Campbell inhaled, tensing. “I… That’s…”
“I’m not asking you to talk about it. But I know something’s going on with you. I’m not stupid.”
“I know you’re not.” He paused. “Yeah. There’s something.”
Varina waited a beat, not surprised when he didn’t elaborate. This was not something she could pull out of him—in order for him to heal, the decision to talk would have to be his own. Still, she couldn’t deny the pang of disappointment at his silence. Though logic told her it had nothing to do with her, a small part of her couldn’t help but take it personally.
That made her feel vulnerable and dramatic, and she hated the sensation.
“I was scared,” she continued, the words heavy. “So I lashed out.”
Campbell’s brow furrowed. “Scared?”
“Yeah.”
“What were you scared of?”
She swallowed. “You. I still am.”
The frown intensified. He looked at her as though he was trying to mentally tackle long division. Several times his lips parted and he inhaled as though ready to speak, but he couldn’t seem to find whatever he wanted to say. Ultimately, when the quiet moment had stretched a hair past awkward, he let out a breath and said, “Oh.”
Varina nodded, her heart thudding. “This is all new for me. I don’t have friends. Not really. I have contacts, resources. I have people I call when I’m in town, couches I can crash on, guys I—”
Though her brain caught up with her mouth before she could finish that thought, the way Campbell’s eyes widened told her the damage had been done.
“Guys,” she continued lamely. “Not like this.”
“I’ve only been here a couple days.”
“Yeah. And that’s what scares me the most. You’ve been here a couple days and I’m…telling you things I don’t tell people. Things I’ve never told people, ever.” Varina paused again. “You’re dangerous to me.”
Campbell stared at her.
“I like you. You’re dangerous because I like you. It’s weird to me, and scary, and it makes me vulnerable. You come with baggage and demons and you remind me of all the bad things I’ve tried to forget, and I like you anyway. So I tried to provoke you into a fight, and all that happened was I felt like an asshole.” Varina looked away then. She couldn’t help it. “It’d be easier for me if I could find a reason not to like you. A real reason—not just that you have lousy taste in friends.”
He was quiet for another moment. At length, he released a heavy breath. “I don’t know what to say.”
“You don’t have to say anything. I just wanted to tell you—explain what happened yesterday. After you left, it occurred to me how much I didn’t want you to go. And like I said, that I felt that way was a helluva shock.” Varina swallowed. “When you like people, when you care about them, they have power to hurt you. I promised myself a long time ago never to give anyone that power if I could help it.”
“Varina, hurting you is the last thing I wanna do.”
“Yeah. But you have the power. Just a little now, but if we…” She forced herself to look back at him. “If whatever this is lasts, then that power will just get stronger. Of course, it might not last, but—”
“I want it to.”
Her pulse thundered and a flash of heat seared her veins. “This just started. Whatever this is.”
“No, it just continued. It started the moment I saw you at Rat Trap.” Campbell held her gaze a moment longer, then turned his attention back to the box at his fingertips—one he had not yet opened. “It surprised me too. I didn’t want it. I’ve never wanted anything like this, but being with…” He frowned, his words trailing off. “Huh. Think I might have found something.”
Varina’s heart jumped. “What?” she asked, jerking to her feet.
He held something up—a sheet of paper. “Twelve Hour Midnight,” he said. “Novel by Jenning Jefferson.”
“No.”
“It’s right here.”
“My father didn’t write sequels.”
“How do you know this is a sequel?”
“The title—he also wouldn’t reuse words for titles, no matter how clever. When I was a kid, after he’d finished Herod Complex, he and Mom bounced potential titles off each other for a month. His publisher was set on Amnesiac History or something like that, but Dad wouldn’t budge.” Varina shivered. “Midnight History was Dad’s most famous work. He wouldn’t use those words again. Not even in a first draft. He was very careful about that.”
Campbell waved the paper. “You say that, but it’s right here. Maybe he relaxed.” He peered back into the box. “And look at this. It’s dedicated to you.”
The pain that had taken residence in her chest when she’d found the photo in the parlor resurfaced, vibrating outward and touching nerve endings she hadn’t known existed. “It’s what?”
“Your father dedicated this to you.”
“He wouldn’t have.” The words were reflex—Varina had no idea what her father would or wouldn’t do. Two weeks earlier, she wouldn’t have thought she’d be on the short list for inheriting Mount Zion, and she’d been proven wrong and then some.
Her father dedicating a book to her, though, was bigger than the house. Jenning Jefferson took his dedications very seriously. In fact, he’d only recognized two people in the whole of his writing career—her mother, and his own father.
At that, Varina cringed. “Is it a bad dedication?”
“There’s such a thing as a bad dedication?”
“The one to my grandfather was essentially a published fuck you. So yes.”
He snickered, looking down again. Then he shook his head. “No. This isn’t one of those.”
“What does it say?” A shiver ran down her spine, a ball of pressure materializing in her chest as the words her father had written to her mother flashed through her mind. Before she knew what was happening, her eyes prickled and her vision went blurry. “Wait, no. Don’t.”
Campbell tilted his head. “Are you okay?”
“I…” Varina wiped at her eyes, the heaviness intensifying. “I can’t. Right now.”
And she couldn’t say why—she wasn’t sure she wanted to know why. Except her mind kept dragging her back to what he’d written to her mother. Loss was something she had experienced before, but her father had been a distant figure for so long—molded into something else by her mind, warped into a man she hadn’t recognized. The one who had allowed his daughter to be tormented by a demon and then denied her home. The father she remembered from childhood, the one she’d played with and loved, hadn’t been around for a long time. So when he’d died, there had been no cause to mourn him.
Except she’d come to Mount Zion anyway, when the easier thing would have been to tell his lawyer to fuck off.
She wasn’t ready to see what he’d written to her, and face the possibility that she’d been wrong. That she could have come back sooner—that these last years spent alone were wasted.
That her father had died thinking she still hated him.
The pressure in her chest cracked, and Varina drew in a sharp breath, wiping at her eyes again. She couldn’t be in here anymore.
Campbell followed hot on her heels. “Varina?”
She didn’t answer. She wouldn’t have known what to say, anyway. All that mattered in the moment was putting distance between her and that manuscript. Between her and the pain blossoming in her chest, the hot sting behind her eyes.
But her room—the destination her feet had evidently decided upon—was not the best alternative. A familiar tingle took the place of the shiver at her spine, and her thoughts turned to Legion, and the damning certainty that the demon’s silence was about to come to a hard end.
Varina stood staring at her bed. She didn’t move when Campbell came up behind her, and didn’t protest when he wrapped his arms around her middle and drew her against his chest. It was risky, she knew, allowing someone else to comfort her. Allowing anyon
e as close as he’d become, especially with so much still left unexplained. But she’d spent so much time not accepting comfort that she didn’t have the will to turn him away. His arms felt good and warm around her. He didn’t ask questions she wasn’t ready to answer, didn’t make demands.
And though he was becoming too important to her too fast, she couldn’t summon the will to stop him. She wasn’t ready to retreat inside her head just yet—she’d lived there alone far too long as it was.
For just a while longer, just a little while, she wanted to pretend.
When she twisted in Campbell’s arms and met his gaze, she knew he understood.
He understood her far better than she’d thought a person could. She was starting to love that.
Love him.
And that thought, more than anything, scared her shitless.
21
The terrible, heavy feeling he’d carried with him from Rome had manifested into a physical ache. One he experienced with every breath, every move, every goddamned blink. The noxious black fear that had chased him had not dissipated, but ever since he’d awakened to find Varina in his bed, it had morphed. He was no closer to facing it, either, though he could sense it lurking around the corner. The moment she would discover the truth about him, and this perfect thing he’d found would shatter.
Campbell didn’t know what to do. It was the first time in his existence he could recall not seeing a way out. No matter if she learned now or tomorrow, next week or next year, she wouldn’t forgive him.
A thing of Hell had not only been in her home, but inside her. Gotten closer to her than she’d allowed anyone. Was lying in bed with her now, naked, as she dragged her lips down his chest, her green eyes open and warm. She looked at him as though she felt what he felt—as though there was a chance she could love him too.
Campbell’s gut twisted. He had to tell her. Before it hurt worse, he had to tell her who he really was.
Except once he did, this would end. All of it would.
“How’d you get this one?” Varina asked, drawing a line across an aged scar over his left pec.
“Werewolf.”
She jerked her head up, her eyes wide. “What? Seriously?”
Campbell grinned, or rather forced himself to.
She snickered and shoved at him. “Jerk.”
“More exciting than the truth, I’m afraid,” he said, sparing a glance at the blemish. “That was a spat with my sister.”
Varina arched an eyebrow. “You’re hard to imagine with sisters.”
“I don’t know what that means, but okay.”
“Are you close?” She frowned and eyed the scar again. “Well, I guess if they’re leaving you beauty marks, you wouldn’t be.”
Campbell shrugged. “Ah, the one I’m closest to is actually the artist.”
“Wow.” Varina tsked. “You must’ve been a jerk.”
“Yeah, I probably was.”
“And you’re very zen about being knifed by family.”
“Eh.” He shrugged again, the prickling at his neck telling him to change the subject, lest she start asking questions he wasn’t ready to answer. “What about yours?”
“My what?”
“I’ve shown you mine.” He trailed a hand down her back, then around to where he knew lay the deeper scar. “Tell me about this.”
Varina stiffened in his arms. Instead, she dropped a kiss on his belly before sliding lower. “Kind of a mood killer,” she warned, and didn’t elaborate.
Fair enough. He wouldn’t push. He could understand not wanting to talk.
Then her fingers wandered across an expanse of skin even he had been hesitant to explore. The gnarled, angry wound down his side and across his gut—the one that had opened his insides and nearly claimed his life the night the world had almost ended. Campbell inhaled sharply, every inch of his body going still.
“Fuck. This…” Varina glanced up. “This should have killed you. How did you survive this?”
Campbell’s throat tightened.
“Sorry,” she continued quickly. “I didn’t mean to say that.”
“It’s okay,” he lied. “It looks worse than it is.”
“I guess it’d almost have to.” She flashed him an apologetic smile, one that didn’t reach her eyes, then dropped a kiss under his navel. Then another, this one lower. Lower, lower and lower still.
The air between them remained charged and awkward for a moment, but as her lips continued southward, Campbell found himself relaxing, his more primal instincts assuming control. And when she shifted so she was between his legs, her mouth close to his swollen cock, the last of his unease had all but dissipated. Even the guilt gnawing at his chest and gut fell quiet. Every cell in his body shifted in time with her.
He’d never known a woman like her. Her approach wasn’t nervous, nor was she particularly shy or overly confident. When she wrapped her hand around his dick, she didn’t offer him a coquettish grin or a sly wink. She didn’t blush, either. The look she shot him was straightforward and open.
“I don’t think I’ve ever just looked at a penis.”
The corner of Campbell’s mouth tugged upward. “Oh?”
“I’m not saying I haven’t given a blow job. I have. Guys tend to like them.” Varina tilted her head, her gaze falling back on his cock. “And I’ve seen dicks, obviously. Quite a few. But it’s something I’ve never really just…looked at. I never thought of sex as something like…well, like what we’ve been doing.”
His chest tightened as he flashed back to their conversation a couple days before. The one where she’d admitted she had never thought of herself as sexual. Her sexuality had been her currency—she’d used it when she needed something. How she wasn’t completely turned off by any sort of intimacy as a result, was beyond him.
Which made what he was doing even more terrible. Enjoying her body, getting her to trust him. The lie might be in service to a noble cause, but that didn’t make it better. She might be wrong about all things Hell, but that didn’t make him right.
He had never cared before. What a person didn’t know wouldn’t hurt them, and all that jazz.
But never had the person in question been someone he loved. The first person outside his family he’d ever loved.
“I hate that,” Varina said, her tone soft.
Campbell jerked. “What?”
“That look you’re giving me. Like you feel sorry for me.” She squeezed his cock once as though to ground him, then again when she saw she had his attention. “Whatever I did was my decision.”
Campbell nodded and tried for a smile, but it didn’t feel convincing. He assumed it didn’t look it, either.
“I mean it,” Varina continued. “Sex has never been worth much to me, but I knew it was worth something to others.” She paused, her gaze falling again to his cock—which was not bothered at all by Campbell’s guilt or the conversation. It remained hard and eager in her hand, his foreskin wrapping around his cockhead with every upstroke before she drew it back again. “But it’s never been for me. This, with you, is the first time it’s ever has.”
Her perfect, pink tongue peeked between her lips just then, and Campbell inhaled so hard his chest ached. Again, the guilt broke and scattered, overshadowed by the need of the moment. By the sight of her head descending, watching his crown disappear into the warm haven that was her mouth. He hissed and tunneled his fingers through her hair, his hips rising off the mattress. He watched more of his shaft disappear, watched her take him in deeper, and for a wild moment he thought he might spill before she even got started.
Varina pulled back until her lips were around just his tip. Then she licked him and swallowed him again. Deeper this time, her head descending and her tongue scaling the underside of his cock. Campbell tensed, willing himself not to thrust himself deeper, not to fist her hair and hold her where she was. Not to fuck her face with wild abandon. He was so accustomed to being in charge of his own pleasure, taking what he wanted as he wan
ted it, setting the pace with his lovers and helping them keep up. But that had been before, and the world was a different place now. He wanted Varina to explore him on her terms. He wanted this—everything—to be hers.
He wanted to give her whatever he could. In absence of anything else, he gave her control.
Not that it was a huge sacrifice on his part at the moment, with her lips working up and down his dick, one hand tight around what she couldn’t take into her mouth, her other cupping the weight of his testicles. She explored him in an exchange of long, languid sucks and short, intense strokes. She released him to trail her tongue over his cock’s more prominent veins, then took him in deep enough that he brushed the back of her throat. From the way she moved, she had been with uncircumcised men before—she naturally seemed to know what he wanted, what felt good. How rolling his foreskin around his head and back again added friction. When to add pressure, how to read his body’s cues, take him to the edge and scale back again.
His skin felt fevered. His legs started trembling under her touch. His balls tightened and blisters of hot pleasure began prickling their way through his body. Campbell kept his gaze on her, riveted by the sight of his cock, slick with her saliva, disappearing between her lips again and again. He’d always found the visual almost as stimulating as the experience—the brain and body interconnected to push him toward that final threshold. But there was something about now that was thoroughly singular in ways with which all past experiences couldn’t compete.
It wasn’t until Varina’s green eyes locked with his that it struck him.
Campbell had known last night that he was in love with her. He’d known it as they made love against the wall downstairs too. And as his tongue had played with her clit in the shower. He’d known it, but it hadn’t occurred to him how thoroughly awesome that was. How it felt to be worshiped by someone he loved. To see the need in her eyes that echoed within his body—the need to make the other person feel pleasure. The need to be the person giving it.
Deliverance from Sin: A Demonic Paranormal Romance (Sinners & Saints Book 5) Page 21
