The awkwardness began when they entered the room and Law stilled like he found a gunman lying in wait or a bomb ready to explode. For the barest of seconds, Magdalena’s mind haunted her with all the possibilities, but she stepped into the room ready to face the horror. Only she hadn’t been ready at all.
Beyond Law, thick tapestries, a low-slung ceiling, and smoke-stained fireplace suffocated the room in a boudoir feel. If she thought the kiss at the station threw her for a loop, the king-sized canopy bed Law’s gaze riveted to knocked her smooth out. Four scrolled wooden posters scraped the ceiling and connected beams carved with intricate rosettes. The rich mahogany of the head and foot boards hosted masterfully sculpted flares and flowers. But the yards and yards of gauzy white fabric made it a bed fit for fucking.
Magdalena’s nipples tightened beneath the simple tank she wore, just thinking about the sex sled. Awareness of the rough breaths flowing in and out of Law’s flared nostrils followed suit. She clamped her eyes shut and willed away the stir of hormones inside her body. The emotions of the past two days were quite enough to handle, without adding sex to the mix. Not that her body didn’t scream for his. It had since the first moment they touched in obstinate fashion, attuned to his every move. His every glance. But she couldn’t throw every newfound moral in the dumpster because she thought she loved another chap. Okay, she knew she did, but it still didn’t give her carte blanche to wrap her legs around him and ride him harder and longer than they’d ridden the bike.
She tried to lighten the heaviness in the room. “Don’t tell my father we were this close to Stonehenge and didn’t go see it. He’d be pissed. Maybe even more so than he’ll be about the house. He used to drag me out here once a year until I left for school.”
Law’s gaze jumped from his folded hands to her face, then flashed to her breasts before rising again. The muscles in his neck strained and he cleared his throat. “Don’t worry about the house. It’s been taken care of.”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s returned to normal, minus a few broken things which I’ve commissioned someone to replace.”
Her hands stilled from worrying the fray of her usually very comfortable boxer shorts. A leave-behind from some bloke along the way. Now they only left her wishing for a thick terry robe to hide behind. “Thank you,” she whispered. She worked up the nerve to meet his brilliant gaze. “Really, it means so much to me. You helped my dad. I hate that I couldn’t do it myself, but thank you.”
“Don’t thank me,” he rebuffed. His hand scraped across the stubble littering his face. “It’s my fault… God, I can’t believe I left you… I—"
“Stop, please.” She smiled wide to stave off the tears threatening mutiny against her. “Not right now. I can’t talk about that yet.”
His gaze fell to his lap and he found an interesting stitch in the jeans covering his wide legs. “Clara and I met junior year in a two day pre-law course at UCL. She beat me in a mock trial preceding and I was in love.”
Magdalena’s heart seared like the chef decided to serve her tattered organ for breakfast and fried it up inside her chest. Jealousy, the ugliest emotion, hurt so intensely she surprised herself by holding back the shriek.
Law pinched his lips between his teeth then released them and met her gaze. “So hard and fast it caught my breath. Everything fell into place like I’d been told it would my whole life.” He swallowed. “I have sisters, remember. That plus my over-the-moon-in-love parents, I never had a chance. Clara and I had our lives perfectly planned by the second month.”
Mags was lucky to have an outfit planned the night before she needed it. No way in hell could she plan a life in two months. It had taken her years of agonizing to decide on her own goals, without having to take anyone else into consideration. Hearing this made her question her own maturity, and maybe feel a bit incompetent about achieving the lofty expectations she’d placed on herself. But no. Twenty-five years had led her to this place. She wouldn’t degrade herself by judging it against others. Different people. Different lives.
“I asked her to marry me a few weeks later.” A tear rolled down Law’s strong jaw and fell to his shirt, turning the grey fabric it touched into a dark dot. The ominous mark grew as another dropped. He looked off into nowhere, and Mags knew he was reliving his time with Clara.
Her jealously faded away at the presence of his pain. Magdalena would give almost anything to return Clara to him. To ease the hurt that obviously changed the course of his life. Even if it meant she’d never know him or love him in any real way.
“She said yes, and my family immediately went to work planning an engagement party for the next weekend. All of us and some close friends. Stews. Bread. Cakes. It was a great time. The last really great time.” Law wiped at the moisture on his face and sniffed, trying to compose himself.
“That night, after the party, I found a lump in her left breast.”
“No,” Mags whispered.
“We were optimistic. Then denial came. Cancer ate her from the inside out. So. Fast.” He leaned forward, steepled his hands, and rested his mouth on the first two fingers, still a million minutes away from the present. “We dropped our course loads a month after the celebration. She couldn’t even get out of bed the next week. And then she stayed in that in-between for so long. Not alive. Not dead. A skeleton of the woman I’d first met, but still so strong.”
Magdalena closed her eyes and struggled to block out her own memories of the heinous sickness. When she opened them, tears cascaded down her face, but she clamped her mouth together. This was his purge. His chance to free a bit of the memories that preyed on him. He would never forget, but sharing them lessened their piercing edge. Even if only a little. Willow had been her restoration and Africa had been her rejuvenation. She would try to be one of them for Law.
“Then she was gone and so was I. All the plans we made for a firm and future went with her. The wind kicked me around for a year before I even thought about going back to school and finishing law. When I met Baine, we were both looking for something to help us forget the numbness.” He exhaled. “And that’s how we ended up living the life of James Bond. Well, parts of it anyway.”
Law returned to the present with a vengeance. His left hand cupped her face while the other chased away her tears. “Why are you crying?”
Magdalena’s lower lip quivered and his thumb arrested it. “I know her sickness. It’s the most dehumanizing condition. When I was a girl I lost my mother to cancer. Clara was lucky to have you. Just like my mother was lucky to have my father.”
She covered his hand with hers. “It takes a strong person to ease a loved one into death. But it’s what they need. A hand to cling to. Loving eyes to tell them it’s okay to go. That everything will be all right.
“Even if it is a lie.”
He nodded, seemingly unable to speak for a moment. “What about you?”
“What about me?”
“Who took care of you while your dad took care of your mom?”
“Dad did the best he could. I was old enough to help out around the house.”
“But not old enough to understand what was going on,” he whispered.
“Who really understands premature death, or death at all?”
“I’m sorry I left you.”
“I’m sorry I pushed.”
“Don’t. I needed a good shove and it seems you’re the lass to give it to me. You asked me earlier, if I was still in love with her.” Mags threw her hand up to stop him, but he grabbed it and intertwined their fingers. “I haven’t been in love with Clara for a while now, but I haven’t been living either. I’ve been caught in a deadened haze.
“When I saw you, you burned the clouds away and I’m just adjusting to the light. Slowly. And not very gracefully.”
Law dropped his hand from her face and tugged her from the table. He led her to the far side of the bed, away from the guns on the nightstand, and pulled back the thick comforter. Even though she k
new the gesture wasn’t sexual, and that he would not kiss her tonight with all the rawness of their discussion in the foreground, her heart skipped at his closeness and care. She slipped between the sheets and watched him walk to the other side and do the same.
He settled the sheet around her shoulders and rested his head on the downy pillow. Their gazes locked in a near unblinking trance, connecting them more absolutely than sex had ever linked her with another human being. Three feet of bed yawned between them, but physical contact was inconsequential at the moment. Desire. Fear. Hope. Excitement. Love. The emotions swirled between them then slowly faded, as did her consciousness.
23
“Look through it again,” Law barked.
Magdalena’s bleary eyes blinked the massive V of Law’s tattooed back into view. Good morning. Judging by his tone, Law didn’t share the sentiment, but she wouldn’t let it ruin her spirit. She hadn’t ever slept so well or woken to such a striking view. The Roman goddess Justitia stared at Magdalena, unseeing for the blindfold over her eyes. She stood with her chin high and arms outstretched. In her left hand she thrust a sword in the air, ready to strike. In the other the scales hung in balance. Cuffs of material clasped her upper arms, draped across her chest, and gathered about her legs. The prominent position covering much of his sinuous back and the artful excellence with which it sculpted against his smooth skin spoke to the importance its message had in his life.
Propping on an arm, she angled for a better look. A terry cloth towel, exposing the upper half of two muscle-arched dimples at the small of his back, rewarded her efforts. Her lips curved into a smile thinking about the other half of those dimples, hiding beneath the covering.
One of his arms held a phone to his ear while the other hung loose by his side. “No. I’m not,” he growled. The free hand scraped over his head once and then again. When she sat and slid her feet over the side of the bed he twisted his torso toward her. He covered the mouthpiece. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”
“It’s okay,” she mouthed.
His chest expanded on a breath and she caught a glimpse of his tight abs as he returned to the vanity and his conversation. Small cuts littered his pecs and there were two punctuated gashes on his side and arm, but they didn’t bother his economical movements. Magdalena walked to the image scrawled across his back as though drawn to it. Close, the detail enthralled her greedy gaze. And then her hand.
Law’s breath hitched at the touch, but he made no move to stop her exploration. She started at the scales, noticing the barest raise of the inked skin beneath her fingers. Magdalena traced the blindfold, the length of the sword.
“I won’t believe it until you check it yourself, or you can send the computer and drive back and we’ll look through it ourselves.” After a pause, he added, “None of your business. Goodbye, Khani.”
Magdalena added two and two together and figured they hadn’t found anything in her work files. Her heart sank, but the disappointment didn’t have quite the effect it should have had because her hands, both of them, roved the deep groove of Law’s spine, the inside curve of his lats and mounded traps. Mags focused on the tat to keep from soaking her panties, but the task became impossible as Law’s breaths labored.
“Why Justitia? From the law books in your flat and your profession I know you like the law. Even your name rings true. But there’s more to the story.” She was sure of it.
“Nava Zegen was my great-grandmother. In 1943 she escaped the Warsaw Ghetto during the uprising after losing everything during the extermination. Her mother. Father. Four brothers and two sisters. And her son, who was ripped from her arms and shot before her eyes because she begged for a piece of bread for her starving child. They took everything from her, except her will to live.”
Once again Magdalena’s tears fell in earnest at the unimaginable injustice. Her throat tightened and her hands stopped and flattened on his back.
“After Clara died, I went to Europe, visited the mass graves where my relatives may or may not have been buried. I walked the path she took to freedom. I arrived in Finland a month later and got the ink as a constant symbol of what I fight for and of what I have to live for.”
Magdalena lifted a hand to stem the flow of emotion, but only soaked her fingers. Her palm fell from Law’s back as he turned and she considered every angle of his face. In turn, he stared at the bruise on her neck, which had turned vibrant green and yellow by dinner last night. Like a whisper, his fingers glided over the battered skin. She froze as his head lowered and his lips caressed the same spot.
The gulp that cleared the lump in her throat sounded loud enough to rock the windowpanes, but he didn’t seem to care. Law collected her unruly hair in one hand and guided it over her shoulder while his other hand smoothed over her spine, nuzzling the dip of her ass and pulling her closer.
She exhaled in a rush as his mouth worked over her jaw. He licked tears from her cheeks. When his slick lips finally settled on her mouth, her pulse thrummed between her legs. He yanked her belly flush with the solid ridge of his cock. His six feet two inches to her five feet three placed the swell of his head awfully close to the curve of her breasts. Magdalena’s nipples brushed his chest and abraded the thin cotton tank separating their skin, and she moaned into his mouth.
Before she could get her bearings, both his hands cupped her ass and lifted. He guided her core over his sex and wrapped her legs around his waist. She clung to him like he were the only source of oxygen in the world, interlocking her feet and sucking his tongue into her mouth at the same time. He groaned as she worked him to the tip then released him. Law turned and the backs of her legs hit the cool countertop as he settled her in front of him.
“You taste like sex, Magdalena. And I’m a starved man.”
His words excited her and ignited a yearning she’d denied for too long. But apparently not as long as he had. She arched, rubbing her swollen, and irritatingly boxer covered, pussy lips up the length of his dick. “Eat your fill.”
He entwined a hand in her hair and eased her back farther. Her full breasts and erect nipples pointed toward the ceiling. She whimpered as he licked his lips then dropped them to her right, and consequently, most sensitive peak. Wet heat enveloped the tip of her breast and she keened on contact, which spurred him to tug more firmly. He pulled her through his lips then returned with teeth, nipping and dragging the tender, cotton-covered flesh over the rigid texture. Liquid desire coated her lower lips, readying her to receive the thrusts of his manhood. Plumping her left breast with his big hand, he continued tormenting her already aching nipple. Magdalena moaned as his mouth grew bolder, suckling deep pulls she felt all the way to her vagina. She panted and bucked from the overwhelming sensation.
Law rested his head in the valley of her breasts and pulled several ragged breaths. “Christ, I’m like a virgin about to shoot at second base.”
“You can, if you want. I won’t mind,” she gasped.
Teeth caught her collarbone and she giggled.
“You ticklish?”
“Never knew I was ticklish there.”
“Hmmm,” his lips vibrated against her neck. “So, there are other places.”
Magdalena’s fingers explored Law’s back from the new and much improved vantage point and enjoyed the dichotomy of his hard, smooth body. “Maybe,” she evaded.
His grip slid to her ass cheeks and he molded the generous curves in his palm. “God, your body is dangerous enough to kill a man.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Fuck. Yes. Pure pleasure overdose. Call the police. I think I’m addicted.”
Law straightened and the hands at her bottom smoothed up the slope of her hips. The pads of his fingers stirred her craving as they touched the bare skin of her torso and coasted up her waist.
“Raise your hands, Magdalena.”
Her breath hitched in a mixture of excitement and surprise. Surprise she had no compunction about getting naked with Lawrence Pierce, the man who held her hea
rt in his hands. Surprise he had overcome his misgivings and hurt so quickly. Startled and excited, Magdalena responded with complete obedience and willing anticipation.
He was one of those people. The ones at Christmas who opened their presents with such patience and care that others mauled their package like a rabid dog just to irritate the gentle package opener. Law took beautiful care lifting the hem of her shirt centimeter by precious centimeter. His gaze left her face and fell to the heated flesh he exposed. That decisive stare delighted her hypersensitive skin as though it actually caressed and coaxed the dewy surface.
An animalistic grunt rattled Law’s chest as he finally lifted the thin shirt from her breasts. He disappeared from view for a moment while he pulled the fabric over her face and up the tips of her fingers. Her hair plummeted to her shoulders and Law discarded the shirt over his.
Standing back as he was, Magdalena studied the angles of his chiseled torso with salivating thoroughness. The groove down the center of his back was nearly recreated over his front as abutted ridges of muscle bisected his centerline. Two slabs of pectoral brawn ate up a good portion of the real estate. Flat disk nipples set wide and aimed at the ground. Below, eight. Yes, she counted correctly. Eight bricks of fibrous tissue formed the most glorious abdomen she’d ever seen. Where it disappeared behind the terry cloth intrigued her even more. Magdalena’s tongue furled inside her mouth, longing to explore all the light and shadows of his body.
She dragged her gaze from his physique to his equally inspiring face which studied her form as she’d just appraised his, only with more fortitude and endurance. Magdalena couldn’t endure much more waiting. Her core clenched, yearning for the thick cock that tented his towel.
Her hunger took the back burner as Law’s hand raised toward her breast, but stalled inches away. The pinch of his brow said he wasn’t exercising extreme self-control, but struggling with painful memories, or more aptly, their affect on the present. Magdalena grabbed his hand and brought his palm to her mouth. Her lips kissed and grazed the salty skin. Then she lowered his hand to her heavy bosom. The simple coaxing evened his brow.
Justice Mine: a Base Branch Novel Page 13
