She pulled slightly away and put a hand to his chest, holding him back so she could move on to her pants. Quickly, efficiently, she undid them, pushed them down, and awaited his verdict in this nightmare of a striptease.
Parts of her were covered, absolutely coated, in ink. Multicolored streaks, masquerading as words, ran up and down both of her arms, her shoulders, over to the top of her back. Her breasts, those beautiful nipples… This was what people did to show ownership, to a gang or a person. She’d beenbranded. Like cattle, only worse, because he could see, here and there, where the fucker had run out of ink or lost control of the needle. There, where it petered out, he thought she must have fought back, and in one place, a big blotch so thick and dark, he wondered if the bastard had pierced a hole in her.
On her beautiful, soft, perfect skin, it was absolutely obscene.
He forced his eyes from her body back to her face. “What he did to you, he’s gotta—”
“Shh.” She put a hand over his mouth. “This is for me. Let me keep this.”
This…? It took him a second to realize what she meant bythis. This moment. Sharing her body with him, her pain. That’s what she meant. And he was ruining it for her.
But fuck, never in a million years had Ive imagined the horror. He’d thought the guy had beat her, but not…
No wonder she couldn’t look at herself. He could barely look at her without feeling… Oh God. So much shit, roiling inside.
Nausea. Horror. Pain. And then anger. No, not just anger, because he’d felt anger before, and this was so much more. Stronger than anything he’d ever known. Even compared to when Frank had beaten Jessie, this was way off the scale.
Because, back then, he’d been a stupid kid, his anger diluted from being constantly pissed off at the world.
Today, his rage was a sharp point, honed by years of containment. Years of calm.
He leaned back, needing to see everything, taking her all in at once, like ripping off a Band-Aid. He was deaf to whatever sounds she might have made, blind to everything but the obscenities etched into her skin.His woman’sskin.His woman, defaced by some monster.
Oh shit, the rage was so right, whooshing through him, filling the hollow spaces, the cracks and crevices, overwhelming him, along with the knowledge of what he had to do.
Kill the fucker.Tear him apart, limb by limb. Destroy him.
It was fate. Everything about his life, every decision he’d ever made, everything he’d ever done. It had all come to this one moment. This one person. This,thiswas what Ivan was made for.
Because Ivan loved Uma. And that’s what you did for the people you loved.
24
“Ivan.”
His gaze ran back up her body, over her arms, where the ink was positively virulent in the unforgiving light of day. Her stomach heaved, but he was looking, and so would she, damn it.
Finally, he ripped his attention from her skin and came back to her, his eyes taking a while to focus on hers, and when they did…
“I’m sorry, baby,” he said, his features relaxing slightly. “So sorry he did this to you.”
She’d thought she’d lost him there for second. But now that he was back in the room, his hand went to her face first—bless him—before stroking over her body, taking it in. Fingers trailed over her shoulders, down her arms.
His silence said it all. Uma had exposed her innards, and all he could do was stare. He couldn’t tear his gaze away.Of coursehe couldn’t. She’d torn herself open, exposed her aching, bloody heart, rent it still beating from her breast, and handed it to him on a fucking platter, and she couldn’t even look at him for fear of what his expression might be.
Shock? Pity? Revulsion?
“See?” she said, voice raw, chest hollow and dry as a bone. “It’s disgusting. Why would you want to look at me like this?”
“Shh.” He bent to press his lips to her jaw. “You can’t disappoint me. You know that, right?”
“Don’t.” She turned away, squeezing her eyes shut. “Don’t fucking pity me, Ivan. I can’t take that.”
“I don’t, Uma. Look at me.”
“I can’t.”
He kissed her—a slow, sweet press of lips, a luxurious stroke of tongues, punctuated by the scrape of his jaw, the movements between them so tiny, so intimate, their sighs a secret shared. Her breath expelled hard, emitting something noxious she hadn’t even realized had been blocking her throat, and he took it in.
