Last Second Chance (35 page)

“You’re afraid,” she whispered. “I see it now.”

“No idea what you’re talking about.”

She reached out and touched his face. His plan to push her away disintegrated at her touch. “Of caring. Of hurting. Of causing me pain.”

“Actually I thoroughly enjoy that last part.”

“It won’t work.” Her hands drifted down his body, sparks of desire flaring beneath his flesh everywhere she touched. The way she watched him—as if she were seeing him for the first time—stripped him bare.

“What won’t work?”

“Trying to keep me out. I’m in, Van. I’m all in. You’re it for me.”

“Don’t say that.” He yanked out of her grasp. “You can do so much better. Christ. Go find yourself a doctor or lawyer or some shit. That white knight’s out there somewhere, cowgirl. Hop on your horse and go get him.”

She shook her head, his words seemingly bouncing off her. “People lie, Van. They let you down, they disappear, and when fate decides to be exceptionally cruel, they die. But it’s the truths we hide when we’re alive that hurt us both the most. Don’t pretend you’re doing me a favor by pushing me away. You’re not.”

She reached for him again and he couldn’t make himself deny her. His head dipped to rest on hers.

“For so long, I’ve been so afraid. Maybe for my entire life. I’ve been afraid to feel—afraid to let people in where they can hurt me. But I can’t keep you out. You’re in, Van. And you can break, wreck, and ruin me. I’ll only beg for more.”

“I don’t want that,” he whispered. “I don’t want to hurt you like that. Jesus. I just want to—”

“Protect me?” Her imploring gaze met his once more. “Take care of me? Do what’s best for me? Even if it nearly destroys you in the process?”

He swallowed hard and nodded. “Yeah.”

Her face broke into the most beautiful smile he’d ever seen. On anyone. “That’s more than enough for me.” She threaded her fingers behind his neck.

“Dammit, woman.” He tried to back up, but her hands gripped him tightly. He wanted to grab her and shake her. His brand of love was not good enough for her. He couldn’t begin to imagine why she thought it was.

“Stop resisting me, Mr. Ransom. I’m not going anywhere.”

She fastened her mouth hotly to his, stealing his breath, imprinting her words onto his heart.

He felt it the moment it happened. A piece of her bright, shiny soul slipped away from her, lodging itself onto his black one. Purity among filth. Brilliant blinding light flared behind his eyes.

It was too much, too powerful.

He’d let go of some of his darkness to be worthy, but it would never be enough.

“I’m trying, Stella Jo. Swear to God, I’m trying to be better,” he whispered, dropping to his knees and wrapping his arms around her waist.

Her fingers grazed through his hair. “I know you are.” She dropped to her knees, meeting him. He knew she meant to console him, but it was as if he were already dragging her down with him. Literally.

“I can’t give you happily ever after. I don’t have that in me.” He was giving her an out, giving letting her go one more shot. But when she pulled his face to hers and kissed him eagerly—flicking her tongue against his lips like an addict needing a taste, he couldn’t even muster enough guilt to stop himself from kissing her back.

“You’re the first, Van. The first person who’s ever truly made me feel wanted. Needed. Whole. I want to show you something.”

She stood and he watched, awe-struck as she lifted her shirt over her head. Turning to the side, she revealed to him the words that left him speechless.

The poem, the one he’d recited to her in a moment of intimacy, was inked in beautiful script across her skin. It began beneath her right breast and covered most of her ribcage.

“It reminds me to be strong, like you,” she whispered.

His entire body vibrated with the steadfast determination of his heartbeat.

“I-I’m not strong. I’m weak. God, woman. You make me so damn weak.”

She smiled wickedly as she pulled him to his feet. “Well then, I guess I’ll have to be strong enough for both of us.”

“Any chance you’ll get my name on your ass now? Since you’ve already taken your ink virginity and all.”

Her lips curved into a smirk. “Perhaps. Soon as you get ‘Stella’s’ tattooed on yours.”

He stood and stared down at her. Her beautiful eyes pleaded up at him. The sensual mouth he loved more than words parted, opening for him, needing him. He might as well get it stamped on his fucking forehead. This woman owned him.

“Make love to me, Van. Tonight. All night. Please.”

“No need to beg, cowgirl. I’ve learned telling you no is a feat more challenging than I’m capable of.”

“No safe word,” Stella whispered. “No stopping.”

Lifting her, he carried her to his bed. Where they remained. The sun set at some point. And then it rose again.

They didn’t notice.

A
fter having heard his confession, the tattoo on his back seemed to be calling to her. It was beautiful. But it was also regret, guilt, and the shame he carried with him everywhere.

His angel of darkness.

She didn’t know how to tell him or how he was going to feel about it, but after he’d ravaged her entire body—every inch, every opening—all night long, hiding things from him seemed impossible.

Her parents had caged her in with the cold bars of secrecy. She wouldn’t do that with Van.

“I have to tell you something,” she whispered in his ear. Pressing her naked body against his, she rocked her hips gently until he stirred.

“You’re like a machine,” he groaned, rolling over to face her.

“You love it.”

He grinned, peeking out from underneath a heavily inked arm to look at her. “Yeah I do. So fucking much.”

She kissed him, gently at first. Then more firmly as she rolled him over and climbed onto him.

“Well good morning to you too, cowgirl. Must be bad news, I take it.”

She frowned down at him. “What makes you say that?”

Van moved the curtain of her hair to the side so that he could see her face. “Anything you have to tell me naked while riding my dick is probably not great. But I’ll live. And probably come before I have time to process.”

She bit her lip. “I want us to make a rule.”

“Oh hell.”

“Shush. It’s a good one. I think.”

“Does it include fucking every morning? ’Cause that’s a rule I could learn to live with.”

She smiled and shook her head. “No. It’s an ‘always be honest with each other’ rule. Even if it hurts. Even if it makes the other person break-shit mad.”

“Break-shit mad, huh?”

She nodded.

“You got something to tell me, Stella Jo? I gotta warn you. If it’s that you slept with cowboy Ramirez after I pissed you off the other night, I am probably going to far surpass break-shit mad.”

“Jesse?” Stella’s eyes went wide. “Pretty sure he’s gay, Van.”

Van sat up so they were face to face. The movement rubbed her clit enough to make her moan.

“Nut Huggers is not gay. He might be an off kind of dude, but I can tell you, he’s as straight as I am. And if you went looking, he’d have shown you just how straight he was.”

“Well I didn’t. Go looking, that is.”

“Good girl. So what’s the news?”

Stella sucked in a breath. “There’s so much, Van. So much I want to tell you.”

His eyes searched hers. “You can tell me anything, baby. Anything at all.”

She nodded. “It’s just… My parents kept so many things from me. Growing up I felt so…unwanted.” She let out a humorless laugh. “Turns out I was so wanted that my parents went to some seriously bizarre extremes to have me. When I came to you the other night, I had learned some shocking and painful truths.”

“And I turned you away because I am a fucking worthless—”

“Shh.” She placed a finger against his lips. “That’s not why I brought it up. But I saw what lies and omissions of truth can do to a relationship. To a child. To a family. I won’t do that to us. Not when we’re just getting started. No, not ever.”

He watched her intently, fitting the curves of her backside perfectly into the palms of his hands. “Okay. Well, I’ve been honest. I mean, there’s a lot more I can tell you about the past if you really want to know. But being here has taught me to look forward—to where I want to be instead of where I’ve been.”

“Where do you want to be, Van?”

He squeezed her ass tightly and began to lift her. His eyes drank in every exposed inch of her skin as he moved his cock between them. “Right about—”

“Wait. I have to tell you something first.” Stella leaned back.

Van’s eyebrows shot up. “Say it quick.”

“I heard you. Heard your session with Dr. McLendon. The one about Val and the river. God, Van. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

His body tensed beneath her. She gripped his broad shoulders with both hands. “Van. Look at me, please.”

Violent flares of anger flashed in his eyes like lightning.

She was tossed roughly aside as he moved out from underneath her. Her knees knocked together as he abandoned her on the bed.

“So much for this place having a privacy policy.” His words weren’t particularly harsh but there was plenty of venom in them.

Stella scrambled to the edge of the bed and reached for him. But she was a fraction of a second too late. He moved out of her grasp and turned to glare at her.

“Anything else you want to tell me? Did you run a background check too while you were at it?”

She pushed back her rising panic and shook her head no. “Van, I didn’t mean to. I just…l—”

“You didn’t
mean
to?” His voice rose to a roar. “The recording of my session was forced into your ears somehow?”

Pulling in a trembling breath, Stella search for her old self, for her shield of armor that protected her from feeling. The one he’d stripped away. Because what she was feeling in that moment was afraid—afraid of angering him and afraid of losing him—but mostly afraid of seeing a side of him she wasn’t prepared to handle.

Wrapping her arms around her bare chest, she looked up at him. “No. It wasn’t forced into my ears. But I did hear the beginning by accident and then I couldn’t just cut it off. Just like I can’t just cut this—whatever we are—off. So yes, I listened to something I didn’t have permission to hear. And I’m sorry for that. But I just wanted to—”

The sound of a kitchen chair hitting the wall kept the rest of her words locked in her throat. She didn’t even have time to finish flinching before he let his rage loose.

“You
wanted
to hear it? You want to know what it’s like to see someone you love be destroyed right in front of you? See the light in their eyes go out as they succumb to the voices and the memories and the darkness?”

She felt like that was precisely what she was seeing at that very moment.

“Van, please—”

“She was a fucking kid, Stella. A fucking kid. And they…and I… Then she was gone. You don’t want this. You don’t want this mess, my mess, my messed up shit.”

She felt his pain as if it were being inflicted upon her in that moment. The ache of loss and guilt settled into her bones as her heart took the brunt of his brutal memories.

Miranda’s words came back to her. If she was going to stand in his corner, there would likely be some bystander injuries. She was relieved to discover she didn’t care. Unless he flung another kitchen chair and it knocked her unconscious, she was going to do whatever it took to soothe him. Just like she knew addiction didn’t have a cure, she knew pain like this couldn’t be loved or fucked away. But maybe it could be eased. Embraced with acceptance and understanding.

“I want you, Van. And everything that comes with you. I told you that. I said I wanted all of you and I meant it.”

“You have no idea what you’re saying, cowgirl. No fucking idea.”

“Show me then. Show me your worst, Van. I won’t run. I can take it.”

His anger seemingly subsiding, he lowered himself onto the bed beside her.

“I don’t want you near me when I lose control, Stella Jo. You deserve better than that.”