Taste Me

by Tamara Hogan

  Chapter 26

  One. More. Rep.

  His torso was sweating so much he practically slipped off the weight bench. What remained of his hair was dripping wet, and his arms wouldn’t stop shaking, but he was going to finish one last rep if it killed him. And it very well might, he thought as he eyed the heavy black slabs bending the metal bar he held suspended over his head on locked out elbows. He could see the embarrassing obituary now: “Underworld Council Member, Risk Assessor Lukas Sebastiani, Killed in Entirely Avoidable Weightlifting Accident.” It would serve him right for lifting so much weight without a spotter.

  Would Scarlett even mourn him if he died?

  The weight swayed overhead. Okay, focus. One more, and you’re done. His abs and biceps burned as he lowered the bar to his chest, whooshed out a breath, and grunted out the last punishing bench press. “Now get the bar into the stand before it kills you, you dumb shit.” He did so with a hard clank, dropped his dead arms to his sides, and lay there with his eyes closed, waiting for his breathing to even out.

  Scarlett was right. He was a chickenshit.

  He hoped Scarlett was wired like her mother was, because Lukas’s father had told him not two hours ago that when he pissed off Claudette, a heartfelt apology usually sufficed. The twinkle in his father’s eye led Lukas to conclude that his father’s apology technique also employed judicious amounts of make-up sex.

  Funny how you never stopped learning from your parents.

  His lips quirked. Yeah, he could get behind the make-up sex, one hundred percent. But unfortunately the apology had to come first.

  His house was filled with emotional booby-traps. No matter how much weight he lifted, no matter how many punishing sit-ups he crunched, he couldn’t erase the memories: Scarlett laughing and splashing water at him while they washed the dishes together. The cute little scowl of concentration between her eyebrows when she wrote. That goddamn headset, permanently clamped to her ears. The way hot showers turned her skin a rosy, carnation pink. That haunting, infernal humming that turned his cock to rock in the span of a heartbeat. The way she throatily demanded more of him, more and more, when they made love. The way he willingly gave it to her, every way she asked, and then some.

  “Damn it,” he whispered. He owed her an apology whether she gave him another shot or not.

  “I told you he’d be here.” As Jack entered, he set a shopping bag on the floor, his expression darkening as he took in Lukas’s shaking body, the sweat-darkened workout clothes, and the slabs racked up on the bar.

  Rafe walked in behind him and immediately eyeballed the weights. “Are you trying to kill yourself?”

  Lukas didn’t dignify his comment with an answer. He sat up, grabbed a towel, and dragged it across his sweaty face. “What are you two doing here?” Jack and Rafe didn’t run in the same circles. Seeing them together, without him to bridge the gap, was a little unusual.

  Jack picked up the head of the sparring dummy that Lukas kicked off earlier, setting it on the table where Scarlett used to work. “This is an intervention. You haven’t left this building in almost two weeks. You need a change of scenery.”

  “Blow off some steam,” Rafe said with a grin. “Maybe get laid.”

  Jack raised placating hands at the killing look Lukas speared them with. “Or not. But you’re coming out with us.”

  “You might want to shower first,” Rafe suggested.

  Lukas stared at them. He wasn’t in the mood for a Saturday night bar crawl, and the way Jack and Rafe were dressed, it didn’t look like they had a biker bar in mind.

  “Brother or not, Sasha won’t let you in the door if you show up looking like this.”

  Underbelly, then. A bite of cinnamon hit his tongue. Despite Rafe’s casual slouch, his brother was worried about him. Damn. But he couldn’t go clubbing, not tonight. He had to apologize to Scarlett, try to—

  Scarlett’s place is right upstairs from the club, you dumb shit.

  He stood. “Okay. But you’re buying.” At Rafe’s surprised look, he said, “Hey, I can drink a beer or two if that’s what it takes to get you off my back.”

  He stripped off and stepped into the shower, feeling more energetic than he’d felt any day since Stephen’s attack. He turned the knob and stood out of the way until the water warmed up, staring at the girly purple puff, a pumice stone, a can of watermelon-scented shaving cream, and a bright blue razor that still sat on the shelf in the shower. Sasha hadn’t looked in the shower when she’d come over to retrieve Scarlett’s things, and Lukas couldn’t make himself move them under the sink.

  Steam rose from the shower, and he stepped under the spray with a moan, letting the water pound his tight muscles. What the hell. He snatched the purple puff off the shelf and used it.

  With her scent filling in his nostrils, Lukas strategized, then reviewed his plan for flaws. He’d spend an hour or so at Underbelly with the guys, long enough to assuage their concern, but no longer. He’d let Rafe buy him a couple of beers, steering clear of Sasha, who’d taken it upon herself to give him regular, torturous updates about how busy Scarlett was, how she was gaining weight, getting her curves back. Finally sleeping well, and working like a demon. She’d finished one song, and was collaborating on another with Dave Grohl, “now that they’d reconnected.”

  Lukas turned off the water with a twist that threatened to break the heavy knob, and stepped out of the shower. Sasha had known the mere thought would lodge under his skin like a fucking sliver.

  “Hey, I have a puff like that at home,” Rafe said from the open door. “Feels great, doesn’t it.”

  Shit. The steam wasn’t thick enough to hide the damage Stephen had inflicted upon his body—damage he hadn’t shared with his family.

  Rafe silently examined the healing burns on Lukas’s collarbones, sternum, hipbones, and spine, taking in the singed body hair on his chest, abs, and underbelly. “What the hell…?”

  “Your guess is as good as mine.” Lukas snatched a towel off the hook, ran it over his upper body, and slung it around his hips as he stepped out of the shower. He didn’t have any answers himself. The last report he’d received from the secure medical facility where Stephen was being held had been maddeningly inconclusive. “I just know it itches like a bitch.”

  He surveyed his collarbones in the mirror hanging over the sink. The blackened skin had finally sloughed off, leaving shiny red welts. He could hide those wounds under his clothing, and had for two weeks, but there was no hiding his singed eyelashes and eyebrows, or his tattered hair. He met Rafe’s eyes in the mirror. “Sure you want me to come along? I might scare all the women away.”

  “With that scowl, you hardly even notice you don’t have eyebrows.”

  Lukas sighed.

  “Jack? Can you bring that shopping bag in here?” Rafe called. He opened drawers, the medicine cabinet, the doors under the sink. “Where the hell’s your hair product?” he muttered.

  “Huh?”

  “No wonder your hair always looks like crap. Keep drying.”

  “Okay, Kyan.”

  Rafe smiled at the reference to the Queer Eye for the Straight Guy hair stylist, and knelt to better root through the items stored under the sink. “Ah.”

  Lukas recoiled at the scissors in his hand.

  “Lukas, we have to cut your hair.” Rafe indicated his brother’s uneven hanks. “You can’t get your woman back looking like that. You shouldn’t throw out your garbage looking like that.”

  Jack walked into the bathroom carrying a stool and the shopping bag. He reached into the bag and handed Rafe a clipper.

  “Sit,” Rafe said, indicating the stool. “Let’s get this done.”

  Lukas sat and watched long strands of hair drop to the rough bathroom tiles. Once most of the length was gone, his brother carefully plied the clipper over his skull.

  “Okay, shower off. Jack, check the closet and see if there’s anything worth wearing. I’ll—”

  “Out, both of you. I
can take it from here.” The bathroom was the one room in the place that had a door on it, and it was about to get slammed. Hard.

  As he washed his prison-inmate brush cut under the shower’s massaging spray, he decided he’d wear whatever clothing Jack chose for him.

  Tonight, he needed all the help he could get.

  ***

  Music rumbled through the concrete walls as the three men pulled into the Sebastiani Building’s underground parking garage twenty minutes later, Jack at the wheel of his Volvo sedan, Lukas riding shotgun, and Rafe sprawled across most of the backseat. As Jack cruised the lot for an empty parking space, Lukas’s gaze, as always, momentarily flicked over a very specific parking slot—innocuous enough, smack in the middle of the row, and currently occupied by a gray SUV dripping with sleet.

  But in his mind’s eye, it was forever a crime scene, partitioned off with yellow tape—the place where his mother had fought off a mugger like a tiger, turning a purse-snatching into a stabbing that wouldn’t have happened at all if her oldest son hadn’t stomped away from the car in a testosterone-fuelled teenage huff, about some perceived slight that Lukas couldn’t even remember anymore. He’d left her alone and defenseless. Sometimes, in the deepest recesses of his psyche, that teenager still raged, “Why didn’t you just give him the fucking purse?”

  But with no surveillance cameras in place to find the criminal, Lukas had discovered his wild talent, and helped bring his mother’s killer to justice.

  Was Scarlett safer with him, or without him? And did it really matter? He couldn’t stay away from her either way. Earlier today, his father had punched a hole in his ego by musing that self-blame was self-indulgent, allowing a person to retain the illusion that they had control over the outcome of a bad situation in the first place.

  Lukas knew that his control issues stood in the way of any future he and Scarlett could have together. Intellectually, he knew he had to step back, let her take risks, to live her life—beautiful, wild, and free. He just hoped it wasn’t too late to convince her to do it with him rather than without him. Tonight he was flying without a net. He’d better get used to it, because if tonight went as he hoped it would, he’d be getting a hell of a lot of practice.

  He joined Rafe and Jack near the trunk. “Remember, you’re buying,” he reminded his brother.

  They took the stairway from the garage up to the first floor, and the music blasted them as soon as the doors opened. It didn’t take long to find Flynn holding court at the back bar, spilling his Irish charm over a trio of tipsy women.

  “Hey, guys,” Flynn greeted them with a wave, reaching for two Heinekens. He popped off the caps with a twist of his wrist, and then skidded them down the bar to Lukas and Jack. Turning to the taps, he started building Rafe’s Guinness. “Place is hopping, and look at all the pretty ladies here tonight.” He grinned at the women he was serving. “Ladies, meet Jack, Rafe, and Lukas.”

  “You weren’t kidding about the eye candy here, were you?” the buxom redhead murmured to her friend. Her gaze stopped on Lukas. “I’ll take door number three.”

  Jack smiled and saluted them with his bottle of beer. “Ladies.”

  Lukas tried not to scowl as he acknowledged the women’s greetings with a nod. Though the redhead was perfectly attractive, she wasn’t the redhead he was looking for. He wasn’t interested in picking anyone up, watching his brother work his infallible hookup mojo, or even standing here at the bar talking. He wanted to find Scarlett, apologize to her, and see if there was anything left to salvage of the relationship he’d stupidly shot down.

  The pheromones drifting from the dance floor didn’t help. Someone had set Buffalo Bill’s disturbing “it puts the lotion on its skin” dialogue from Silence of the Lambs to a slow, grinding beat. The juxtaposition made him twitchy. “What is this shit?”

  “Forgive my brother. He’s antsy tonight,” Rafe apologized. “Where’s Sasha?” he asked Flynn.

  “It’s Guilty Pleasures night, so she’s either on the floor or in the DJ booth.”

  Lukas snorted. Suddenly the music made a lot more sense. On Guilty Pleasures night, Sasha picked the tunes.

  Flynn scanned the dance floor and gestured. “Over there.”

  Lukas looked over to where Sasha and Bailey danced together, cheerfully hanging on each other in that platonic way girlfriends often did, but which caused the assholes dancing around them to spin hopeful ménage à trois fantasies. The two women were being circled like baby seals, drawing all the wrong kinds of attention. Great. Just fucking great. He picked up his beer and took a healthy swig. He’d come here to relax, but he was going to end up knocking some heads together before the night was over. And apparently Jack felt the same way, because he stood up straight, at full alert beside him.

  Rafe shook his head at both of them. “They’re fine. Relax, enjoy yourselves.”

  Suddenly Scarlett sauntered down from the DJ booth, joining Sasha and Bailey. What was she doing down here instead of upstairs? Lust punched him in the gut. Rafe smirked beside him, but didn’t say anything.

  Jesus, she was beautiful. Sasha was right; Scarlett had gained a crucial seven or eight pounds since he’d last seen her, and in all the right fucking places. The way her well-worn jeans cupped her ass made his hands itch, and the heeled boots she wore canted her hips flirtatiously. He wasn’t the only one who admired her curves, or noticed that she wasn’t wearing a bra. She swayed to the music, eyes closed, with a slight smile on her face. She lost herself in the pleasure of the sound, and drew every eye.

  “Damn it.”

  “Jesus, Luk, give it a rest. They’re just having some fun.” Rafe placed his half-finished Guinness on the bar. “Watch that for me, would you?” He winked at the women. “I wouldn’t want anyone to slip me a roofie.”

  Rafe had spotted his quarry for the night, and Lukas didn’t have the heart to tell the women avidly babysitting Rafe’s beer that it wasn’t going to be one of them. His brother waded through the people on the dance floor, cheerfully fending off a few arms slung around his waist, and finally stopped when he reached Scarlett, Sasha, and Bailey. He tipped his head back and laughed at something Bailey said, then he—

  Lukas’s eyes bugged as Rafe wound his arms around Scarlett’s torso from behind, cuddling every inch of his lanky body right up against hers. She smiled up at him, placed her arms over his, and leaned her head back against his shoulder as a singer throatily implored that he wanted to see her stripped down to the bone.

  Lukas looked at Jack and Flynn, chatting and flirting with the women as if there was nothing out of the ordinary going on, like his brother’s long, wavy hair wasn’t twining with Scarlett’s blazing red mane. Like Rafe wasn’t grinding against Scarlett’s ass not thirty feet away.

  Lukas slammed his beer onto the bar and plowed through the crowd.

  He didn’t see Jack and Flynn high-fiving behind him.

  His eyes locked onto his brother’s the whole way. The son of a bitch saw him coming, and his expression was filled with challenge and an almost unholy glee. As he approached, Lukas raised a singed eyebrow and flashed his right hand with every digit extended, silently giving Rafe to the count of five to back the fuck off. He was down to one and actually had his fist clenched when Rafe finally stepped away from Scarlett with a theatrical “she’s all yours” gesture, and turned his attention to Bailey.

  Scarlett kept moving to the slithering tune, eyes closed, as happy to dance by herself as with someone else. He hesitated, and then stepped behind her as Rafe had, pressing his whole body against hers, wrapping his arms around her abdomen. She halted momentarily, inhaled, then relaxed back against him.

  Lukas absorbed her essence, her helpless reaction to him. To him, he reassured himself, not to his brother, who was too damn good looking for his own good.

  But good Christ, he hated to dance. Lukas felt the moving throng close in on him, so he closed his eyes and swayed, focusing on the feel of Scarlett’s soft breasts resting on hi
s forearm.

  No wonder his brother liked clubbing so much.

  Scarlett squirmed, and then turned in his arms so she faced him. “Hi,” she murmured, raising her hand to stroke his shorn head. “You look much better than you did the last time I saw you.”

  His senses were wide open, but he couldn’t find a whiff of anger or recrimination mixed in with the emotions swirling from her. Did she really find it so easy to forgive him? He wrapped his arms around her waist and opened his mouth to apologize. To grovel. To beg her to take him back into her life, to sing to him and only him. But before he could speak the words, she pulled his head down and kissed him.

  Despite his good intentions, he dove in, all too willing to take advantage of her generosity, because she tasted like home. Yes, he’d apologize. They’d have a serious talk, but… later. Lukas tunneled his skinned-up fingers into her hair and feasted on her mouth like a king at a banquet.

  They grasped and groped, swaying a bit for propriety’s sake, but no one could mistake the pheromones blooming around them. “Shit,” Lukas whispered, reluctantly dragging his lips from Scarlett’s to see Rafe, Sasha, and Bailey grinning at them from nearby.

  “Never mind them. Come back here,” Scarlett said, pulling him back down to her mouth.

  He drifted back into the kiss, heard her haunting voice, calling to him. How can she sing when she’s kissing me? Then he noticed that people around them had stilled, and were craning their heads to the three-story speaker system.

  Scarlett tensed in his arms and pulled back slightly. The glorious voice continued, though he could see that her mouth was closed. Scarlett’s new song. Sasha had mentioned that Scarlett had been on a creative tear, but wow. Lukas wrapped his arms around Scarlett and rested his chin on top of her head as the extraordinary sound system pulsed.

  Waves crashed. Voices emerged from deep in the mix. A man and a woman, murmuring softly to each other, barely audible, but their pleasure was unmistakable. There was Scarlett’s breathy moan. And… his face flamed.