“I know, but it takes the edge off.”
Rust takes a drag and smoke escapes through the corners of his mouth. He drops the cigarette, extinguishing it with his boot. “Maybe I can help with that.”
I step into him, smelling the metallic scent of blood on him. “Then give me something better than a hit of nicotine. I need to feel something except that numb cold inside my chest.”
I grasp his hand. It’s sticky with fresh blood but I guide his fingers to my throat.
“Right now I can’t deal with everything I found out today. I want to forget for a moment. Can you do that for me?” I whisper. “Touch me, please.”
Rust lets out a low growl. “You sick girl, lusting after a cold-blooded killer.”
“I’m lusting after the man I love,” I say without missing a beat.
He blushes. “Tell me exactly what you want me to do to you, Trouble. You might be in shock and I gotta be sure I’m not takin’ advantage of you in a vulnerable state.”
I swallow against the light pressure of his fingersaround my neck. My cheeks burn. I’m still not used to asking for what I want—and then getting it.
“Fuck me brainless and make me come until I can only think of how good you feel inside of me.”
Rust’s grin turns wolfish. “That I can do.”
46
RUST
I killed a guy.
So what? I can live with it.
Before this, I already became an accessory to murder. I lied to law enforcement. Then I held up a diner with the same shotgun that I used to blow a man’s head to smithereens moments ago.
But if I had the chance to turn back time, I’d do it all again. For her. My crimes were a small price to pay to keep my wife safe. To make her smile. To inspire her.
To make her mine again.
I drop the shotgun and drag my blood-smeared thumb over Tally’s bottom lip, painting it scarlet. Her breath stutters as her thighs clench. I’m already rock-hard.
My willingness to fuck her right next to my victim’s headless corpse probably makes me some sort of psychopath. But it also makes me the kind of man she wants and the kind of man she needs.
That’s all I truly care about.
My whole life, I’ve wanted to be everything she craves. I’d become whatever she wants me to be. Hero or villain, itdoesn’t matter to me. I’d let her shape me and use me until I’m spent.
I slip a hand under Tally’s skirt, cupping her sex. She inhales sharply through her nose as I brush over her drenched panties.
“Oh, you’re really a bad girl, Trouble. Getting soaked from your ex-husband killing a man for you.”
She grinds her center against my palm. “Don’t you think I deserve to be punished? Please, punish me. I’ve been so bad!”
She doesn’t have to ask twice.
I spin her around by the shoulders, taking a spare cable tie from my pocket. “Arms up.”
Tally raises her hands. I sling the cable tie around her wrists, fastening them to a metal ring drilled into a load-bearing beam. I hike up her skirt, exposing white cotton panties with a lace trim.
“Gotta say I love a pair of jeans on a gal, but these flouncy, flowy skirts are growing on me.”
“Oh yeah? Why’s that?”
