeans pocket. He knew that Luke was right.
Chapter Ten
Nick walked into the apartment and was relieved that Mia was still up.
But of course she was… she’d promised to be, and she was nothing if not a woman of her word. She’d never broken a promise to Nick – and he was pretty damn sure that she’d have her teeth pulled before she’d ever knowingly go back on her word.
Mia looked up from her laptop. “Hey.”
Nick shrugged off his jean jacket. “Hey, babe. How you doing?”
“Good.” She stretched and he watched helplessly as her full breasts pushed up against that flirty little summer dress that she was wearing. “Just writing out some notes about my interviews today.”
“Yeah, how’d they go?” He walked over to her now, watched her watch him approach. “Feels good to be back at work?”
“Sure does. But we can talk about that tomorrow – I want to hear about the meeting.”
“Actually, I wanted to talk to you about something else.”
She heard it in his tone, and she looked up sharply. “OK.”
Nick sat, scrambling to think where to begin with this. He’d pondered it the whole ride home, and as he’d paid the taxi driver and walked in to the building, he’d realized that he still didn’t know how to begin.
Maybe some things didn’t really have a beginning. Maybe some things were just too big and too emotional, and all you could do was jump in to the middle of it all and have faith that it was going to shake out.
So that’s what Nick did: he jumped in. He jumped in with both feet.
“I’m afraid that you’re going to find my stump ugly,” he said, laying it all out in front of the woman that he loved, no flinching or pulling punches. “That’s why I begged you not to look last night, and why I made sure I was up before you this morning. I’m afraid – no, I’m fucking terrified – that you’re going to look at me and not find me attractive. That you won’t be able to – to look past it. That all you’re going to see is the damage and how I’ve changed.” He sucked in air, determined to articulate every fear weighing on his mind. “How I’m not the same man that you fell in love with, and the new man that I am isn’t one that you want to be with.”
Mia stared at him. He waited.
“Oh, Nick.” Her voice was soft, affectionate. “Thank God you finally brought this up.”
“You knew?”
“You kidding me?” She shook her head. “Of course, babe.”
“OK… so…” He gulped. “What do you think?”
Mia was silent for a long, long minute, then she said, bizarrely:
> “You know about my work in India and Cambodia?”
“Uh,” Nick stammered, trying to see the connection. “Yeah. I mean – kinda. Sex trafficking, right?”
“Yes and no. Yes, I did research into that and wrote books about it, but I wasn’t talking about sex trafficking. I was talking about my work with women who have been burned.”
“Sure. I know about that.” Nick gave her a small grin. “I read your book, babe.”
“I remember.” Mia returned his smile, just briefly. “So you know that I met with dozens of women who’ve had acid thrown into their faces by men who felt that, somehow, the women had humiliated them. Turned down a marriage proposal, chosen another man, chosen to go to school or get a job. Something that challenged the man’s sense of worth, and his masculine ego, and his overblown entitlement to a woman as his personal, God-given property.”
“Right. You wrote that it was like the woman had somehow taken his ‘face’ – his reputation or his credibility – and so the guy took hers in return.”
“Exactly,” Mia agreed. “You also know that I lived with the women in India for six weeks. Saw them every day, interviewed them, accompanied them to court in some cases, helped them improve their English or learn some skills.”
“Yeah.”
“You know what I saw that whole time, Nick? What I saw when I looked at their faces?”
He shook his head, trying not to imagine it. He’d seen some pictures of the women and he’d been horrified at the damage inflicted on them. God, what the women had suffered was literally unimaginable: many, many of them had lost an eye, one woman had had her lips burned right off.
Even the women who hadn’t been hurt as ‘badly’ – though Nick thought of that as a relative term – were horrifically, permanently scarred. The scarring disfigured them to the point that many women felt less than human. It was a heartbreaking thing to have happened to them, and Mia had written an incredible book about it.
“What did you see when you looked at them?” he asked her.
“Strength,” Mia responded. “Spirit. Unbreakable courage. Determination to get on with things, as best they could. Triumph. Some of the best and brightest things that humanity has to offer us.” She paused. “I saw sheer, staggering beauty.”
Nick bit his lip, kept listening intently. He knew that Mia had the ability to see beauty in destruction. It was one of the things that he loved and admired about her the most; it was also one of the things that he personally understood the least.
“Those women, Nick… what happened to them. It was so damn unfair. They didn’t deserve it, they sure as hell didn’t ask for it. But it happened to them anyway, and they had a choice. Most of the world declared them ugly, twisted, broken, totally worthless… and each and every one of them had to decide if they were going to believe that shit. Those women could lie down and die – or they could figure out how to get on with their lives. Changed lives, to be sure, lives that looked nothing like their old ones. But they could make choices about those new lives, and by doing so, they gained strength.” Mia smiled. “They grew and they changed… but in many, many ways, they remained true to who they were. They looked different, but their hearts stayed the same and they knew that. They were the same people but they were just – stronger versions of themselves. They were better. They were more.”
Starting to see where she was going with this, Nick smiled.
“I look at you, Nick, and I see you as you are. Yes, I see what got taken from you, what’s not there anymore. But more than that, I see what still is. I see you, babe. I see your courage and your intelligence and your fierce will to fight. And when you look at me, the way that you are right now?” Mia reached out, touched his face. “I see nothing but love.”
“Mia,” Nick said thickly. “Can you imagine making love with me the way that I am now?”
“Yes,” she said instantly, then she grinned. “Truth be told, I’ve been imagining it for what feels like forever.”
“Me too.”
“So.” Mia’s eyes were on a slow burn now, lighting up gold and beautiful in her face. “You about done imagining?”
“Oh, hell, yeah.” Nick got to his feet, extended his large hand to her. She took it, let him tug her up and in to his arms. “I’m ready for some hardcore reality, babe.”
“Hardcore?” she teased him as he led her into their bedroom. “How hardcore?”
“You want me to tell you? Or you want me to show you?”
“What do you think?” she whispered and Nick was done talking. Like, totally done.
Without one more syllable, he threw her to the bed. Mia gasped at his rough dominance, loving it, totally giving herself over to it. Nick tender and sweet in the bedroom was one experience and it was a great one… but Nick possessive and allowing his inner caveman to run things was something else entirely. And whatever the hell it said about her, Mia loved Nick a bit rough and demanding.
Almost as if he heard her thoughts, Nick ripped her dress up and off, ripped her panties down and off. Mia’s breasts were bare and Nick’s gray eyes flared at the sight of her pink nipples. Her breasts weren’t very big – something that had bothered her greatly before Nick told her how much he adored them – and it was a hot August night, so she was braless and Nick was delighted.
One less thing to have to get off her.
Still fully-dressed, he pushed her farther up the bed, then opened her curvy thighs wide and slipped between them. Mia gave a small cry as his fingers moved up her body, up her stomach, circled her nipples.
“Nick,” she moaned, already losing control of her body. “Oh, God… Nick.”
“Feels good, babe?” he breathed, his mouth now just inches away from her lower lips. “Tell me, Mia.”
“Yes,” she sobbed. “Yes, yes, yes.”
“You want more?” He blew on her pussy, watched her face as her eyes rolled back in her head. “You want my mouth on you?”
“Yes,” Mia panted, spreading herself wider, opening herself to him completely. “Oh, yes.”
“Then you ask me to do that.”
Nick leaned back and away, and she gave a frustrated groan. She’d always been a bit shy and hesitant about asking for what she wanted and needed in bed, and he knew that, the bastard. When she reached for his head and tried to silently pull him back to where she needed him so desperately, he grinned and pulled free.
“Nuh-uh, angel,” he said teasingly. “Use your words.”
“Nick…” Her voice was actually a growl, and his eyes flared again. Fuck, he loved when she sounded like this: all primal and feral. All hot, needy woman. “Nick…”
“You want me to do something, babe?” He gave her a long, slow lick, his tongue sliding delicately between her pussy lips. Mia whimpered, tried to push harder against his mouth, and he drew back again. “You want more of that?”
“You know that I do,” she groaned. “Nick, please….”
“Begging’s good,” he admitted. “But hearing those dirty words come out of your sweet mouth is better. Let me hear ‘em, babe.”
“Oh.” She closed her eyes. “I want – I want –”
“That’s it, Mia,” he said in an encouraging tone. “Tell me what you want. What you fucking need.”
“I want… I need you to kiss me.” Her chest heaved. “Lick me. Touch me.”
“Where?”
“Between my legs,” she sobbed. “On my… my pussy.”
“What about here?” He gave her clit a light flick with his finger, watched as she tensed. “You want me to kiss and lick and touch you here, too?”
“Oh!” Mia cried. “Oh, God! Yes!”
“Yes what?”
“Yes, there too!”
“Say the words, Mia.”
“I need you to kiss me and lick me and touch me on my – on my clit. Nick, please!”
Semi-pissed-off now, Mia opened her eyes and glared at him. “For God’s sake, just shut up Spencer, and do what I asked!”
“Yes, ma’am,” he murmured, and mercifully, his mouth descended at last. Kissing, licking, sucking her most sensitive flesh, Nick set to work pleasuring Mia in the most intimate way that she could imagine.
Wild for him, wild for more, Mia reached for the back of his head again, her fingers curling in his blond hair as she pulled him to her mound, closer and tighter. But he took both of her wrists in one hand, raised her arms up above her head.
“No touching me or trying to control things,” he gritted out. “You keep your hands right up there like a good girl. You move them anywhere close to me and I stop what I’m doing.”
“Nick…” His name was a broken plea. “Please don’t stop again…”
He cocked his head at her, gave her the wicked grin that she knew all too well, God help her.
“You gonna keep your hands up there then?” he said.
“Yes.”
“Mmm-hmmm.” Nick moved back down her body, using his broad shoulders to widen her thighs even more. “We’ll see.”
His mouth was slower now, more deliberate and teasing. He was punishing her for her hesitation in saying what she wanted, for trying to force his movements. Bossy, commanding Nick didn’t take well to being kept waiting or pushed around – and Mia knew that she was going to pay for doing both of those things.
If past experience was anything to go by, though, she was going to love being made to pay for them.
She moaned as he worked his way down her quivering stomach, his lips blazing a trail of fire on her skin. He reached her soft brown curls, nuzzled them gently. She tensed up, everything in her body needing his mouth to close over her hot centre.
He made her wait, though. His lips danced over her pussy, barely touching it, just grazing her slit, his breath so hot on her aching little bud. Over and over, Nick skimmed her sex – up and down, up and down – refusing to touch her hard enough anywhere to start the slow build to orgasm.
Fighting Back (Fighting For Love Book 5) Page 11