The Ties That Bind

by Norinne, Rebecca

  When she dragged her gaze back to me, I continued. “I think he knows about us.”

  “There is no us,” she reminded me.

  As if I needed it.

  “Fine. I think he knows about the past.”

  “That shouldn’t matter now.”

  “But it does though,” I replied.

  “How so?”

  “Because I’m the one who’s supposed to kill you.”

  She laughed then. Honest to God laughed. “Of course you are. He really hates you, doesn’t he?”

  I shrugged. “It is what it is. I’m used to it by now.”

  “So now what? You’re supposed to put a bullet in my head? That’s your m-o, right? I’ve seen enough of my father’s men to know your trademark style. They might call you The Enforcer in your family but in mine, you’re The Executioner.”

  She wasn’t wrong. If someone was about to meet his maker, I wanted him to know who had sent him. There wasn’t always time for such a hands-on, personal touch … but yeah, the name fit.

  “Is that why you reached out to me? Because you knew I couldn’t ignore you? So what’s the plan? Once you had me alone, we’d catch up for a bit and then you’d do your sworn duty? Tell me, Xander, how did you see this playing out?”

  It was my turn to look away. I got it, she was angry with me. Of course she was. We had nothing but years of bitterness between us and I’d just told her I’d been sent to kill her. That’d be enough to piss anyone off. But surely she didn’t honestly think I had it in me. There were some lines a man just didn’t cross, and killing the woman he’d loved was one of them. That she thought so little of me stung, but then again, why should she think any different? I’d spent years killing her family members, hadn’t I? She knew my work. Of course she thought I was the type of man who could kill his former lover.

  “I’m not going to kill you,” I answered, turning back to her. I dropped my head and stared at my feet. Clasping the back of my neck with my palm, I raised my eyes and captured her gaze. “I loved you Arabella. I might be a monster in every other way, but not like that.”

  Her eyes flicked between mine and then she nodded, once. “So what now?”

  I sighed and ran my hand through my hair. “Now, I kill Jayce instead.”

  “And how, pray tell, do you intend to do that? Even I know he doesn’t go anywhere without his security detail. You’ll be dead before you can even get a shot off.”

  Jayce’s main bodyguard was my cousin, and I was pretty sure he hated Jayce even more than I did. Rumor had it Jayce was blackmailing him, and for a moment I wondered if whatever my brother was holding over him was worth dying over. Either way, it didn’t really matter because one guy wouldn’t be enough to stop me. Jayce would have to employ a whole team to protect him now that I’d made up my mind. One way or another, the fucker was going down.

  “Not your problem,” I answered, dismissing her worry.

  Besides, it wasn’t like Jimmy was at Jayce’s side all the damn time. In fact, he’d been nowhere in sight during my last meeting with my brother. Getting Jayce alone wasn’t going to be the problem Arabella obviously thought it was.

  She nodded thoughtfully and began pacing again. “So he still trusts you then.” It wasn’t so much a question as a statement of fact.

  “As much as Jayce trusts anyone, I suppose.”

  “My sources tell me he’s been erratic. Paranoid.”

  I didn’t answer. Her sources weren’t wrong, but just because I’d decided not to kill her didn’t mean she wasn’t still my enemy. When I took Jayce out, I’d step into his shoes, effectively pitting Arabella and I against one another. She didn’t need to know anything beyond what I’d already shared.

  “I’ll take your silence as confirmation.” She walked back to the Mustang and leaned against it.

  “Take it however you want,” I replied noncommittally, as I followed and took up a spot next to her on the hood of the car. “It doesn’t matter one way or the other since he won’t be around anymore.”

  “Right,” she answered tersely. Then, all business again, she asked, “Do you know when you’re going to do it?”

  Never in a million years had I thought I’d be sitting next to Arabella Wilson casually discussing murder. Even though she was the only daughter of my family’s biggest rival, we’d always set that part of our lives aside when we were together. We were each others’ safe haven, refuge from the insanity that came with being born into the modern-day mob. She’d known my role in the family business from the beginning, but we’d never really talked about it, as if our silence had negated our reality.

  Maybe we’d been fooling ourselves back then. You couldn’t escape who we were. This conversation was proof enough of that.

  I turned to her. “It has to be soon. If I don’t bring him proof of your demise by the end of the week, he’s going to send someone in my stead … and then we’re both done for.”

  “Why now?” she asked, her eyes flicking away nervously.

  I paused before answering, something niggling at the back of my mind.

  “How long have you been running the show?” I asked, trying to make the pieces of the puzzle fit.

  She shrugged nonchalantly. “Not long. Six months or so. Why?”

  My voice subdued, I asked, “How’d it come to this, Arabella?”

  She glanced my way and our eyes locked. Arabella sucked in a deep breath and then blew it out slowly. Then, leaning her head back and looking to the sky, she answered, “I don’t even know anymore.” With a sardonic laugh, she continued. “Dad’s not the man he used to be—the booze finally caught up to him. I probably shouldn’t be telling you any of this, but you coming to me with Jayce’s threat … well, let’s just say I think I can trust you.”

  Her eyes found mine again and I took her meaning. This was going to have to work both ways. I nodded once to let her know we were on the same page. At least some things hadn’t changed. We’d always been able to communicate with just a look. Once upon a time we’d probably known each other even better than we knew ourselves.

  She laid her hand on my arm to acknowledge our understanding and I felt a familiar bolt of electricity shoot up my spine. She might be my enemy, but my body seemed unable to distinguish friend from foe. Where this woman was concerned, it would always respond … like muscle memory, I thought. Even if I’d trained myself to block out those memories, my hands refused to forget skating over her naked skin, my lips recalled feasting on her lips, her neck … her clit.

  And now I couldn’t get that image out of my head. The first time I tasted her, I thought I’d died and gone to heaven. Up until Arabella, eating pussy had been something I did in reciprocation, not necessarily something I enjoyed. But with her? I’d looked forward to. In fact, I’d eaten her out for months before I ever sank my cock into her waiting warmth. I swear, back then I could have happily spent every waking minute of my life with my head between her soft white thighs. Actually, strike that. Because the night I’d taken her virginity? It’d been the single happiest moment of my life.

  That was a memory I vowed to never let myself revisit. Except that’s what I was doing right now, wasn’t it?

  Unconsciously, I licked my lips and her breath hitched while her eyes dropped to my mouth. The air around us crackled with electricity, longing, and expectation. It was like the first time we met all over again.

  Once again, everything around us ceased to exist—it was just me and this woman, the woman I’d wanted every minute of every day. The woman I thought was lost to me. And maybe she was, but right now? She wanted me as much as I wanted her. It was right there in front of me, written plainly on her face … in the sawing of her chest, the flush of her cheeks, the hazy lust in her eyes.

  Leaning forward, I cupped her cheek in my palm and she leaned into the caress. “It doesn’t have to mean anything,” I whispered, scant inches separating us.

  Her eyes sought mine. “It’s just physical,” she agreed.

&
nbsp; “It’s always been this way between us.”

  She nodded. “I’m powerless where you’re concerned.”

  “It’s chemistry.”

  “Not chemistry. Physics,” she corrected. “Space, time … it doesn’t matter. We’ll always find each other.”

  “I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about so just shut up and kiss me already,” I said, stabbing my hand through her hair and tugging her close.

  When my lips crashed down on hers, she moaned into my mouth and flung her leg over me. Using the heel of her boot to anchor herself, she dragged her body across the hood of the car until she straddled me. Breaking our kiss, Arabella stared down at me, her chest rising and falling with rapid breaths.

  “This is a bad idea,” she whispered against my lips.

  Kiss.

  “The worst,” I agreed.

  Kiss.

  “We should stop,” she quipped, doing the exact opposite by licking the seam of my mouth.

  Kiss.

  “You first,” I challenged, nipping at her lush bottom lip.

  There was no use pretending we were stopping anytime soon. Like I’d said, it’d always been this way between us. Once the match was lit, it was only a matter of seconds before the whole world went up in flames around us. I was fire and she was my kerosene.

  “I want to touch you,” I told her, dragging my hand down her neck and resting it on her exposed collarbone. “I need my hands on you.”

  Arabella arched her back in invitation as she rocked her hips over my aching cock. “Then touch me Xander.”

  Her voice, soft and husky with lust, sounded like warm honey drizzled over ice cream—my absolute favorite dessert of all time.

  I groaned with need as my palm traced the slope of her breast until it rested full and heavy in my hand. Ghosting my fingers over her nipple, the nub drew taut under the thin cotton of her t-shirt and bra. I leaned forward and took the tight peak in my mouth and sucked, wetting the fabric. My tongue danced and swirled over her while she gripped my head tight against her chest.

  “Oh my god,” she moaned. “What are you doing to me?”

  I chuckled before moving to her other breast and giving it the same treatment. She knew damn well what I was doing to her—it was the same thing I’d always done. I was using my lips, tongue, and teeth to make her crazy with desire, drive her out of her mind with need. I knew she’d be wet and I hadn’t even touched her yet. Not really.

  I reached behind her and unclasped her bra. Dragging her shirt up, I was treated to the sight of Arabella’s perfect fucking tits, something I thought I’d never see again. Only, they weren’t exactly how I remembered. Her nipples were a slightly darker and the tear drop shape of them was fuller, weightier in my hands, as I ran my thumb back and forth over her nipple. My eyes took their fill and I felt a mighty pang of heartache. Once upon a time, these breasts would have grown heavy with milk for our baby girl. Arabella might look different from how I remembered her, but the changes our love had wrought on her body made her all the more beautiful to me now.

  Closing my eyes on a sigh of regret for a life that would never be, I leaned close and circled the dusky pink peak with my tongue as she shuddered against me. Sucking her nipple into my mouth, I flicked my tongue back and forth, teasing her just the way I knew she liked as I rolled the other between my hard, calloused fingers and plucked. My lips drawing away with a pop, I dropped my hands to her waist and guided her hips over me.

  “Ride me, baby,” I breathed, pushing her down onto my straining shaft.

  “I can’t …” she breathed out. “I … it’s not …” Arabella’s eyes slammed shut as she fought the feeling.

  As she tried to deny her orgasm, her finger nails dug into the muscles of my back while her hips, acting of their own accord, rolled over me.

  “Just let go,” I whispered against her neck as I licked a path over the pounding vein there and then sucked her skin into my mouth. “Don’t fight it.”

  “I’m not …” She bit her lip and her eye brows furrowed.

  “I got you Arabella,” I assured her. “Trust me. I’ve got you.”

  As the words left my mouth, I felt the truth of them down to my core. With Arabella back in my arms, I never wanted to let her go. We lived in a fucked up world where custom and tradition dictated we hate each other, but I just couldn’t bring myself to feel anything but love. She was a part of me. We’d lost so much time but I wasn’t going to let things continue on that way. I needed her and I knew she needed me too. Nothing else mattered but making her mine.

  Family. Responsibility. Obligation … it was all focused on her.

  “Let go,” I urged as the pace and pressure of her hips intensified and her breathing became ragged and then faltered. “Take what you need, baby. Take it all.”

  With one last thrust of her hips, she gripped me hard and a strangled moan escaped her lips. “Oh fuck, I’m coming. Fuck, fuck, fuck,” she murmured over and over again as she shuddered against me while wave after wave of her orgasm crashed over her.

  Eventually, she stilled, but she continued to tremble in my arms. I was hard as a goddamn pike, but I’d live. All that mattered now was comforting the woman in my arms, easing her back from what I knew had been an epic orgasm. It might have been years, but I knew Arabella’s body and remembered with crystal clarity what it looked like when she came. The tears in her eyes, the flush of her neck and cheeks, and the slack of her lips as she collected herself told me she’d been overwhelmed by how intense she’d come for me.

  “That was …” she whispered seconds later. “Holy shit Xander. I haven’t had an orgasm like that in years.”

  With a smug, cocky grin, I said, “I figured.” Then, dropping a kiss on her forehead, added, “Watching you come is the single most beautiful thing in the world.”

  Uncomfortable with my praise, Arabella tried to ease off my lap but I banded my arm around her waist and held her still. “No, not yet. Stay. Just stay for a second.”

  When she looked at me with conflict in her forest green eyes, I did something I hadn’t done for years. I begged. “Please. I just want to hold you a minute longer. I just need to feel you against me.”

  Studying my face for a second longer, she finally relented. “Okay,” she said, laying her head on my shoulder as I wrapped my other arm around her and held her tight.

  I stroked my hand over her back in circles and whispered words of adoration against the silk of her hair while I fought for composure. It was on the tip of my tongue to tell her everything—to tell her I never wanted to let her go—but I held off. We weren’t there … yet.

  What had just happened between us had only occurred because we’d never been good at keeping our hands off one another. If Arabella and I were in the same orbit, we were bound to crash together. The physical wasn’t our problem; it was the emotional. And the reality was there was too much between us still for me to say those words. We had almost a decade’s worth of baggage to work through before I could even begin to think of sharing my heart with her again.

  Fuck, it wasn’t just the baggage that stood between us. Baggage was one thing. My brother—my twin—was a whole other and he wanted her dead. If I’d been at all conflicted about what I was going to do, there was no more question in my mind. Between Jayce and Arabella, she’d win out every single time. Now my heart just had to get on board. Because killing Jayce? That would surely kill a part of me too.

  “Where do we go from here?” she eventually asked, breaking the soothing silence that had settled around us.

  Fuck if I had the answer. “I don’t know.”

  “Do you ever get the feeling the universe is trying to tell us we’re not supposed to be together?”

  I chuckled. “To be honest, I sometimes think it’s the opposite. I don’t have to tell you that we don’t make sense. Shit, we’re legitimate enemies. And yet every time I see you, something inside of me clicks and I feel as if—for just a few moments anyway—that non
e of that matters. That you’re mine and I’m yours and the rest of the world be damned.”

  “Is that what you’re thinking now?” she asked, her voice heavy with uncertainty. “That I’m yours?”

  “What do you think, Arabella?” I squeezed her closer and dropped a kiss on the top of her head.

  “I think you’ve always been impulsive.”

  “Only where you’re concerned,” I reminded her. “In every other facet of my life, I’ve got things planned to the nth degree. But when I’m near you, I can’t help it.”

  “It’s like that for me too, you know?”

  I loved hearing her say that, and yet …

  “I know you didn’t trust me before, that you believed what those dick heads told you about me, but if that’s the way you feel, why’d you stay away?”

  She sighed and shrugged out of my embrace. “Honestly? I think it comes down to my age. I was young, Xander. We both were. I wasn’t equipped to deal with everything that was happening to me and because I was hurting, I wanted to hurt you too.”

  “And you don’t want to do that anymore?”

  She looked away. “I thought I did when I came to find you. I had all these plans about how I’d taunt you and try to humiliate you, but when you talked about … when you said her name, I knew I had to let it all go.”

  I nodded. “So I guess that leaves us circling back to your original question. Where does this leave us?”

  Arabella placed her hand on my chest, her warm fingers settling over my heartbeat. “I don’t know. But I’d like to find out.”

  6

  If I profane with my unworthiest hand

  This holy shrine, the gentle fine is this:

  My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand

  To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss.

  ROMEO & JULIET

  I opened the door to my dingy motel room to see Arabella leaning against the jamb, a bag of groceries clutched against her middle and a bottle of Tennessee whiskey held loosely in her free hand. Immediately my mind jumped back to a similar night, a similar motel room. The twinkle in her eye and the shit-eating grin on her face told me she remembered too.