“I couldn’t forgive myself, and hatred was all I had to keep me going. So I…I…”
He hated me. Hated himself. Self-inflicted punishment.
“Elias.” Tears cloud my vision.
“Shhh.” He nibbles the thin straps of my nightgown and drags them off my shoulders.
Cold air meets my skin as the fabric pools on the floor. Wetness slicks between my thighs as I rub my hard nipples against his shirt.
“Despite everything, I couldn’t stay away. I couldn’t let you go. I told myself my obsession with you was because of hatred. But that’s a lie.”
Hot, passionate kisses trail down my neck and I melt into him.
He presses his confession over my heart. “The truth is, you’re the only good thing in my life. And I would’ve done anything to remain in yours. Sending you puzzles, the necklace—they were all because I couldn’t leave you. I couldn’t stand to be cut off from you.”
Gripping my thigh, he bears down, dragging his groin against my soaked core, letting me feel every inch of him. “For the past twenty years, those twenty-eight minutes have been what I lived for each day.”
The hiss of the zipper slices through the air, and I moan when I feel his thick cock rubbing against the seam of my underwear.
“T-Twenty-eight minutes?” I whimper when his fingers tug on the straps, ripping the delicate fabric from my body.
“Your birthday, February twenty-eighth…the day the most beautiful angel descended on earth and the day I entered hell.”
Elias caresses my heavy tits, his thumb flicking one nipple while his mouth claims the other, mainlining ecstasy into my core.
My knees buckle, and he catches me easily. He hoists me up and drops me onto the bed.
A chilly draft meets my heated flesh. He hovers before me, his hands quick at work on his clothes, revealing every solid inch of him. Up close, I see the scars—slashes, burn marks, round puckered holes that must be from bullets.
Agony twists through me as I trail my fingers over each one, a testament of the pain he’s endured to transform from Kian to Elias.
Then there’s the scar bisecting his cheek.
I gently touch it, and he closes his eyes.
“This one I inflicted on myself,” he murmurs. “A reminder that the Kian, the pretty boy, couldn’t exist. Not if he wanted to avenge his family.”
A lump thickens in my throat as I press a kiss on the scar. “It must’ve hurt.”
“Don’t feel sorry for me,” he rasps.
He stands naked before me—glorious and breathtaking—a dark-haired demon with tattoos writhing up his arms, the vines swirling over scars. The simple Asian character stands out on his chest.
I trace the strokes with my fingertips.
He throttles out a breath and stills my hand. “Trust.Believe.It’s the Chinese word for it.”
“Because?” My gaze catches his.
His eyes soften, and he leans down, slowly pressing his hard frame against mine, burning me up with his presence.
Elias cradles my cheek the way he usually does—reverent, gentle, like I’m precious.
“I had it inked after the fire,” he says quietly. “When everything I believed in…was gone.”
Closing his eyes, he dips his forehead against mine. “At first, the tattoo was a reminder for me to keep going. To trust that I’d get through this. Find Sofia. Get revenge. It kept me standing while I worked my way through seedy clubs, collecting secrets, trading favors…”
“Becoming Elias Kent,” I whisper, my heart cleaving in half.
