No More Masquerade

by Angel Payne

  “Where you goin’ so fast, little bang-bang?”

  The big brute chuckled. “She looks like she’s got nowhere to be, bro.”

  “Ohhh, yeah. I’m pretty sure her Iditarod is totally free.”

  “You mean itinerary? Holy Christ, you are a moron.”

  “Whatever. She’s hot. I want her to stay with us.”

  “I agree with Aaron.” One of the guys slipped behind his friend, helping him out by spreading my other arm to the window. “Come on, honey. You’re hot. We’re hot. Let’s have a good time.”

  He emphasized by thrusting his sad erection against my thigh. I would have giggled had I not been so mortified—and terrified. “Let go of me. Now!”

  This was bad. Really bad. My sobriety had nothing on their strength. As the other guys closed in tighter, turning my personal space into a zone ripe for violation, panic set in. True, deep fear.

  Fleetingly, I thought of my pepper spray—still in the pocket of my hoodie, laying in my entryway from last weeks’ confrontation with Killian. Not that it would’ve helped now. Somebody suggested they take me back to “the house” so they could tie me up. That did the trick for sending me into scratching, kicking, wildcat mode. If I was stuffed into a vehicle with this many horny assholes, I was so screwed—with the pun as drenched and useless as my keys.

  “I’m meeting someone.” As I snarled it, I forced my glare to confront their sweaty leers. “He’ll be looking for me. If you let me go now, we can just forget this, and you can still have a great night—with someone else.”

  I was babbling. The words swayed all over the board with my fear. But all of the things I’d learned in self-defense class? All the little tricks I’d read about online? Gone. Out the window. I couldn’t think of a single thing to save my skin. Another useless pun.

  “Shut up, bitch, or I’ll duct tape your mouth.” The moron snarled it at me while pushing forward then drawling to his friends, “Screw the house. I want some of this sweet pussy now. Right now.”

  Vomit burned my throat as he struggled with his zipper. A wave of laughter took over the others. They pressed in tighter, laughing at Moron and his shitfaced clumsiness.

  “Come on, man! What’re you waiting for?”

  “Do her hard, dude. She should’ve never pulled out in front of you like that. Like she owns the goddamn street or something.”

  “Yeah Bri, teach her a lesson.”

  “Hey, asshole! Shut up! Don’t say his name. Don’t you know shit?”

  My muscles turned to noodles from terror though I forced myself to keep fighting. While two of them reached for my jeans, I kicked and squirmed and bucked, determined not to be their easy little victim. If this was happening, I wasn’t going down without a fight.

  “Gentlemen.”

  The word boomed up the narrow passage. Consumed it. Commanded it.

  In a baritone that replaced the bile in my throat with a cry of joy.

  A voice that had spoken the exact same word when it ruled other gritty, impossible situations—like boardrooms filled with looming sharks and press conferences with circling piranhas.

  Was it him? Really him?

  My senses careened. I barely knew where the sky was anymore, let alone what was real and not. I sobbed as logic dragged me toward the doorway of despair. Surely I only imagined him. It had to be my mind’s way of coping with this trauma. It had simply manifested my deepest fantasy instead.

  One of the guys wheeled around. “Who the fuck said that?”

  His answer came, dark as the shadows themselves. “You don’t want to know, asshole.”

  My heart set off fireworks.

  Oh, God. Killian.

  It was him—though I’d never heard him snarl like that before. His voice was horror movie dark, filled with the sinister intent that accompanied action plans like buzz sawing people to pieces or going rogue ninja on all the enemy’s penises.

  “Oh yeah, asshole?” the biggest of the brutes slung back. “Well, what the fuck do you want?”

  “I want what’s mine.” Every word was low, lethal, measured. “And right now, you’re groping her in ways that make me very, very pissed.”

  He dotted that sentence with a distinct chi-chuck that made even my jaw go slack.

  Where the hell had Killian gotten a damn shotgun?

  “Shiiiiit.” Two the guys whimpered it in tandem. They took off running. That left the ones who were actually still pawing me, their hands stilled and their eyes looking like deer in Mack truck headlights.

  “He don’t mean it,” one of them whispered.

  “No shit,” concurred Moron Boy. “I mean, like a dude’s going to fault us for—”

  “What the hell are you not comprehending, motherfuckers?” Finally the shadows gave him up. Like my breathtaking, avenging angel, Killian stalked across the pavement, his renegade hair and leather trench flying from the midnight wind. And no kidding, there was a shotgun in his hand. “Let. Her. Go. If you care to test me, I’d consult your balls first. I promise I’m an amazing shot.”

  The assholes gave that two seconds of thought. Then turned tail—whatever they had left—and ran.

  For a long moment, I was too stunned to move. With the tie still in my mouth and my hands still slammed to the window, I gaped at my CEO-turned-Terminator ex, handling that weapon like he’d trained Schwarzenegger himself. The moon highlighted the fury in his jaw. His jacket rose and fell with each of his heavy breaths. He was bad-ass and beautiful—

  And here.

  For me.

  “Oh, my God.” I wrenched the tie free and crumpled to my knees. It was impossible to stay on my feet because everything shook too badly.

  The periphery of my senses picked up on the thunder of his approaching steps. But when he reached me and knelt beside me, his touch was like the softest rain. “Claire,” he breathed against my hair. “Oh, damn. Claire.”

  I didn’t talk myself into expecting anything more than the comfort of this moment but I greedily took it, scrambling into the shelter of his embrace. “Thank you. Thank you. I don’t know what would’ve happened if—well duh, I do know what would’ve happened but—how did you—and where the hell did you get that gun—and where did you come from—?”

  He cut me off with a short kiss. But right after, a longer one. Ohhh, it was so much harder not to read any meaning into the way his tongue coaxed mine, into how his mouth slanted and moved, truly seeming to echo the word he’d just used to designate me to those asshats.

  Mine.

  The effort moved into the realm of impossible when he pulled away his mouth but tightened his hold, shifting his arms beneath me and scooping me into the air. The entire time, his gaze didn’t leave me. And in a murmur filled with equally dark determination, he said aloud…

  “Mine.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Killian

  As little as a week ago, I could’ve never imagined this scenario being added to the memory book of my life.

  Shotgun slung across my back. The woman of my dreams in my arms. Lungs still throbbing from the nightmare I’d just nearly witnessed her endure.

  My horror that I almost hadn’t gotten here in time.

  My vow that it would never happen again.

  “Killian?”

  She’d queried me like that so many times before, yet none of them meant as much as this one. A single word, filled with a thousand questions but demanding no answers. And why would she? I’d given her no reason to expect them. No trust in anything I could offer anymore.

  Yet here she was, wrapping her arms around my neck like I’d become her hero once more. Selflessly giving me her sweet, open tears. Gazing at me in these tattered jeans, this faded T-shirt, this scruffy beard and this secondhand coat as if I still wore Tom Ford and smelled like Armani.

  All she asked for in return was my belief that she meant it.

  My belief in myself.

  My belief in us.

  “Kil?” she prompted again. “It’s
all right. I’m okay now, I think I can st—”

  “No.” I growled it. Backed it up with a stare I didn’t allow even a blink to interrupt.

  “No?”

  “It’s not all right. Not yet.”

  Her brows knitted like I was the homeless lunatic I resembled, spouting about the world ending in three days. That was okay. Better than okay. It made turning back toward my building—I used the term loosely—a much easier journey.

  “Where are we going?”

  “Someplace those dickwads won’t come back for you.”

  “Or you.”

  The undertone in her voice, so silken with her soft concern, almost caused me to falter. I’d blocked out so much of how this felt—to have her care for me, even in subtle little ways like that line. But I’d been so lost and hadn’t wanted to find my way back, so I’d burned the whole damn forest behind me. Cauterized the good memories along with the shitty ones. Like that had worked out so well. I’d ended up back here, anyway. My spirit had guided my body back to San Diego, even when I was too drunk and stupid to figure it out on my own.

  I’d returned to her.

  I always would.

  The elevator was broken so I hiked the stairs to the third floor, still refusing to let her go. When we got to my apartment at the end of the hall and I easily opened the door, Claire’s gaze widened with alarm. “Your door’s not locked.”

  “Not right now.”

  “Is that a habit of the new Killian?”

  “It is when he looks out his window and spots his woman being mauled by half a dozen douche jockeys.”

  I pulled off my coat and the gun. Though I’d locked down the safety on the weapon before slinging it across my back the first time, I double-checked the lever before setting it in the corner, next to the new leather couch I’d bought after moving off the yacht. To the outside world, I was an incognito eccentric artist bum. That didn’t mean my living space had to keep up the act, too.

  Claire barely looked at anything. Though her gaze skated over the easels in my work space and the massive bed in the studio bedroom corner, a deeper glimmer was at work in the depths of her eyes. She was somewhere else altogether. Locked in a thought that finally pushed up the edges of her mouth, and made her lift a hand to stroke the opposite forearm.

  “His…woman.” Her voice, echoing my words, was filled with such sweet longing that I moved without thought, easily clearing the two steps back to her side. I pulled her hand off her arm and pressed it between both of mine.

  “Yeah.” I drew her fingers up to my mouth. Curled them against my greedy lips and nose. Goddamn, she smelled so good. Not the way I remembered. Better. Her lavender and wildflowers were mixed with wind and night and woman, an ambrosia that drove me to my knees before her.

  Who the hell was I kidding? It wasn’t just her scent. It was her presence, period. My relief because of it. My thanks for it. And my agony of being too late in recognizing the treasure of it.

  “Claire.” I didn’t want to let her go. She was here. I finally had her again. But did I have her? “Oh, God.” It came out in a thousand pieces of meaning. And supplication. “My Claire.”

  Without a word of response, she uncurled her grip from mine.

  My head dipped beneath the weight of despair.

  Too late. You’re too fucking late.

  With just as much silence, she threaded her fingers into my hair. Then pulled my face back against her body. Hard. Urgently. So ferociously, I now heard every wild thump of her galloping heartbeat.

  A sound welled up in me, half growl and half moan. It curled from places inside that I’d forgotten about—no, that I’d sealed off completely—because they were the chambers only she could reach and understand. I never thought I’d be able to roam them again, letting out the raw, bare, animal of my soul…the beast who now clutched her with ravenous joy and pure jubilance. My hands felt more like paws, my senses enslaved by unchained instinct, and I didn’t care. Primal cravings burst loose, prowling higher up the walls of my composure, ascending into a perfect spiritual realm that only she could take me to.

  I needed her. I belonged with her. We were moon and tide. Twilight and daybreak. Thunder and rain. Nature that never should have been denied—or run from.

  “Killian.” Her voice shook and so did her hands. “Oh, Killian.”

  I dared to look up. She gazed at me with eyes that reminded me of dawn, sparkling and brilliant and bright. “I sure as hell hope those are happy tears, fairy.”

  She spilled a watery laugh. “Me too.” Her lips wobbled. “Please tell me they are, Kil.”

  I drew her tighter to me. Craved her so much that I began seeking her skin even through her sweater, taking soft nips with my teeth. “I’ve been such an idiot.”

  She let out another soft laugh. Her fingertips dug into my scalp, as if my gray matter had turned into a balloon and she’d watch it float away if she let go. I didn’t blame her for that perception, either. Lately, it had been closer to the truth than not. “Well…yeah,” she teased in a murmur.

  “I’ve been so damn…lost.”

  “I know, baby.” Her hands flowed to the back of my head. “I know.”

  She did. Her conviction flowed into me like the stardust her eyes evoked. I took a long breath. Held her tighter. “My pride and my confusion collided. Before we came back from Europe, when we were in Venice, I’d said goodbye to Klarke. I loved how you looked at Stone. For the first time in my life, I liked being him.”

  “But you still are him.” Her vehemence yanked her down to my level. On her knees with me, in the middle of the shag rug in the center of my Les Miz apartment, this beautiful, adamant woman lowered herself to become equal with me once more. “I don’t care if your last name is Klarke or Stone or Smith or Beetlejuice. I love you, Killian.” She brought her hands forward, delving her fingers into my beard now. “I love you, Killian.”

  I ran my hands up her spine before gripping her shoulders from behind, clutching her as close as I could. Still not close enough. I needed to make her a part of me again. Drag her strength and goodness inside of me and never forget how good that felt, ever again. “And I never stopped loving you.”

  “I know that, too.”

  “But you don’t trust it.” The tentative smile on her lips, in lieu of her full and perfect smile, proved that much. “It’s all right,” I ensured. “If I were you, I’d be keeping me at the end of the yardstick as well.”

  Her chin wobbled. It looked like she was trying to turn the smile into something more encouraging but hit the fail switch. “We’re both just a little scared.”

  “Actually, I’m terrified.” The confession was easier than I’d expected, yet the hardest thing I’d ever said. I swept up a hand to steady her face as I stared the intensity of my meaning into her. “But I want to be terrified with you.” I took her lips in an urgent kiss. “Tell me we can. Tell me you’ll be there even when I don’t get it right—because believe me, I won’t get it right.” I couldn’t prevent myself from kissing her again. Longer. Deeper. Gently opening her lips again. “Tell me it’s not too late, Claire. I’d rather face the world again with you as Killian Klarke than escape it as Killian Stone.”

  She tucked away from me a little. I couldn’t determine what that meant since her eyes, welling with tears, never left me. Another anvil of dread landed in my gut.

  Until her body convulsed with a harsh sob.

  Before she launched herself at me in a searing kiss.

  I groaned from the pounding, perfect impact of her bold, beautiful passion—and held nothing back on what I gave her in return. I let her pull at me, fill herself with me, wrap herself around me. I adored her for it. Clawed at her for it. Needed her more for it. I loved how she dug her nails into my skin, not leaving an inch between my neck and shoulders unmarked. I loved the pain that etched its way down my body in response, awakening my skin and my blood in all the best, hottest ways. I loved the roll of her tongue against mine, and the darling
mewl of her pleasure at my taste. I loved savoring her in return, even sucking her tongue deeper into my mouth, delighting in the startled catch of her breath in response.

  And I loved how she couldn’t seem to get enough.

  Because I sure as hell couldn’t.

  We all but stripped each other there on the floor, with her yanking at my T-shirt and me roaming beneath her sweater, at last snapping her bra free. I groaned when my fingers brushed her nipples, reveling as the sensitive skin puckered and stiffened for me.

  In a frantic fever, I finally ripped my shirt free. A grin plastered itself to my lips as she eagerly did the same with her sweater.

  I pushed off her bra myself, using the movement as an excuse to dip my mouth to each of her taut, needy swells. “Fuck,” I growled between licking and biting at the sweet strawberries, “you taste so good, baby. So damn good.”

  After I turned her into a writhing, panting mess, I hitched up, forcing myself to look at her. Really look at her. We’d done this just ten days ago and I’d turned the after-party into an emotional blood bath. If she needed to talk, go slower, or put this locomotive on full brakes, I needed to know now. I wasn’t sure my cock would be on board with any new track changes after this point.

  “Talk to me,” I urged. “What do you need? What do you want? Say the word and it’s yours.”

  Say the word and I’m yours.

  I loved being the witness when a deeper point connected for her. The glint of golden triumph in her eyes. The impish delight that snuck into her dimples. Yet as she gathered the full impact of my words, her beauty was tripled—because it was magnified by her love.

  “You really want to know?” When I only nodded slowly in acquiescence, she went on, “What I want, Mr. Killian What’s-Your-Face, is for you to make me forget everything in this room exists except that bed. And us in it.”

  Goddamn. Nobody but Claire could rev me so fast from desire to lust. A handful of words, and I really was hers. A long, fire-infused stare later, and I was ready to grant her wish in all the ways she dreamed—and maybe a few she hadn’t.