Page 114 of X's and O's

I nodded.

“That doesn’t sound pleasurable.”

I winked at her. “Depends where you’re being whipped.”

I continued before I could start thinking of places I’d like to use one on her. She was a goddamn fucking virgin. One who currently hated my guts. I wasn’t going to be spreading her legs with that bar and whipping her sweet pussy anytime soon.

But, of course, now that was all I could think of. Peeling her clothes off. Introducing her to everything in what was clearly a BDSM-themed room.

The air suddenly felt too hot around me. I caught Violet watching me, that delicious blush on her cheeks, and all I could think about doing was stripping herclothes and seeing if that beautiful pink color matched her nipples.

I fought back the urge to groan and mentally told my dick to fuck off. It wasn’t invited to this little party.

“I think I need to get some lunch before I tackle all of this.” She spun on her heel, taking her sweet pink cheeks and cute embarrassment with her.

Fucking hell. I was such an idiot. If I hadn’t been so all up in my head after getting out, so purely consumed by guilt and hate for myself, I could have had her in my arms.

Hell, I could have had her naked in this room, playing with her pleasure, finding out all the things she liked, all the things that turned her on.

But instead, she hated my guts, and I couldn’t blame her. I hated myself too.

“Can I buy you lunch?” I asked stiffly.

“I can pay for myself.”

I knew better than to argue with her. I knew taking a handout from anyone was hard for her. The way she’d grown up, she’d had to fight for everything, and she’d only had herself to depend on.

“Can I eat lunch with you then?”

She shrugged. “It’s a free country, Levi.”

Well, that was better than a no, and probably the best I could hope for, considering. I followed her out onto the street, and she didn’t seem to have any objections to me walking with her. I just wanted to do something nice for her. That was the overwhelming urge I couldn’t shake. I knew she had her roommate-bestie Toby, but other than him, Violet’s letters had always held a sense of loneliness. It was partially why we’d connected.

I knew that same sense of it hung around me like a black cloud.

I might have been back at the club, but things had changed. War and Hawk and Fang were all gone, living with their families and raising kids. Club business still happened, but it was clear to me it wasn’t War’s primary focus like it had been his dad’s. War was a family man through and through. That was obvious in the goofy, sweet way he talked about his kids and the complete and utter obsession he had for Bliss. Hawk was studying to be an EMT and working at the hospital in an honest-to-God nine-to-five. Fang was fixing bikes and running his hoard of kids around to daycares and Little League practices.

The club aspect was still there, but at its heart, it was a family who did the odd business deal. Not the illegal enterprise it had been when I’d gone away.

I had a roof over my head, but I didn’t know where I fit in with them. Or if I did at all.

Violet and I walked through the backstreets surrounding Psychos to the main street that ran through the middle of Saint View. A lot of the shops along the main strip were empty, the windows boarded up by the owners, who couldn’t get tenants in because Saint View was a hole. But there were a handful of businesses that had always done well. The strip club, with its neon sign, though that was closed at this time of the day. The Dead End Diner at the end of the row. And the tattoo shop that Dax ran, which was always busy because Providence was too snooty to have a tattoo place. People came from the surrounding areas and the city to get their tattoo work done, because Dax was the shit.

I slowed my steps as we approached his store,always drawn in by the brightly colored work displayed in the window, even though I’d only been in a couple of weeks earlier and probably nothing had changed.

“Wow,” Violet said quietly from beside me. “These are gorgeous.” She wandered along the window, taking in all the designs.

“The owner is an old friend of mine. He’s good.”

She nodded, her eyes big.

Something Dax had said the last time I’d been here bounced back into my head, and a slow grin pulled across my mouth. Without even thinking about it, I grabbed Violet’s hand. “Come inside. I need to ask Dax something.”

Her gaze darted to my fingers wrapped around her fingers, but she didn’t try to pull away. She just followed me up the steps that led into the tattoo and piercing shop. A little bell jingled over our heads, and Dax leaned around a drawn curtain.

“Reaper. How you doing?” He held up his gloved hands, a tattoo machine gripped in one of them. “I’d shake your hand but I’m kind of in the middle of something.”

His gaze drifted to Violet, and his forehead crinkled. “Have we met?”