Broken and Beautiful Read online

  But right now, I wanted him. To my muscle fibers, to my bones, the tips of my hair, I wanted him. And it wasn’t just this moment.

  The truth of tonight had its roots in the moment he came to my door with the ad in his hand.

  “Do you want to? Make a woman scream like that? Make a woman feel that way?”

  He didn’t nod. Or move. But he listened to me with his whole body.

  His whole soul.

  I realized what made Luka different than any other man at this party or in my world. Any other man I had ever met.

  His soul was right there. Just under the surface of his skin. All it took was one tiny scratch. One tiny shift and it was revealed.

  He. Was revealed.

  I didn’t reveal myself. I never shook off my bracelets and my necklaces. Or smoothed the rough edges of my blistered hands, my shitty attitude. Not for anyone. At any time. The world I lived in was pretenses and walls. Half-truths and half-lies that everyone told everyone else.

  So this, walking into this room with him, was like walking right into a forge. Hot enough to change everything.

  It was terrifying.

  And thrilling.

  “Luka?”

  “You’re asking me if I want to make someone feel so good they scream?”

  I nodded, walking into the space between the heat of him and the cold of the window. “Do you?”

  “Yes,” he gasped, blinking as if I were a bright light. “My God. Yes.”

  “I don’t know what to do.” He was glacier-still. Like he’d never moved. Like he never could. He’d been frozen and could not imagine heat that would thaw him.

  “Let’s start with a kiss.” I reached for him, carefully. As if asking permission. “Can I—”

  “Don’t…” He grabbed my hand and the heat of him was searing. Not frozen at all.

  His eyes, his touch, his skin—every part of him burned.

  “Don’t treat me like an experiment. Like I’m some poor sad victim and you’re doing a good deed. Kiss me like the fire escape.”

  Thank GOD.

  He was so tall I got up on my toes, my hands clenched in the warm flannel shirt he wore. I pushed my body into his, my lips onto his.

  And he kissed me back. He kissed me like I could save his life. Like it was now or never.

  His hands were in my hair, holding my skull. Holding me still for this nonstop plundering kiss. It was nearly hard, his teeth and his desperation but I absorbed that and returned it to him, softer. Quieter. Until the kiss gentled into something sustainable. Into something that wouldn’t make us both cry at the end.

  He stepped forward, his big body crowding mine against the desk. He pushed me up onto it, knocking off books and the small rocks. I spread my thighs and he stepped between them, pushing them wider with his size.

  His giant fucking size.

  His palms were rough, the callouses on his fingers catching in the fine strands of my hair, and the small licks of pain up and down my skull were a hot counter-tease against the sweet licks of his tongue.

  He smelled like winter. Like ice and damp skin under layers of clothes. It was animal—that smell. He was animal.

  And he was turning me into one too.

  “Touch me,” I said.

  “I am.” He clenched his fists, as if to show me, my hair in his hands.

  “Touch me more.” I pulled one of his hands out of my hair and put it on my waist. He might be inexperienced and slightly damaged but he wasn’t slow. That big wide palm covered almost my entire rib cage, like I was caught in the trap of him, and slowly it slid up, raking over my jersey tank top to find my breast.

  I gasped.

  He gasped.

  He squeezed me in his giant hand, a wild compression that almost hurt but backed off at the last second. His thumb found the hard point of my nipple and worried it. Ran over its contours, tested its strength as if he were memorizing me.

  A current arced between his hand, my clit and my brain.

  “Take off your shirt,” I said between biting kisses of his lips.

  “This is…this is about you. You and some good screams.”

  I laughed. Sweet guy. “You without a shirt is very much for me.”

  He leaned back without smiling. Without flirting. More of his soul, right there in his eyes.

  His blunt fingers made short work of the soft red flannel shirt he wore and it dropped off his body. He grabbed the back of the neck of the black thermal he wore underneath it and pulled it over his head and tossed it down beside the sleeping bag in the corner.

  His hair was static-y and wild and I smiled at him, patting it back down. My hands fell to his wide pale shoulders and I leaned back, taking him in.

  It took me a second, distracted as I was by his being ripped to shit. Abs, chest arms. He was stunning. He was human anatomy brought to life.

  And he was scarred. All over.

  Slashes and nicks. Long red slices. Scar tissue that stood out, pink and red against his skin.

  “What—” I traced the edges of what looked like a bullet wound on his shoulder, “—happened?”

  “It’s nothing.” He leaned down to kiss my neck, my ear. It wasn’t at all nothing but he didn’t want to talk about it. “Can I take off your shirt?” he asked, changing the subject.

  I lifted the black jersey tank over my head. My necklaces fell back against my bare skin. Cold and a little shocking.

  Beneath the tank top I wore a black bra, and my jeans and boots. My tattoos. My bracelets.

  “I like these,” he said touching my longest necklace with the feather and the key. “Your decorations.”

  I very nearly put my hand over them, but I stopped myself. This was not a moment to stay hidden.

  “Thank you.”

  His fingers slipped over the fine muscles of my arms and back, tracing their edges like boundary lines on a map. He covered the owl on my shoulder with his palm. Touched the arrow of geese of flying south on the inside of my elbow. In the reflection of the window I saw him looking at the phoenix on my back.

  My body had more tattoos, birds and otherwise. Across my knuckles of one hand was the word want and on the other hand need. A reminder of the only scale that really mattered.

  “You like birds.”

  “My name is Wren.” There were other reasons for the birds, but this mood should not be spoiled by such things.

  “Rennie.” His eyebrows went up. “I like that.”

  “So do I.”

  “You’re like a fox,” he said, his thumb running under the lace edge of my bra.

  “A fox?” I smiled.

  He smiled back, as if realizing that might be strange. “I like foxes. They’re smart and sly and sleek. Ferocious and sweet in turns.”

  My heart curled up in my chest. That was easily the best compliment I’d ever gotten.

  I popped the buttons on my pants. “Take off my boots.”

  And the big strong man with the scars of a perilous life I couldn’t begin to understand knelt at my feet, unlaced my boots and pulled them off. His bright hair caught the moonlight and glowed white. Like bone.

  So did his skin.

  It was as if he had his own luminescence.

  Crouching at my feet, his jeans pulled taut over massive thighs, he glanced up at me, waiting.

  I pushed my black jeans down off my hips, the lace of my underwear got caught in the current and slipped down over my hips too. I got it as far as my knees and he took over, pulling them off my body.

  I expected—I wanted him to come up off the floor and cover me with that big body. But he didn’t. He stayed right there, looking up at me.

  “You’re so strong,” he said, looking at me in pieces. My legs. My stomach.

  “It’s the work,” I said. Forging and welding. Hammering out metal against an anvil. It was the kind of work that built muscles. I liked them, too.

  “Touch me,” I said.

  “Where.”

  “Wherever you want.”r />
  His fingers found the small dips at my hips. He ran his hands down over the muscles of my legs and then back up, skirting toward the inside of my thighs, inching ever closer to my pussy.

  I spread my legs, because I wanted to be touched there. Because I ached for his touch there.

  But he paused.

  What’s wrong? I almost asked, but I knew what was wrong. At least the bare bones of it. And frankly, he didn’t want to talk about what was wrong. That was the whole point of this. He was tired of what was wrong.

  “Do it,” I said.

  He swallowed and nodded in the way of a man about to jump off a high dive. Part jubilation, part fear.

  His thumb slipped up the tender skin of my inner thigh. So, slowly. Agonizingly slowly. So much I had to force my muscles to relax, I had to breathe through the near pain of the anticipation.

  The tip of his thumb found the seam between my legs and I sucked in a breath. Not realizing I’d been holding it.

  He ran his thumb over the seam, as high as it went, down low, low until I had to spread my legs further so he could feel everything he wanted. If I were an exploratory mission, I would give him everything, show him all my secrets. His thumb touched the puckered flesh of my asshole and I jumped.

  He jerked back, eyes wide. “I’m sorry.”

  “You just startled me,” I said. “It’s good, it’s all good. Keep going.”

  His hands went up to my inner thighs. His thumb, starting at the bottom, worked its way back up to the top, without once ever slipping inside the lips. I was wet and hot and this slow agonizing touch was torture. I sighed and curled my hips toward him a silent invitation.

  “Tell me what to do.”

  “Inside. Touch me inside.”

  He whispered the word back at me and slipped his thumb though the sleek folds of my pussy. It felt like an intrusion. Wide and dry, a calloused thumb that was not mine. Deliciously foreign.

  “Oh, Jesus, you’re so hot.”

  Yeah. I was. I tilted my head back, trying to catch my breath. And that thumb of his found my clit and I jumped again.

  I could feel him about to retreat and I put my hand over his. “That’s good. It feels good.”

  “It’s…it’s hard to know.”

  I imagine it could be if your entire sexual knowledge was as fucked-up as his.

  “This…” I shifted his hand a little, until he found my clit again, “…is my clit. Touch it.”

  His thumb ran over it like it was a stone he was polishing. Around and around. Back and forth with a featherlight touch that was awesome until it was frustrating.

  “Harder.”

  “I don’t want to hurt you.”

  “You won’t.”

  He applied harder pressure. More pressure. “I want to…see it.”

  I nodded. Swallowed. Yeah, sure. Look all you like.

  His thumbs spread me open and I gasped again at the twinge of the tender skin being pulled taut.

  “It’s pretty.” His breath a gust over the exposed pink flesh of my pussy. “I can smell you.”

  Oh, Jesus, why did that turn me on.

  His face was so close, his eyes so rapt, I could not resist.

  “Lick me.”

  He gave me one quick look for confirmation and whatever he saw in my face must have been enough, because he dipped his head and put the flat of his tongue against me.

  My breath shuddered in my throat. The tide was rising in my body.

  His hand slipped around me to grab my ass, one cheek in the palm of his hand like he needed to hold me still. Ground me for what was to come. He fell from his crouch to his knees with a heavy thunk against me. His face, the point of his nose, the knob of his chin, pushing into me.

  His tongue found my clit in an ecstatic lush swipe and a return for more.

  My body was bright hot coils now, connecting all over my body. The bottom of my foot, the top of my head, my clit and my fingers. Everything was connected and it glowed, now. He was the spark that lit it all up.

  “Suck,” I said. And he sucked me into his mouth. The pressure, internal and external, was electric. The flesh captured in his mouth he tortured with his tongue without any prompting from me.

  But then I groaned and he let go.

  “What?” I panted. “Why did you stop.”

  His face was wet, his eyes wild and dilated. “Am I hurting you?”

  I shook my head. “Trust me. It feels good. Really, really good.” I curled my leg over his shoulder, about to press him back into me. “Do you like it?”

  God. Was I somehow forcing him to do this?

  “Yes,” he breathed. His eyes back on my pussy, his hand gripping my ass. I bent my leg, urging him back to me and he went willingly. Fell eagerly onto my body.

  He sucked. Licked. Feasted. It was messy and wet and his enthusiasm was exciting. Thrilling even. No one had ever gone down on me with half this much enthusiasm.

  Paulo had sex like there was a camera crew in the room.

  Luka ran his nose through the folds as if memorizing my scent. As if he was looking for a way to experience more of me.

  “Use your fingers,” I said. “Inside.”

  “Inside?”

  I showed him. I dropped my death grip on his hair and slipped my finger into my pussy. I was wet and hot and the pressure felt so good. “There.”

  “That…that looks so good.”

  “Yeah?” I stroked myself a little more, turning my wrist so I felt the pressure deep in my belly. I wanted to watch him touch himself. I wanted him to sit on the futon and jack off while I fingered myself until we both came. I wanted to be bent over this desk and plowed into the wall. I wanted to suck him into my throat. And I wanted to come on his face.

  I wanted a lot of Luka.

  I removed my finger and it was wet so I slipped it into my mouth, tasting myself. My desire. The radical and righteous humors of my body.

  He watched with wide eyes and I took my finger and wiped it across his lips, my spit and my come making them shiny. His tongue swept over the slick I’d left behind.

  “You do it.”

  Slowly, he pushed his finger deep inside me.

  We both groaned, I bent forward. My dark hair over my face.

  “You are so hot, inside.” His finger was wide and blunt but I was seriously turned on and I needed more.

  “Use another finger. Two…two fingers.”

  Another stretched me and I shook on the edge of the desk. “Fuck me with them.” I opened my eyes and found him staring at me. “Do it.”

  A long slow push inside, so deep. So full and then an equally long slow retreat.

  “God, oh…God, yes,” I sighed. My hair was a tickle down my back and I swung it slightly because it felt so good.

  Everything felt good.

  And then he licked me. He licked me and fucked me with his big wide fingers and I lost myself in the pleasure. I curved myself around it, gathering more and more like a giant snowball made of the best feeling in the world.

  I clutched the back of his head, pressing him deeper and harder into me and he lost his tentativeness. He lost his hesitation, and the force of his giant body was applied to mine.

  “I’m going to come,” I told him. “You’re going to make me come.”

  He made a sound in his throat, wild and encouraging, but he did not stop. Harder and faster until I was nothing but sparks burning in a night sky.

  “There! There!” I fucked myself against him, greedy and punishing. Until finally, finally, it felt like I combusted from the inside. A series of chain reactions until I was sagging on the desk.

  Sweating and aching and content.

  I sat back, gave him some space, but not quite able to let go of him. I petted him. His hair, the beautiful soft skin of his shoulders.

  He lifted his serious face to mine. Totally unaware that he wore me like a fine sauce all over his face. I smiled at him and cleaned him up with my fingers. My thumb touched his lip, the lush corne
r, and he turned slightly, capturing my thumb with his mouth.

  He did the same to each of my fingers. I have never in my life felt so savored. And despite that orgasm, despite the completeness of it, I grew interested again.

  “You screamed,” he said.

  “Good scream.”

  He braced his hand on the desk and got to his feet, my legs fell from his body, my hands slipped from his shoulders, until he was towering over me.

  “That looks uncomfortable.” I pointed to the erection in his jeans.

  “It’s always uncomfortable.” He reached down to arrange himself in the tight denim.

  “It doesn’t have to be,” I said, not coy, just matter-of-fact. “I can do to you what you just did to me.”

  “A blow job.”

  I smiled. “A blow job.”

  He hesitated like he didn’t want to put me out. Like he was asking to borrow my keys or something, and I wondered at the sparseness of his experience.

  I very suddenly had to give him a blow job. A great one. I had to blow the back of his head off.

  “Let me,” I said to him, looking up at his eyes. “I want to.”

  I undid the button of his jeans and revealed the damp patch of underwear over the head of his cock. I bent forward and licked that cotton, tasted the salt of him, and he jerked against me. So turned on he wasn’t going to last. His fingers cupped my head, touched my ear. Such soft strokes, barely there. But totally there at the same time.

  His sweetness was too much.

  I jerked his pants off and slipped the fabric of his briefs down under the length of his cock. He was big. Thick. Hot against my hand as I eased him away from his belly.

  He made a sort of gasping/laughing sound in his throat and I smiled up at him.

  Fun. What a thing to forget, that sex could be fun.

  “Has anyone ever done this to you?” I asked.

  He shook his head.

  “Brace yourself, buddy,” I whispered and slipped him into my mouth.

  “Oh God!” he cried, his soft touches at my ear and neck suddenly turning into a hard grip. “Jesus. Rennie—”

  He was uncircumcised and I pushed the skin back away from the head, running my tongue over the tip, finding that salty little slit and teasing it.

  His knees buckled and I smiled against him.

  I spit on him, lubricating as much as I could and I jacked my hand, twisting it, while sucking him as deep as I could into my mouth.