Claw 2

by Lucian Bane

  He shook his head slightly, his blue eyes burning hot on her. But even that didn’t penetrate the calm storm inside her. “Okay, Princess,” he whispered. “Anything you want.”

  She nodded a little. “Thank you,” she whispered.

  Chapter Twenty

  Dante was officially worried now. There was no point in telling Jo what Jessica had done, she’d only want to kill the girl. Not that Dante cared if she did, he could see her lying her stupid ass off to Rin about God only knew. He wanted to ask but Rin was … Rin was on a fucking ledge. He needed to be careful.

  And now he was stuck taking her to a place where she would likely discover more about his past he didn’t want her to know. Not so soon. She wasn’t ready for a fucking night on the town either. The shock of that would only add to whatever shock had hold of her now. Make her feel even more out of place, more lost.

  How did this get so fucked so fast?

  Dante kept a close eye on her as they got ready to go out. She was quiet and it was making him fucking crazy. He’d fucked up royally telling them what he did and had he known she’d find out this way he would not have. And that bitch lying about him fucking her in that room had to be what had her in this beyond state that he couldn’t kiss her out of.

  Truth was, he fucked her in the back alley of a nightclub when she half raped him. Stupid term, he knew, would be like accusing a mouse of raping a bear in their size difference. He could have stopped her but didn’t. While she sucked his cock, it helped fight the vortex of shit trying to suck his soul from him. Of course he realized when his head cleared that fucking wasn’t an optional therapy with him. That was in contradiction with the treasures he’d gotten from Tin Tin—his moral values. That was the only rod and staff he’d use to fuck anything with.

  The black dress. She looked fucking amazing in it but he wished she hadn’t chosen it to wear. Not tonight. Not the night when it felt like there was a mile wide abyss between them. She wore the delicate black spiked heels. She’d had practice in heels like that too, he could tell. The rich church life perks. Like riding a bike, it seemed to come right back to her. She was soon walking in them like she’d owned them for years.

  She took her time with the final touches in the bathroom and Dante paced like a new father waiting for the birth of his first child. His stomach knotted with seven kinds of fears at the idea of having a family suddenly dangled in his reach.

  Rin would be the dream wife. That woman of substance and integrity that he’d kill to spend the rest of his life with, to protect, covet and cherish. To make love to, and fuck, and make fucking love to every day or night, or both.

  The bathroom door opened and he spun. When she stepped out of it, that sweet innocent woman he’d first met flashed across her face just long enough to make him want to kill Jessica. To kill Daryl. And to kill himself because it was all his fault. If he’d not fucked Jessica—no if he’d not been so nice to her before he fucked her, she wouldn’t be so attached. That was on him and she was only following the instincts of what should happen when you’re with a person that way. But it would have never happened at all had he been thinking with the right head.

  He couldn’t stop staring at her as she made her way to the bed. Fucking breathtaking. That’s what she was. He felt so stupid now, letting her pick that dress. The lower part of it was a skirt, but actually it was the thinnest silk that stopped two inches over her knees. The perfect length to show ass if she bent the wrong way. It didn’t cling but it clung to the priceless treasure it barely hid. The top was split to the chest bone and again he wanted to shoot himself. The idea of other men seeing her this way while she was vulnerable—was a very bad fucking idea.

  He suddenly needed to know what she wore beneath it and hated that he couldn't ask. Fuck, she was nearly his height in those heels. That wasn’t the least bit intimidating. Everything about her felt like a challenge, a threat in some way. Without even trying, or intending it, she created a battlefield before him that promised to hold the biggest war, the most important war he’d ever land his ass in.

  Dante hadn’t felt the fear of a brawl in a long time but the adrenalin surging in his blood tasted just the same. He was about to fight, he could feel it. But it wasn’t any kind of fighting he’d ever done and yeah, that had him just a tad nervous. Okay, more than a tad. He was fucking terrified because of the gamble up on the table, a gamble he’d not realized till that instant. This wasn’t his life he was risking, it was theirs. It was their life, their family and their future at stake.

  He tried again to stop staring while wanting to say something. But it had already begun, that war, that silent fight and every move, every word he said or didn’t say cost him something.

  He swallowed, still reeling from the first punch she’d delivered upon exiting the bathroom. It felt like Tin Tin’s flying, bone shattering blow. He considered his art of evasion tactics while his heart hammered and his body staggered inside. Evasion was hard to execute once the fight was started.

  He’d have to evade while fighting. Somehow.

  “You look beautiful,” he said finally. He waited in the silence for what his words would cause.

  Not a damn thing. She may have not heard him by the way she acted. But there was no reason she shouldn’t have heard him, he said it plenty loud enough. Which meant she was not biting. The idea of fighting with her in any fashion felt so wrong.

  “I don’t want to go out,” he said to her.

  “Okay,” she mumbled.

  He eyed her, needing to know she understood he didn’t want them to go out. “You don’t mind not going?”

  She looked at him and his mouth went dry with the need to touch her. “You can stay but I’d like to go. I don’t need a chaperone.”

  Fuck. She wasn’t playing.

  “I know you don’t need a chaperone.” He considered his words carefully. “But if you really want to go, I’ll go.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  “Rin,” he said, his anger sparking. “I don’t want to fight with you.”

  She looked right at him. “I’m not fighting with you Dante,” she said. The gentleness and keen understanding in her tone was ten times worse than anger. “I don’t hate you,” she went on in that same softness. Kindness. “I’m not stupid, I understand what’s happening. I understand what that girl was doing, I know deceit and the pain it causes very well. I can’t blame her entirely for wanting to be with the man who fucked her and was probably once nice to her.”

  Wow. He nodded. “You’re right. I take full responsibility for that. And if I could go back and change that one night, I would.”

  “Would you? What would you change it to?”

  He eyed her, anticipating her angle. “I would change it to not laying a finger on her.”

  “Did you massage her too, Dante? Like you did with me?”

  “No,” he said, firmly.

  “Or do you reserve those for the desperately broken, frigid married women who’ve been sexually mistreated?”

  “Rin, stop,” he whispered, his head down. “I never touched a woman the way I touched you. I never felt about a woman the way I feel about you.”

  “Save it,” she shot out. “I don’t want to talk anymore to you about it. Not tonight.”

  “Let’s stay here,” he tried not to beg. “And talk.”

  “Not tonight. I can’t,” she assured but still in that same, controlled tone. “As you can see I’m in no frame of mind to see around the pathetic, jealous-tinted glasses I’ve got on.”

  He stood there, trapped. Trapped in what to do, how to do it and if he even should. “I’m ready,” he said lightly to her, needing more time to think. Hopefully as the night progressed, he’d find his footing and figure out what the hell to do.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Two hours at Frodo and Dante was down for the count. His sweet Rin … what a victory she’d scored, only she had no clue what she was causing as she danced on the floor among a throng of men. She’s dr
unk, she’s hurt, she’s confused. She’ll snap out of it. You deserve to sit here and watch every second of it.

  That little speech was worn to a frazzle and no match for the possessive fury that had him a petrified statue in that chair, watching. Watching and promising himself that if just one of the men around her put their hands on her, he could cut loose.

  Finally it happened. That one prick he’d had his eye on, finally slid his hand under her dress. He launched from the chair even as she pushed his hand away, only for the prick to try again.

  Death penalty.

  She saw him coming before he got there and ran to meet him. Her palms slammed into his stomach hard enough to break the fury driving him. He looked down at her and she shook her head. “You can’t fight,” she yelled at him over the blaring music.

  “You should have thought of that before you ground yourself all over his fucking leg!” he grit in her face, his fury back to blinding.

  She slapped him across the face and stormed off, leaving Dante at a burning crossroad between kill and kill. Who to kill was the only question to answer.

  He shot out after her and caught her arm as she entered the hallway leading to the bathroom. Dante pulled her instead into the club’s supply room on the opposite wall and shut the door. “We’re leaving,” he grit.

  “Fine, but only because I’m ready to go.”

  “I see you danced yourself sober,” he said.

  “What are you so angry about, Dante,” she asked, winded. “Upset your flirting with Jessica didn’t bother me?”

  “Flirting?” he said, astounded. “You shove her on me and force me to watch you play the slut with every guy out there? I get you’re pissed, you’re hurt, but I can’t do this, I can’t watch you do that! I tried Rin, I tried to let you punish me, I tried to take it, whatever it took to help you feel better.”

  “Help me?” she hissed, tears making her eyes glittery. “Is that what you’re doing, helping me? Another Dante healing? To sit there and do nothing while I die? You learned that from Tin Tin?”

  Dante stared at her speechless, at what she’d just said. Him sitting and watching while she died. As her tears fell, it hit him in the chest, then the gut, then right in his cock as his stupid brain made the connections. She wanted him to show her with his actions what she meant to him. Well, he might be confused about how to show what he felt, but he wasn’t confused about what he felt or the fact that he felt it.

  “Let’s go, Rin,” he muttered, his body shaking with the need to show her.

  “I’m not leaving with you,” she suddenly said.

  He saw her then, the scared, fragile, and impossibly beautiful woman he’d fallen so hard for. She wasn’t leaving with him. The idea struck him senseless and caused his entire being to downshift into that final stretch gear. The one he’d hit in fights when it all seemed hopeless, he’d hit that point where things clicked inside him and he knew what to do, saw it in his mind. He turned to the door but he didn’t open it. He locked it.

  “What are you doing?” she whispered.

  “Giving you what you’ve been begging for,” he said, his tone final.

  “Open the door,” she said, her voice frail.

  He turned slowly and shook his head. “Not happening.” He reached behind his head and grabbed at his t-shirt and pulling it over his head.

  “Dante,” she whispered, her tone breathless as she eyed his chest.

  “Rin,” he whispered back, the lethal desire burning in his blood, making his tone thick. “I should have known.”

  “Known what?” she gasped, watching his hands undo his pants next.

  “But I see it now. I was so stupid. So blind, but now I see it so very clearly.”

  “What are you talking about? Stop undressing,” she said shakily.

  “You …” he whispered reverently as he slowly worked his pants off. “You’re unlike anything I’ve ever had to fight.”

  “Fight?” she asked, her breaths getting louder as she slowly moved back.

  “You’re dying right before my eyes. Crying out for help.”

  Tears fell down her face as she stared at him, her back against the wall now. “I’m not … dying,” she barely squeaked, her lips trembling.

  “Undress, Rin.”

  “Why? No, I don’t want to.”

  A gush of breath escaped him as he removed his briefs. “Oh yes. Yes you do want to.”

  She shook her head, the movement unsure and weak, telling on her. Telling the whole story. His cock pulsed with that little confirmation about his discernment.

  He walked slowly toward her now. “I have to know what’s under that dress.”

  He read her body language, the only thing she spoke with, though she wasn’t aware. Her hungry eyes roamed over his nakedness, her breaths shallow with what she craved, what was finally coming.

  When he stood before her and she stared up at him, he said again, letting his patience slip. “What … color panties … do you have on, Rin?”

  Her breaths increased and she licked her lips. “B-black,” she stammered.

  “You don’t have a bra on,” he said, knowing. “Because your nipples have been calling me, and every, other, fucking man all night long.” He reached out and touched one, watching her eyes shut as he moved a finger slowly over the hard tip. “I’m assuming you want me to take it off for you,” he said, sliding his finger inside the edge of the material and up to the strap. He then slid it off her shoulder and lowered it down her arm, his eyes locked on the creamy breast he was uncovering. He moved to the other strap and did the same with it.

  He regarded her turned face as she stood with her beautiful breasts bared to him. He ran all his fingers over her hard nipples and his cock jerked with her strained breaths. Fighting sounds that told on her, moans of desperate need for what she’d been craving since he’d met her.

  He lowered a hand and slipped it between her legs and slowly moved up, raising the dress as he did. When his fingers encountered her naked pussy, he paused, looking at her. “No fucking panties?” Then he felt it. Silky material. Crotch-less panties. His cock hardened with the need to punish her and he was seconds away from agreeing.

  His harsh breaths mixed with her tiny moans as he continued to feel along her naughty secrets for more evidence. Her slick essence coated his fingers. “Your fucking pussy …” he said as a groan cut his words and breath. “I’m going to have this all over my cock finally,” he shuddered, sliding her juice along her slit.

  Her lack of words, the way she stood there, braced for it, waited for it, all screamed Yes. Don’t stop now, do it.

  “I know I said I would make love to you first, Rin,” he whispered, his finger wetting her clit now. “But that was before I realized. And usually, I don’t do eye for eye, tooth for tooth. Fuck for fuck,” he grit, keeping his touch delicate. “But in your case?” He slid his finger slowly inside her. “Evil stole your life. Had a man fuck it right from you.”

  She cried out, lifting her leg for him, her breaths coming faster.

  “Do you know what I’m going to do to you, Rin?” He began moving his finger in and out of her, slow, deep strokes. “I’m going to bring you back from the dead, Rin. I’m going to fuck you so good, and so hard, and so fucking perfectly, that you will have no choice but to get your ass out of that grave, and live.”

  She suddenly launched onto him and the clash of her explosive need against his body sent his mind into a frenzy of action. His back hit the wall and he grabbed her hips, guiding her to his cock while her she devoured his mouth with a reckless hunger.

  SLOW! his brain screamed the second before he slammed her down onto his cock.

  He gave a harsh growl as he fought himself, fought her even from taking it. Her virgin body never had what he was about to give, but that didn’t stop her from fighting with all her might to get it in that second.

  God help him. Nothing had ever been harder to deny, especially when she called his name with every frantic breath.
When he made sure his cock was exactly where it needed to be and lubricated, he released the death grip on her hips, letting her start.

  Her sharp cry hit his mouth and her nails dug into the muscles of his neck as she experienced the head of his cock in her pussy for the first time. She panted and didn’t move an inch while his breaths shook from the strain of not taking her hard the way he needed.

  “That’s it, baby. Take your time,” he gushed, biting his tongue on FUCK MY FUCKING COCK screaming in his blood.

  She tormented him with a slow descent, her whimpers and the clamp of her pussy making him delirious. “Oh God, oh God,” she gasped, adding to his agony. She continued down his cock her legs trembling around his body. Dante slipped his hands under her ass, helping hold her up, not trusting them on her waist or near her perfect fucking hips.

  He leaned and sucked her neck when her head fell back, needing to taste her in some way. She was nearing the bottom and his cock jerked and throbbed at knowing what was coming next.

  His control slipped and he bucked his hips. Her sharp cry made him hungrier and his hands slid up to her hips. “Fucking fuck!” he growled, his fingers digging hard into her soft flesh.

  Her strong legs tightened around his waist and she gripped his shoulders as she raised her body. Her pussy sucked slowly back up his cock but it was those delicate cries devastating him.

  Before she made it half way, he lifted her by the waist until her entrance gripped the head of his dick. Her head fell forward and she locked her lust-drunken gaze onto his. The hunger in that gaze ran him over and he shoved her onto his cock only to grip her waist before he reached bottom and hurt her.

  Her brows were drawn in fierce desperation, her eyes never leaving his. Dante lifted her up again before letting her drop back down, feeling for signs that it was too much.

  He saw it in her eyes when the tides turned. That breathtaking longing from a lifetime of need, raw and open before him, crying out for him. Ready for him to take her, devastate the darkness inside.