He grabs my hand and uses it to cup his flaccid penis. “Trizapam and ket are a hard-on killer.”
“Oh. Well. Oh.”
Thank. God.
“It is what it is.”
He flops back on the pillow, and I go with him, tucking myself against him. It’s not like I’m missing anything, and besides, I’ve waited what feels like lifetimes to be right here in this very spot. I don’t need sex to enjoy the moment. We’re alive and safe. That’s enough for me.
“I’m sorry, Wraith, I truly am.” I trace my finger up his arm, over the delicate angel tattooed on his inner forearm. It’s a stark contrast to the masculine tattoos on the other parts of his body. “But I’m not sorry it allowed our paths to cross. Does that make me a terrible person?”
He runs a hand over my hair. “No, Jamie, it doesn’t make you a terrible person. Now go to sleep.”
Exhaustion and Wraith make for a toxic truth serum. Best I take his advice and quit while I’m ahead. “Good night, Wraith.”
“Night, runt.”
I breathe him in and listen to the steady beat of his heart, my mind blissfully blank for the first time in ages. Gomorrah doesn’t exist. David is nothing. Not even a speck of nothing. And my father… He’s less than a speck of nothing. All that matters in this moment is being is Wraith’s arms. And as I drift off to sleep, my dreams, for once, aren’t haunted by a screaming demon saturated in liquor and drunk on rage.
12
Wraith
Feels all sorts of wrong to wake up in my bed, clean, and not in pain (healing knuckles notwithstanding). Probably going to take me a while to get used to being normal again. But Jamie sleeping next to me is a good start. Still doesn’t seem real, though. I have to lie here for a minute and let reality sink in because part of me still can’t believe we pulled off the impossible. A fucking miracle, actually.
And now I’m going to rip Crane’s world down around him.
But not today. Because first, I’m going to enjoy being home. In my bed. With a woman I’ve missed like my right fucking kidney for eight goddamn years.
With the late morning sun spilling over us, I roll over and see the top of Jamie’s head. The rest of her is tucked beneath the blanket. I lift the gray sheets and black comforter and see she’s curled into a tight ball, with my T-shirt too big on her tiny frame. She flips over in a tangle of hair and said shirt rides high enough to give me a nice view of her giant blue underwear, which are about the furthest thing from sexy I’ve ever seen. Doesn’t matter. Jamie could be wrapped in a burlap sack, and she’d shine brighter than a quasar.
She reminds me of whiskey and smoke, and with the drugs slowly leaving my system, my dick is finally starting to come back from the dead. It’d be too easy to drag those ugly panties down her legs and press my—
“Wraith, what are you doing?”
I drag my gaze up her body and give her a guilty grin. “Imagining what it’s going to feel like to fuck you.”
Never let it be said that Wraith Shaw doesn’t speak what’s on his mind.
Jamie snatches the blanket out of my hand before swiping the tangled hair off her face. “Pervert.”
And yeah, that, too.
The bruise on her cheek wakes the monster, but I beat it back into its cage because not today, motherfucker.
“You’re half naked in my bed, Jamie. I think that’s call for a little perversion.”
I shake my healing hand when the godawful sensation of thousand needles and pins shoots to the rapidly healing knuckles. Stupid of me to punch the mirror but getting an eyeful of myself was…shocking. I may not be vain, but holy shit, doesn’t mean I was prepared to see the extent of what Crane did to me. But whatever. It is what it is. I can’t undo the damage, but I can kill him nice and slow. Make it hurt. Make his death last for a damn long time as payment for the new me he created.
Jamie, though, isn’t looking at the scars. She’s too busy studying my tattoos. “The grim reaper, huh?”
On instinct, my hand moves to my right shoulder. The drill marred the design after the last torture session. Not too bad, but like my Unholy tat, the reaper will need to be fixed where they fucked up the artwork. If it’s possible. Not sure if the ink will take where the skin is scarred.
“Fitting, no?” I ask with a shrug.
I never had a problem killing people.
I do have a big fucking problem murdering innocent people.
