Page 22 of Sinful Desires (Sinful #4)

I dragged my fingertip along the curve of the letters, watching goosebumps bloom across his chest. They rose once. Twice.

“More than once.”

My finger slipped from his collarbone to his throat, dragging along the warm skin where his pulse beat steady and deep. I watched it jump under my touch, fully aware of his eyes on me.

My finger shamelessly slid down his chest, then traced the curve of his arm until it reached his bicep. It twitched beneath my touch, a breath catching quietly in his throat.

I wrapped my hand around his arm, needy and curious. It didn’t even reach halfway. I bit my lip, eyes still locked on the muscle under my fingers, wondering what it would feel like around my neck.

Gosh.

I wanted to slap him. I wanted to beg him. I wanted him to hurt me just enough to feel real again.

“ Jesus , look at you,” I murmured, more to myself than him. “Bet the Navy liked having a monster like you.” Then I looked up at him. “What if they ordered you to kill someone you love?”

“I don’t love anyone.”

I tilted my head. “Not even once?”

A flicker. Barely there. But it was enough.

His throat bobbed like he’d swallowed something bitter. “No one’s worth the risk,” he said.

My hand slipped away. I turned, facing the pool, the moon catching on the glassy surface.

Maybe he was right. Love was the worst kind of gamble. You got a taste of sweetness, sure, but the burn it left behind was always bigger. Hotter. Hungrier .

I stared at the water, the weight of the champagne pressing behind my eyes.

“You ever think,” I said, softer now, the words dragging out of me, “that maybe some things are worth the risk?”

“Was it worth it when Luke Conrad pissed himself dying on your floor?”

The world tilted. Not fast. Not loud. Just a slow, sick shift in the gut, like my soul took a step back before I did.

Luke.

I could feel LeRoy behind me, still. Waiting. Watching. Like he wanted me to break in front of him. Like he needed to see it. Needed to make me feel the rot he already saw in me.

And I did. Because he wasn’t asking me a question. He was dragging the corpse between us and laying it bare.

And the worst part? I didn’t hate him for it.

A soft sob escaped my lips. “I never loved Luke. We weren’t?…?I wasn’t his type .”

But somehow, I still felt like his killer.

“He’s not the only man I’ve killed,” I whispered. The wind caught my hair, tugging it back from my face. “I was on my second world tour. Years before you started working for me. One of those nights I came back from the show, voice raw, legs aching. I showered and collapsed straight into bed.”

My chest tightened. My eyes closed.

“And then I heard it. A sneeze. Loud. Right under me.”

I opened my eyes slowly, my throat thick.

“It wasn’t mine.”

When I turned, LeRoy was right there, so close I nearly walked into his chest. So close I could see the grain of stubble on his jaw. So close I could feel the heat off his skin and smell the faint saltiness of the sweat clinging to him. My brain short-circuited.

He looked every bit the soldier, moving with quiet precision. As if he had been trained to vanish, not walk.

My breath caught. Not because I was scared, but because part of me wanted to lean in. Just to see if he’d catch me?…?or let me fall.

My voice dropped, my hands shaking at my sides.

“There was a lamp on the nightstand. One of those heavy ones. I grabbed it and jumped off the bed. He was crawling out from underneath, but I didn’t wait.

I didn’t ask who he was. I just swung. Hard .

The lamp connected with his temple. He folded in on himself, his head thudding against the floor as blood began to pool beneath it. ”

My voice barely made it out. It felt like it was being squeezed from my throat. “I stood there for a full minute before I moved. Too scared he’d suddenly wake up. But when I got closer?…?when I saw how much blood was leaking into the carpet, I knew. I knew he was gone.”

I didn’t know what I expected him to say. But it wasn’t the slow step forward, the brush of his body against mine.

“Bastard deserved it.”

The air in my lungs rushed out sharply. “You don’t get?—”

“The first men I killed were selling children,” he said. “Thirty-five of them. Trafficked through oil deals and gun routes. Some were sold. Some stolen. I found the ship, took it back, and put the children somewhere safe.”

The wind moved through the night. The silence between us was heavier than sound. I looked at him, really looked, and saw it: the flicker behind his eyes, the thread pulled tight beneath that stillness.

I swallowed hard. “And the men who took them?”

He didn’t answer. Instead, his hand rose slowly, fingers brushing the wet skin beneath my eye. He caught the tear like it was something alive, something fragile, then let his thumb drag lower, skimming the curve of my cheek.

He didn’t stop there. He followed the line down to the edge of my lips, tracing them once, and I swear my knees nearly buckled.

He watched the way I leaned into him. Watched the way my mouth parted. Then his palm cupped my face—rough, warm, possessive.

I let out a soft breath that sounded far too much like a whimper. My eyes fluttered closed as he tilted his head, the tip of his nose brushing mine. His breath kissed my lips and I tasted it.

“They got what they deserved,” he finally said.

I didn’t ask again. His voice said enough about the past he had written in blood.

My hands found his chest, trembling as they spread flat. I felt his heart beating behind them. His other hand glided lower over the small of my back, his fingers curling, dragging me flush against him.

“And what do I deserve, soldier?” I whispered.

His hand slid from my cheek into my hair, gripping hard at the root, tugging just enough to make my legs threaten to fold. He dragged his mouth down my jaw, deliciously filthy, until his tongue found the curve of my throat.

He licked me once, slow and hot, right where my pulse was losing rhythm. His lips parted and he kissed me there—open mouthed, possessive, like he was marking me.

My nails clawed at his shoulders. I couldn’t stop touching him, couldn’t stop needing to be touched back.

He moved to my ear, his voice rough and hungry. “Everything.”

His head tilted back toward mine. I reached for the nape of his neck, fingers curling into the heat of his skin, dragging him down.

Champagne and lust had me swaying, eyes half lidded, starving for him. I wanted everything . His mouth, his hands, his ruin.

The second our lips brushed, I rose on my tiptoes to meet him, my eyes fluttering shut. It wasn’t a kiss, but a threat of one. A ghost of something filthy waiting to happen.

My mouth had just barely touched his when the lights of the living room suddenly flicked on.

My body froze. My breath slipped out shaky and needy.

His hand didn’t leave me, not right away. But his mouth did.

And when I opened my eyes, he was already gone.

Only the heat of him remained along with the ghost of his mouth, still trembling on mine.