Page 7

Bella

He’s keeping a lot locked away. Bad things that he’s done since we saw each other last. Maybe even hurt over the way we ended things. I saw him lock it up even tighter during lunch, saw it in his eyes and on his face. Understood that he didn’t want to talk about any of it anymore.

He unlocked something else though. Something sweeter.

His hand gently brushing a strand of hair off my face so it wouldn’t get dunked in my food.

His arm resting lightly across my shoulders as I led us back to my apartment.

A genuine, booming laugh as I told him a few of the funnier stories of my last ten years.

Like the time I gave a British guy a tattoo of an ass when he actually wanted a donkey .

“Talk about a glitch in communication,” he says, chuckling again. “What did you do?”

“The guy went berserk, so I spent the whole night fixing the tattoo and turning it into a donkey,” I say. “It turned out to be one of my better tats, if I do say so myself.”

“Well, you’re the best person to know.”

“The guy agreed, thankfully.”

I don’t know if he’s making fun of me or genuinely agreeing with me. But I was never sure with him. I doubt anyone is. He’s got this quiet form of sarcasm, irony some would call it, and it goes straight over my head most of the time.

We’re sitting on the lumpy, wine-red sofa in my living room, the sky outside a dusky purple laced with grey and dark blue.

I made us sweet mint tea and the room is filled with its aroma.

It reminds me of summer and long, lazy afternoons spent at his mom’s house in Angelino Heights.

The house was old, and everything creaked if you so much as sneezed, but it was still the coziest and most peaceful place I’ve ever known.

His mom was nice to me too. Until the occasional line of heroin turned into something much worse for me. Then I had to come for visits via the overgrown shrubbery in the back and sneak in through the laundry room window.

“How’s your mom?” I ask.

He shrugs. “Hanging in there.”

“And how does she view your crime fighting life?”

He grins. “You mean because she’s always been so overprotective of me?”

I nod, biting my lip. His parents were a rich white couple who couldn’t have children of their own.

They’d adopted him when they were already in their forties and proceeded to give him everything, wrapping him in cotton wool like nobody’s business.

It didn’t help that his dad had died when Blade was only fourteen.

“She’s accepted that I’m a grown man now who makes his own choices.”

“It went that well, huh?”

“It took awhile, but it’s all good now. She worries, but I try to see her as much as I can.”

“That’s good of you,” I say. “And good that she understands.”

He leans forward and deposits his cup on the coffee table. “I’d ask about yours but I figure it’s not good.”

I shake my head. “Nope. Not good. My dad and my brother Ricardo are dead. And my other brother Matteo won’t speak to me.”

“I’m sorry they’re dead.”

“They disowned me long before that happened. And I’ve long since stopped considering them my family,” I say, as always, wondering if that’s entirely true.

They treated me very badly when I refused to marry the man they picked out for me.

But sometimes I still get lost in the memories of the good times we had as a family.

“And after they almost killed you… I didn’t want to have anything to do with them either. I’m still so sorry about that… ”

“It wasn’t your fault, Bella, like I’ve told you a hundred times already,” he says gently, probably assuming I once again won’t believe him.

“But it was… I knew how things were done in my family, I knew they’d react violently if I started dating you, but I did it anyway…” I say.

He grins. “Because you couldn’t help it. You loved me.”

I smile too. “That’s true.”

He always turns this conversation down this lane every time I bring it up, won’t let me take the blame. But everything I said is true.

He brushes a strand of hair off my forehead. The touch is gentle, but I feel the coiled tension emanating from his muscles. I feel it deep in my core like a magnetic force I can’t fight. I never could fight this pull he has on me, and I never felt the like of it with anyone else.

“All this reconnecting talk is nice and all, but there’s something else I’d rather be doing.”

And I know exactly what he means. I’d rather be doing that thing too, ever since the moment I saw him. And every day of the past ten years.

“So how about it?” he adds and I just nod. My voice would be just a croak if I tried to speak anyway.

He leans forward and touches his lips to mine. It’s a soft touch, but the force of two strong magnets connecting claps through me, making my head spin and taking my breath.

Not that I need to breathe as he deepens the kiss, his tongue invading my mouth with an urgency and a need only he’s ever had for me.

Sparks of pleasure and bliss start coming to life deep inside me, slow to start because they’ve been dead for so long.

But soon, as his tongue plays with mine and the taste of him starts waking memories I’ve buried so deep I might as well call them forgotten, they explode into a raging fire that nothing can stop.

He pulls me into his lap and slides his hands up my back under my shirt, his lips still firmly planted on mine. The years we spent apart are flaking away to reveal the joy we used to feel for each other. The newness of being in love for the first time. The sheer bliss of kissing your soulmate.

But the ugly is coming up too.

I kiss him back. Fiercely, hungrily. Slide my hands over his cheeks and his strong arms and back. Fighting the ugly. Trying to get back to the light. The good. The joy.

He stops kissing me and grins. “How about we take this in the bedroom?”

I stand up and take his hand. “I thought you’d never ask.”

I was almost there. Almost back in the bliss. Now the fire is burning bright, but his eyes are sad again and the fire is giving off no heat. He did ask. Hundreds of times. But I just said no and left. I shouldn’t joke about this. Not yet. The last ten years hold too much pain for both of us.

But at least he’s willing to put it behind us. At least his hand is warm, at least I get to clutch it tight as I drag him towards the bedroom.

I really should’ve tidied up. I haven’t done that in a very long time because I never have visitors and I work all the time. But it doesn’t really matter. His eyes are only seeing me as he lets go of my hand and slides my t-shirt up, the touch of his fingers on my stomach electrifying.

I’m about to feel very good. I know it. And that’s enough. It’s more than enough because I haven’t felt good in so long I’ve forgotten what it was like.

He leans down and kisses my neck, his lips finding that spot no one else has ever found. The one that makes my knees weak as a soft river of pure pleasure traverses my entire body. I can’t believe he remembers so well.

But why wouldn’t he? We know all of each other’s spots.

We found them all together, through hours and hours of experimentation.

At his house. In parks and on beaches. In the backs of buses.

On cliffs and in forests. And in the abandoned warehouse where Rogue, Blade and the rest of them created their first clubhouse. The place where I lost him.

I don’t want to remember that place. Not now that I finally have him back and we can finally get on with our forever. But here it is, front and center in my brain, casting very dark shadows.

“Where did you go?” he asks, his eyes like melted chocolate as he gazes into mine.

I went to the night I lost him. The night my father and brothers beat him up and left him for dead as they dragged me away to force me to marry another guy.

The night I tried to save him, but ended up being abducted by Ghost instead.

The night everything I loved was taken away.

I never want to go there again.

I smile and hug him tight. “I’m right here.”

I run my hands down his clean shaven scalp and the way he moans—almost purrs—into my neck as he kisses me again makes me think I might’ve found yet another special spot. I’ll check again later. For now I need him out of those clothes.

I slide his jacket down. He helps by pulling off his t-shirt. Followed by my jeans. Then his. And finally my bra and panties and his boxers. We’re both in a hurry now. Chasing what we had. Needing it back after all these years.

His chest is wide, his abs are chiseled. He’s fully a man now. None of the boy I fell in love with and left. Not on his body, not on his face and not in his eyes as he watches me watching him.

“You like what you see?” he asks, grinning at me. Just not with his eyes.

“I don’t like the scar,” I answer truthfully, maybe letting too much reality into this moment that’s supposed to be all fantasy and all about hopes and dreams coming true.

The scar splits his stomach down the middle and looks recent and too much like the kind they make during autopsy for my liking.

He takes a step closer, sliding his hands down my sides and around the back, cupping my ass to pull me closer. His rock-hard cock in pressing into my belly and I’m getting a little light-headed with the anticipation of feeling it inside me.

“It’s healed, so it’s fine,” he says. “And I got it doing a good deed.”

He kisses me again before I can speak. Probably for the best. I could always talk too much and ruin things.

His kiss, his touch, his closeness after all these years of thinking I’d lost him forever fill me with pure joy, sweet like the freshest nectar, cool like the first drops of a summer storm, fresh like the breeze blowing in from the ocean, burning like touching flame.

He is the man I have always wanted, will always want.

But this is too much. Too good. It’s all my dreams coming true and it hurts.

I pull away from the kiss, step out of his arms, just need a second for the pain to subside, for the pleasure to win, take away all the bad and leave only the good. Leave only what should always have been.

He cocks his head, looks at me sideways, his dark eyes glowing like only they and gold can. The desire he still has for me is what’s causing that glow, the desire I was sure I’d never see again. And that hurts too. Everything still hurts.

It’s all I can do not to burst into tears before he even asks, “What’s wrong? Too fast?” speaking in that whisper that never failed and still doesn’t in waking a river of sparks just under my skin.

I shrug, not trusting my voice to speak. I haven’t cried in years, definitely not since I’ve been in prison, but right now, I just might.

He steps closer and brushes a lock of hair off my face, the touch familiar and welcome, but so damn painful. Am I going insane? I’ve dreamed of this moment, of our reunion, for so long. And now that it’s here, I’m in pain? What the hell is wrong with me?

He smiles faintly and wraps his arm around my shoulders.

“We can take it as slow as you want,” he says. “Don’t worry.”

“OK,” is all I manage to say before my voice breaks.

“It’s for the best anyway,” he says as he leads me towards my unmade bed. “You’re not a fruit that should be eaten right off the tree. You’re to be savored. Always were.”

I don’t know how I feel about being compared to a fruit, but anything from his lips always sounds like exactly what I need to hear and what I always wanted to hear.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” I finally manage to whisper once I’m lying in his arms, under the soft covers of my bed, imagining I can see stars in the dark depths of his eyes.

“There’s nothing wrong with you,” he says. “You’re perfect.”

“We both know that’s a big lie,” I whisper.

He turns so we’re face to face and stares very deeply into my eyes, so deeply I feel like I’m falling through the vastness of his.

“It’s the truth,” he says. “At least for me. It always was. Getting shot and nearly dying put everything in a very different perspective for me. And even with all the shit we’ve been through, together and apart, that’s still true. You’re perfect for me.”

“And you’re perfect for me,” I whisper, tears now rolling freely down my cheeks, but my voice is clear. “I’m so glad you came back for me.”

“I should’ve done it a long time ago,” he says, then leans in and kisses me.

The pain is gone as his lips touch mine, replaced by the sweet, soft feeling of belonging only he could ever give me.

I will give him everything, all of me and more, just like I should’ve done ten years ago. But first, I will fall asleep in the safety of his arms like I’ve longed to do for so long I’ve forgotten how much I needed it.

And this time, I will not let him go again. I’ll die before I do.