Lucifer didn’t seem to notice the pain as she cleaned his arm and began to head towards his chest. If he did feel anything, he didn’t show it. His gaze drifted to her when she had finished his shoulder and started on his pectorals, burning her with its intensity. She kept her eyes on her work, but it didn’t stop the blush from scalding her cheeks when she thought about how he had kissed her.
How it had made her feel.
Fired up.
Hungry for more.
She wanted him, and even though she wasn’t sure it was wise to sleep with him, she felt powerless to resist his pull and the lure of surrendering to her attraction to him. For the first time in years, she wanted to ignore the sensible part of herself and embrace the impulsive one.
She wanted to risk being hurt again.
Because something told her that Lucifer might be worth that risk.
She glanced up to find his gaze on her lips, dark with hunger that echoed within her. It took all of her willpower to force herself to continue and focus on cleaning him and then the task of binding his wounds. He was in no fit state for the things he was thinking about.
Things she couldn’t stop thinking about too, imagining them locked in each other’s arms, tangled in a passionate embrace.
It became harder to resist acting out those thoughts when she reached his stomach. She needed a moment to rein in her desires. Her gaze strayed to the hard compact muscles of his abdomen and heat pooled in her belly, drifted lower to the apex of her thighs. Lucifer muttered something, his voice dark magic as he leaned towards her.
She turned her cheek, her eyes fixing on the dirty water in the sink, but it didn’t stop him. It only made it worse for her. Her eyes rolled closed as he kissed her jaw and then her neck, his lips trailing fire down it, sending shiver after shiver cascading down her spine. A moan slipped from her lips and she bit her tongue, trying to contain the groan of pleasure.
Lucifer’s hands caught her waist.
Nina drew in a deep breath and somehow managed to press her hands to his chest and push him back.
His wounded look cut her to her heart and she glanced down at the chiselled muscles of his chest before finding the strength to lift her eyes back to his.
“I need to get these wounds clean. What if they get infected?” She busied herself with draining the dirty water from the sink, rinsing the bowl, and filling it again.
Lucifer stared at her the entire time, his silence making the air around her too thick to breathe. She wanted him too, he had to know that, but she couldn’t rush into this. She needed to give him time to heal. It wasn’t as if she was going anywhere.
Her eyebrows shot up.
When had she stopped thinking about leaving?
It was all she had wanted for the entire time she had been locked in the fortress, was all she had thought about, born of a desire to protect Lucifer from whatever her ex-husband might have planned for him.
But now the thought of leaving hurt her.
Her eyes slowly lifted to Lucifer’s face.
The thought of leaving him pained her.
His eyes narrowed and dropped to her lips, and she couldn’t resist him as he pulled her into his arms and claimed her mouth again. She surrendered to him this time, allowing him to tug her against his chest as his lips dominated her, filling her with heat and hunger that burned so fiercely she feared they would consume her.
When he tugged her even closer, banding his arms around her and crushing her to his chest, forcing her to tip her head back to keep their mouths together, he grunted.
The sharp sound of pain leaving his lips drove awareness back into her mind, pushing it through the haze of desire like a spear of light.
Nina sighed and didn’t have to push him back this time. He set her away from him and glared down at his chest, as if his injuries were more of an inconvenience than anything else.
“We should finish patching you up,” she whispered, and was that her voice sounding so breathless and needy?
Her fingers trailed over his chest, following the line of the nastiest cut that dashed over his pectoral and the first pair of abdominal muscles. Heck, he was perfect. She had never seen a body like his, had never looked at a man and felt this level of need purely from gazing at him.
She wanted to give in to that need, but that logical part of her mind was screaming at her again, demanding she place his welfare above her desire to get him naked.
Dark golden eyes lifted to meet hers, the wide abysses of his pupils speaking to her of his need. A need that clearly matched her own.
She had to force herself to look away and focus on her task again. The sponge floated in the clean water, calling her back to her duty. She had started taking care of him and she was determined to finish it, no matter how easily he could sway her into neglecting it again. No matter how many times she had to stop him, she would keep finding the strength to do it.
Nina picked up the sponge, squeezed it out and stared at it, awareness of what came next dawning on her.
She had to keep cleaning his stomach.
She wasn’t sure she could do it without her need to kiss him overpowering her again.
Not on the mouth this time.
She wanted to trail her lips down the taut ridges of his stomach, swirl her tongue around the sensual dip of his navel, and follow that treasure trail of dark hair that led down into the waistband of his black trousers.
Nina coughed to clear her throat, shoved that thought out of her head before it did wreck her fragile control, and set to work on cleaning his other arm. She would build back up to his stomach. Arm first. Then his back. And finally the delicious and tempting ropes of his stomach.
She carefully cleaned his arm, trying to ignore the heat of his gaze as he watched her work. When she had finished moving down from his shoulder to his hand, she paused with her fingers supporting his and stared at his black nails. They looked natural. She rubbed her thumb over them, taking in their perfection.
Lucifer drew his hand away from her and lowered it to his side, and she sensed that if she tried to look at his nails again, he would resort to hiding his hands behind his back as he had before.
Why?
She had been astonished by them when she had first noticed them, but now she was merely curious. She was curious about a lot of things regarding the man stood before her, silently watching her, his chest rising and falling at a steady pace.
That curiosity only grew as she stepped around him and caught sight of his back.
Her eyes darted over the multitude of long silvery streaks on his back and the two thick ridges of scar tissue that ran vertically down his shoulder blades in line with his spine, each around twelve inches long
“Good God, what happened to you?” she whispered.
Lucifer snarled at her.
Really snarled.
Like an animal.
She lifted her head and caught a flash of him in the mirror before he shifted his face away from her.
Her mouth turned dry.
She hadn’t slept in hours. That was the only reason she had seen red eyes in that mirror. She was imagining things now. He couldn’t possibly have red eyes.
He whirled to face her, his eyes closed and head tilted downwards, and barked out, “I can wash my own damned back.”
Nina flinched away from him and then rallied, setting her jaw and glaring at him. Someone had done something terrible to him, had put him through living Hell by the looks of his back, but that was no reason for him to snap at her. She sighed as the part of her that cared for him, that felt they were kindred spirits, whispered that she would have lashed out too if the scars she carried on her heart were visible on her skin and he had seen them. She knew he felt more vulnerable than ever, and she needed him to know that she wasn’t going to take advantage of that. She wouldn’t judge him or probe into what had happened to him.
She wouldn’t push him.
She would take care of him, would tend to him until he realised
that she didn’t think those marks on his back made him weak.
They made him a survivor, like her.
They made him strong.
“I’ll wash it for you, Lucifer. I won’t ask any more questions about it or you. It just took me by surprise.” Because the rest of him was perfect. Not a scar marring his pale skin.
Someone had gone to war on his back though.
She glanced in the mirror, drawn to looking at it, filled with a pressing need to see the worst of the two scars again—the ones that formed matching lines over his shoulders.
When he didn’t move, she whispered, “Lucifer?”
The muscles in his jaw popped, his lips compressing into a thin line, and his nose wrinkled with his frown. Her eyes flitted over his face and then down to his hands as he clenched his fists and his arms trembled at his sides. Whatever he was thinking, she wanted him to stop, because it was clearly hurting him.
Was he remembering what had happened to him?
Her heart kicked in her chest at the thought he might be.
“Lucifer,” she softly murmured, set the sponge down on the black vanity unit and cupped both of his cheeks. She tilted his head up. “Look at me, Lucifer.”
His eyes slowly opened and hers widened.
A corona of red edged his golden irises.
“I won’t ask. I promise. I just want to take care of you.”
He swallowed hard and looked away from her, off to his right and the open door there. A bolt of fear shot through her, panic that he might leave. She held his cheeks more firmly, hoping to bring him back to her, because she didn’t want him to walk out of that door.
She didn’t want to be left alone, wondering what he was doing, knowing that he would be feeling lonely too.
“Please, Lucifer. Let me take care of you.”
His eyes shifted back to meet hers and the red was gone, but she knew she hadn’t imagined it. There was something about this man, something incredible. Unique. Powerful. During the time he had been away from her, she had thought about everything he had done for her and revealed to her. She had thought him some sort of mage.
Now she felt certain he was more than that.
She just didn’t know what.
But she wanted to know.
If she asked, would he tell her?
The soft imploring edge to his steady gaze asked her to hold true to what she had said and not question him. She would do that for him, but she couldn’t promise that she would be able to hold her tongue forever.
She needed to know more about him.
Because she was falling in love with him.
CHAPTER 10
Lucifer stared down into Nina’s eyes, a rush of emotions threatening to sweep him away and wash away some of the darkness in his heart at the same time. They poured through him, too strong for him to handle even as he braced himself and tried to master them. No matter what he did, they refused to fade while he was looking into Nina’s soft gaze, seeing a wealth of warmth and tenderness in her eyes that he didn’t deserve.
If she knew how he came to have the scars on his back, would she look at him with so much compassion in her eyes?
He wasn’t a fool, and he wouldn’t allow his emerging emotions to make him one. He knew that he had done unforgivable things.
Did unforgivable things.
No mortal could comprehend what he was, who he was, and the things that he did as part of his duty. Nina would never understand the path he had trod, sometimes because of blind faith and sometimes by his own choosing. She would never understand him, no matter how much he desired that.
Her peridot eyes shifted slightly, veering right towards his shoulder, and he could easily read her desire to see his back again.
He had kept it hidden for centuries.
None of his men had ever seen it.
None of his lovers.
He had never been naked before anyone.
He had been careful to make sure it never happened, always remaining in his opened shirt and trousers whenever he took a lover.
He had thought he had done it to keep them from seeing the evidence of his sins, the marks that fuelled him and kept him walking the dark path towards vengeance. He had thought he had done it to keep things simple, to stop whoever he was fucking from opening their mouths to ask about the scars.
He had thought wrong.
He turned his cheek to Nina but she refused to surrender, keeping her palms against his face, her warm touch giving him a sliver of comfort that countered the crushing weight of pain as he realised the real reason he had been careful to hide the scars from everyone.
He was ashamed of them.
They were a living reminder of the sins he had committed, the suffering he had caused and had endured. They were a reminder of the atrocities that had befallen him at the hands of demons.
They weren’t a sign of strength.
They were a reminder of weakness.
And they made him feel that weakness right down to his soul.
They made him feel vulnerable.
And he hated it.
He curled his fingers back into fists at his sides, unable to bring himself to look at Nina or answer her plea. He wasn’t sure how to process what she had said or what she was asking of him.
He wasn’t sure he could ever allow someone to take care of him.
He was vile.
As wretched as they came.
He had faltered on the path he had vowed to walk, a path that may have led to his redemption if only he had been strong enough to keep inching forwards up the impossible incline rather than taking one of the many paths that seemed to have run downhill.
One of the many easy routes.
He hadn’t been strong enough.
He was weak.
He had been tested, put through trial after trial, and he had failed.
Lucifer closed his eyes and swallowed hard, the pain in his heart making it impossible to breathe as he thought about how differently things might have been. The possibility that he might have been able to redeem himself and return to Heaven still haunted him. It never relented. It was forever there in the back of his mind, deep in his heart, burning in his blackened soul.
His knees gave out and hit the black tiles hard, his breath leaving him in a rush. He didn’t feel the pain of his bones striking the floor. He couldn’t feel anything over the agony tearing his heart to pieces and devouring his soul.
“Lucifer.” Her voice was light in the darkness.
Warmth in the cold.
It curled around him and he foolishly clung to it as he shook, his strength flooding from him. Pathetic. He barked a mirthless laugh, one of self-reproach. Where was the proud King of Hell now?
Where was the male who had vowed to make everyone pay for what had happened to him, who had sat on his throne and ordered the deaths of thousands, who tormented and destroyed the souls of the sinful?
He pressed his left hand to his chest and clawed at it, feeling as if his own soul was the one being destroyed now.
He snarled an oath in the demon tongue, cursing the feelings that Erin had reawakened and Nina had restored to full strength.
He couldn’t live with this heaviness on his chest, this crushing pressure of feeling the weight of his sins again.
“Lucifer?” Nina’s soft fingers danced across his cheeks, her voice offering him comfort that made him want to reach out and pull her into his arms, to forget his pain by losing himself in her.
One hand lowered, coming to rest over the one he held pressed against his chest. Her fingers slipped between it and his body, stroking across his palm, and he stilled as she drew his hand towards her.
“Don’t hurt yourself, Lucifer.” The sound of his name softly falling from her lips only made the ache in his heart worsen.
Hell, he wanted to drown in her.
He slowly lifted his head and opened his eyes, stared at her where she knelt in front of him, a slight smile curving her shell-pink lips and her eyebro
ws furrowed, filling her tender gaze with concern.
Concern for him.
He’d had countless women, had used the power of his voice to sway them into looking at him with desire if they feared him or had accepted their natural attraction to him and used it to get what he had wanted from them, but he had never met a woman like Nina.
He had never found a female who looked at him with a mixture of passion and tenderness.
A combination he was coming to crave seeing in her steady gaze.
He had hidden himself from everyone, had shielded himself behind a façade to stop the world from seeing him for what he truly was, because he had feared they wouldn’t understand.
Nina had seen beyond the veil though. He had shown her things that had tested her and she had accepted them, and he wanted to believe that if she saw the darkest part of him that she would understand and accept that too.
Even when he knew she wouldn’t.
And that would crush him.
He bared his short fangs at that thought and shoved back against the feelings invading him.
Emotions were a weakness, one he had worked to eradicate for a reason. He tore his gaze away from her and ground his teeth as he fought to master his own mind, heart and body. He had no use for emotions. They were only a source of pain and suffering. He had shed them and they were no longer welcome. They weren’t needed. He would purge them again. He would remove Nina from his sight, from his castle, and then he would return to the male he was now.
The master of the realm he had created.
The King of Hell.
The soft brush of her fingers across his right cheek undid him, his strength unravelling before he could fully gather it to shield himself against her. He couldn’t stop himself from seeking her gaze.
He couldn’t stop himself from leaning into her tender caress and stealing more from her.
He needed more.
He needed all of her.
He shot his hands out and snagged her waist, dragging her against him and drinking her gasp in a kiss as he crushed her lips with his. She responded instantly, her mouth opening for him and her tongue coming to brush his lips.
Dark and Damaged: Eight Tortured Heroes of Paranormal Romance: Paranormal Romance Boxed Set Page 53
