Torrid

by Nikki Sloane

  On Saturday, he made me eat something. Whitney was beside herself and had prepared a dozen dishes, wanting to offer comfort any way she could. I ate like a zombie and returned to bed.

  My family was gone, as was the house. I had nothing left in the world.

  Nothing except for Luka.

  “You need to go back to class,” he said finally one night, “after the funeral. Some people will say it’s too soon, but they don’t know you. You need the normalcy. You need to focus on your goal.”

  “Okay,” I said, devoid of feeling.

  Luka pressed his lips together and struggled to hide the worry from his face. I was cold all the time now. Not even Luka’s heat could melt through the ice that surrounded me.

  He sat beside me at the funeral visitation and forced me to do what I was supposed to.

  “You’re not the only one grieving,” he’d told me softly. “It’s important to go through the motions for other people, to offer them comfort as well. You’re strong, Addison. You can do this.”

  “Is that what Vasilije said?” I asked. I’d come into the kitchen last night to see the brothers talking over beers, and had interrupted Luka asking his brother for advice.

  Luka frowned. “We weren’t talking behind your back. I’m shitty at dealing with people. He’s not, so I wanted his help, and Vasilije’s concerned about you.”

  I gave a humorless laugh. “Right.”

  “He knows what it’s like to lose a parent, doesn’t he?” Luka’s gaze softened. “We get what you’re dealing with.”

  “A parent, not an entire family. And you can’t,” I said. “Even I don’t know what I’m dealing with. It’s all just . . . cold.”

  I stared at Jonathon’s friends bawling at his casket, and wondered if I’d ever feel warm again.

  The day of the funeral was tedious. My bones hurt as I suffered through the service, and rode in absolute silence beside Luka in the back of the limo, trailing three hearses. When I stood at the gravesites, I got angry.

  This was unfair. It was so fucking unfair I could hardly stand still. My grip on Luka’s hand was ferocious, and I gnashed my teeth together. What had I done to deserve this? What the fuck had my family done?

  I wanted to break something. I needed to hurl everything to the ground, to tear out my hair, and to lose myself completely in the madness. Better to feel rage than nothing at all.

  Luka set me in the back seat of the limo and recognized the change in my demeanor. He waited until we were in motion before speaking. “Are you angry?”

  “Yes.”

  “With me?”

  “No.”

  “You should be.” He stared at me like I was missing the obvious. “This is all my fault, Addison. None of this would have happened if it wasn’t for me. I brought that down on your family, and you’ll never know how fucking sorry I am about it.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “My father is convinced this was the Russians. They figured out who you were, or followed me when I took you home for the break.”

  “Why?”

  “We’re not sure. He’s still working on it.”

  I stared at him in his crisp black suit, and hated the guilty expression on his handsome face. The hate was a feeling I could respond to. I’d gone so long without any emotion other than sadness, it felt new and exciting.

  So I leaned over and slapped my palm across his face, punctuating the silence with the crack of skin smacking skin. It felt good. A needed release. Luka’s cheek flamed pink, but otherwise he had no reaction.

  It only fed my anger. He should have been livid. Last time I’d slapped him, he’d threatened to destroy my hand, but now he just sat there with his gaze fixed forward. So I did it again. This time I hit him so hard my palm stung, and the force of it turned his head to the side.

  But otherwise he was unfazed. He took my outburst without a word.

  “Goddamnit, Luka. Stop me. Get mad. Fucking do something.”

  I reared back to strike again, but this time he caught my wrist. “You think I don’t deserve this? We just put your whole fucking family in the ground. That was my fault. Everything that’s happened to you, all the shit I put you through . . . I destroyed your life.”

  He had, there was no denying it, but how the fuck was I supposed to reconcile the fact that I still loved him? He’d taken everything from me, but he’d also become my everything.

  His grip fell away from my wrist and he looked prepared to receive further punishment, but I didn’t want to punish him. If it was true the Russians were responsible for the fire that took my family, Luka wasn’t responsible. He didn’t want to be a part of the Markovics’ dark world.

  “Their death is not your fault,” I said, my statement burning in my throat. “It’s your father’s.”

  Luka’s head slowly turned my direction, and there was understanding in his eyes, perhaps even relief that I didn’t completely blame him. But I needed to feel the burn of anger, to soak in the heat of my rage, so I could finally feel warm again.

  I grabbed him roughly and slammed my lips over his, shoving my tongue in his mouth and catching him unprepared. He tried to slow the kiss down, but I wouldn’t have it. Already tiny flames flickered in my body, and made me thirsty for more. We hadn’t truly been together since I’d left him at the mansion, and the pent up lust mixed with my depression, creating a dangerous storm.

  He issued a sound of discomfort when I bit down hard on his bottom lip. I wanted to draw blood and goad him to match my anger.

  “Addison,” he said like a warning.

  I ignored. I hiked my black dress up and climbed on him, straddling his lap. I clenched fistfuls of his hair, tugged his head to the side, and sank my teeth into his neck. Once more he groaned, unhappy.

  His hands seized my arms. “Addison.”

  There was one trick left to try. I wrapped my hands around his throat and squeezed as hard as I could. I didn’t possess enough strength to overpower him, but the dominance snapped his control. His eyes flared with darkness as he ripped my hands away. “What are you doing?”

  “Fuck me,” I said. “Be brutal.”

  His expression was pure shock. “What? No.”

  “Yes. I have to feel something else other than this numbness. I need it,” I said, my voice shaking, “and you owe me.”

  “Jesus fucking Christ.” He shook his head. But as he stared at me, he could tell I was serious. Luka could read what I was feeling, and see how desperately I wanted it. He glanced around the back seat of the limo. “What, right now?”

  He liked to be in charge, so I had to push. “Don’t make me wait another second.”

  Luka clamped his hands on my waist and moved us together, throwing me onto my back on the bench seat. The force was so great when I slammed into it, my head bounced against the upholstery and it knocked the air from my lungs.

  Even though it was mid-afternoon, the tinted windows made the interior dim, and his intense eyes glittered in the low light. “You want it rough?”

  “Yes,” I hissed. Once more I sank my teeth into his flesh, biting him just beneath his jaw. I dove my hands inside his suit jacket, sliding them between the silk lining and his dress shirt. “I shouldn’t have to repeat myself.”

  He drew back so I could stare up at him. His face was hard, all vicious lines and aggressive eyes. Was I pushing him too far? I was reckless and wild.

  Luka rose up on his knees and latched one hand on the back of the seat to steady himself as the limo eased through a turn. His other hand tangled up under my skirt and jerked my panties down while I raised my hips to allow it. He pulled so hard, the fabric dragged painfully across my skin. I kicked it the rest of the way, and he threw them to the floor.

  Lust mixed with danger, and hung thick in the back of the vehicle. When he leaned down, I grabbed the collar of his jacket and peeled it off of him, desire and anticipation making me clumsy. The ache for him was a thousand knives stabbing me. I couldn’t th
ink over it.

  He let me work his jacket off, but that was it. When I reached for his belt with both hands, he grabbed them and pinned them above my head, holding them against the cool glass of the window. He’d done it so his other hand could shove my legs apart and two fingers pushed so deep inside me, I gasped with a hint of pain.

  “You want this?” His tone demanded an answer. Luka never asked permission before.

  Warmth flowed from his hand, burning up my core and snaking out through my veins. I squirmed on his fingers and bucked my hips. “Yes,” I babbled. “Yes, yes. I need it.”

  I needed him to do bad things to me. Make me deserve what had happened.

  When he worked a third finger inside, I cried out, but the discomfort was welcomed. The fire crackled and burned hotter, warming the empty void I’d become.

  “Quiet,” he hissed. Maybe he was worried the limo driver would hear me. Luka’s gaze focused in and his expression was vicious. He was exactly how I wanted him to be. His fingers pumped in and out, and I grew slicker with each thrust, showing him how much I liked it, even if my moans sounded otherwise.

  He had to release me to undo his pants, and I used the opportunity to launch my own attack. I slapped him again, surprising him with the action, and snarled it out. “Hurry up.”

  His eyebrow went through the ceiling and anger swelled in his eyes. As soon as he had his pants shoved down over his hips and his cock out, his palm sealed over my lips. His other hand rubbed my clit in hurried strokes, taking me close to the edge, only for his fingers to come down hard in a strike directly across my aching center. The slap of his hand against my damp skin was a loud snap.

  I cried out against his hand, and stared at him wide-eyed. He was a beautiful demon, made just for me. I scratched my nails down his neck, leaving bright pink track marks in my wake. Marking him as mine. The hand on my mouth shifted, so he could clench it around my neck, tight as a vise, collaring me beneath his warm fingers.

  “You know what you do to me?” he growled. “You make me so fucking hard.”

  He stabbed himself between my legs, taking me in one enormous thrust and impaling me on his cock. The sensation of him inside me tore my mind from my body, and I went wild. I thrashed against him like a rabid animal, all teeth and claws. It felt amazing. For the first time in a week, I was alive. Filled with hunger and need, instead of endless sadness.

  Luka fucked me like a savage. He grunted with his merciless thrusts, pounding into me, and I moaned, although it was choked off. His grip was intense and pressed hard against the pulse banging in my neck. He drove down into me, pushing me into the seat where a seatbelt dug into my back, but I didn’t give a fuck. The fire consuming us was too powerful to fight, so instead I locked my ankles behind his back and held him to me.

  Luka kept me right on the edge of orgasm, not allowing me to go over, so in frustration I reached down and touched myself. If he wouldn’t get me there, I would. When he realized what I was doing, he looked scary. My hand was shoved away, and he tapped me hard on the face. Just with the ends of his fingertips, but enough to make my breath halt in my lungs.

  “Whose pussy is this?” he demanded. “You’ll come when I say so.”

  His soft, corrective slap had shocked me, but I loved it. I was going to explode. “Please,” I rasped. “Fuck, Luka. Please.”

  “I’ll never let you go again,” he said between enormous pants for air. “We belong together. Repeat it.”

  “We belong together,” I agreed.

  “Because I own you.” His lips pressed to mine. We’d gone at it like people on the brink of insanity, and when we reached the top of the precipice, he flung us over with a final push. “And you own me.”

  Pleasure detonated. I screamed as I came, making the limo driver slam on the brakes, sending us tumbling, but Luka held on. He braced an arm on the floor to stop us, and as the powerful orgasm swept through me, he began to reach his end, too.

  “I love you,” I whispered through his loud moans, and gripped him ferociously as he shuddered and pulsed inside me.

  “Fuck, I love you,” he said, when he seemed to have regained the ability to speak. He lifted his head and smoothed a hand over my cheek. “Are you all right?”

  The limo had stopped moving, and we could hear the driver getting out, probably preparing to check on me. Was I all right? “No,” I said lightly, stroking a hand over Luka’s thick hair. “Not yet, but I will be.”

  He stared into my eyes, and I knew he understood exactly how I meant it.

  27

  I WENT BACK TO SCHOOL the following week as Luka had asked me to, and he’d been right. The normalcy helped to combat the unfamiliar life I’d been thrust into. I spent my days in class trying to catch up, and at night he helped distract me during the difficult first few weeks.

  There were setbacks.

  One night, the realization that my great-grandmother’s crystal bowl had been destroyed had sent me into a deep depression. The only photos I had of my family were what I’d saved in my phone or online, so Luka reached out to my extended family and Jonathon’s school to try to get me copies of everything possible.

  And there were days when I had to remind myself they were really gone. Jonathon wouldn’t graduate from high school. My parents wouldn’t be there to see me walk across a stage and receive my college degree. Sometimes the pain was so acute I couldn’t breathe, and I begged Luka to give me a different type of pain.

  Which he did.

  Other days, I coped. I survived by leaning on him. He arranged for a team to shift through the wreckage of my house and bring us whatever might be of value to me, sentimental or otherwise.

  It was an early Saturday morning when a knock on our bedroom door roused Luka and me awake.

  “Addison,” Vasilije said.

  I glanced at Luka with sleepy eyes. Vasilije and I hadn’t said much toward each other since I returned to the house. He’d given me a sincere apology about the incident before I’d left, and then a heartfelt condolence, but most of the time I didn’t see him. He was hardly ever home. So why was he asking for me and not his brother?

  “Yes?”

  “Can you come downstairs?” His voice was loud so I could hear through the door. “My father needs a word.”

  It was barely light outside, and his father was here? I froze as panic pumped through my veins. Luka’s expression mirrored my suspicion, and we both climbed out of bed, pulling on clothes. “Yeah, just a second.”

  We trailed behind Vasilije down the stairs to the first floor, but he kept moving. It wasn’t until he reached for the basement door that Luka’s warm hand wrapped around my arm and jerked me to a stop.

  “Wait a minute, what’s going on?” His voice was uncharacteristically tight. Luka was nervous?

  Vasilije’s expression was stoic. “Dad’s downstairs.”

  “No. We’re not going down there.”

  His brother’s eyebrow rose. “Dad didn’t say shit about you. He needs to talk to her.”

  “No,” Luka repeated, firm. He glared at his younger brother.

  Vasilije’s face soured. “Jesus, calm down. I promise, he just wants to talk to her. And he wasn’t asking Addison to come down, he’s telling her.”

  I’d never had a reason to go into the basement. It was unfinished storage, or so I’d been told, and I worried about discovering something down there I didn’t want to find. Luka’s tension confirmed my suspicion. Whatever was downstairs was related to the Markovics’ true business. But I needed to know, didn’t I? I nodded, signaling I’d go.

  Luka seemed unsettled as he turned the doorknob and motioned for Vasilije to lead the way. He filed down the stairs next, taking my hand in his, so he could enter the basement first.

  The stairs were bare wood, and the stone colored walls and poor lighting made the stairwell feel like a cave. It wasn’t much better when we reached the bottom. It was windowless. Pipes snaked overhead and the cement floor sloped gently toward a drain at the c
enter of the room.

  I could smell the metallic scent of blood before I spotted it.

  Dimitrije Markovic stood in slacks and a white dress shirt with the sleeves haphazardly rolled back, and red spots dotted his bare forearms and shirt front. The blood came from the crumpled heap of a man lying on the floor. Nearby, a bloody metal baseball bat leaned upright against the wall.

  My grip on Luka tightened as my body went on red alert. Had Dimitrije brought me down here to help this man, knowing I wanted to become a doctor? His gaze spotted me beside Luka, and in contrast to the first time I’d seen him, Luka’s father seemed pleased to see me beside his son.

  The man on the floor groaned with agony, and Dimitrije glanced down. Disgust swept over his face. “Maybe I should burn you alive, like you did to this poor girl’s family.”

  My knees threatened to give out.

  Holy shit, was what Dimitrije said true? Was the man lying at his feet responsible for the fire? The police hadn’t found the source of ignition or any evidence, but ruled the fire as starting under suspicious circumstances. I’d had to lie when they’d questioned me, asking if I knew of anyone that could have been involved, and it was the only time Luka hadn’t been by my side when dealing with my family’s death.

  “What you don’t realize,” Dimitrije said, continuing to talk to the puddle of flesh moaning on the ground, “is this girl is my son’s.” His powerful tone was absolute. “It makes her part of my family, and I put my family above anything else. You’ve started a fucking war.”

  The man rolled onto his back and gazed up at the ceiling while he tried to pull his puffy, mangled face into a grotesque smile. “Good,” he croaked. He laughed, but it was cut short when he coughed and a mouthful of blood erupted from him.

  “Ivan?” Luka asked. His gaze swung from the man up to find his father, who confirmed it with a grim nod. “Why?”