Page 61 of Blood & Heartache

Needing some alone time, I slowly made my way to my room while everyone ate. It was time to wash the sins of those who wronged me off my skin. This burden wasn’t mine to carry any longer, and the loss I hadn’t allowed myself to acknowledge was finally hitting me. Besides my father, my uncles were two people I always counted on to have my back. They spent years with me at the house preparing me to do this job.

How had it all gone so wrong?

What had I done to have people betray me like this?

As the scalding hot water of the shower rained down on me, I let my tears fall only to be swept away just as quickly. All the truths I’d been forced to accept in the past few days had been hard pills to swallow. My mother was killed because of me, as was my father, simply because I was a child of two powerful families. Gunner had been manipulated, forced into a situation he never should have been involved in. That man could have had such a bright future if only my bastard uncle hadn’t gotten his claws in him. Even if he took his own life, his death was on my hands as well. I was the reason he was needed in the first place.

Tears came faster as sobs shook my body and the last of my defenses crumbled around me. The blood circling the drain was a haunting reminder of what I let myself do. I’d chosen to allow Darkness to take over, freeing me of the act, but I knew there was no difference—she was still me. I’d done all those things without a care for the person I was inflicting all that pain on. Everyone was right to call me a monster, but it would be the last thing they’d call me. It took this kind of vicious will to survive at all costs when the world I existed in refused to let me live. They were coming for me, and I was going to need this darkness they labeled as monstrous. Without that side of me, I’d have given up long before now with all they did to me growing up. I would take that gift and use it for my survival because when this was all over, the one who’d still be standing would be me.

So I would give myself this moment to fall apart and grieve all I’d lost and suffered this past week. The family I thought I possessed, the secrets that had been revealed, and the lies I’d been led to believe twisted the truth I had always known. My world was shifting and changing which meant I needed to as well. Allowing myself to fall to pieces here and now, letting my heart bleed with the sorrow I felt, gave me the opportunity to gather the truths that I wanted to rebuild with. Once broken, there was no other choice but to fix the damage and replace parts that were too far gone with new ones. The choice now was what to replace them with.

“Astin,” Luca whispered as he entered the shower fully clothed. Grabbing my shower chair, he turned me so my back was to the water, and I could see him. Cupping my face, he pressed his forehead to mine. “I thought you might be struggling, and it would seem I was right.”

I didn’t even know what to say to that as I let him hold me, my tears refusing to stop. He just kept us like that for a while, letting me sort through the pain but offering his silent strength at the same time. Eventually, he pressed his lips softly to mine before standing and stripping out of his clothes. Then he grabbed my loofa and body wash, kneeling before me, scrubbing every inch of my body, leaving gentle kisses as he went. Never did I think a man so deadly could also be so gentle.

Finished with my body, he moved to my hair, washing it twice before conditioning it. He took extra care to make sure I didn’t get any soap in my eyes, tilting my head back with a strong grip on my chin. Everything about what he was doing allowed me to not be in control for just a moment. Slowly, I rebuilt my walls so my grief didn’t overwhelm me, knowing that the moment I was out of the shower, I’d once more need to be the boss. Weakness wasn’t acceptable in the eyes of the mafia nor of those hunting me down.

Luca shut off the water, and when I went to rise, he stopped me. “No, you’ll stay here.”

I wanted to argue, to prove that all this hadn’t beaten me, but I couldn’t. The need to be taken care of right now was so strong, but I didn’t have the energy to fight it. He returned in a moment and started drying my hair and wrapping it up in the towel as he used another to dry off my body. I caught a glimpse of my leg and cringed at the sight of torn stitches and raw flesh.

Darkness didn’t feel pain, so it shouldn’t have surprised me that she’d forget she was wounded.

“We’ll need doc to come and deal with this, but I think for now, we can just wrap it up and keep it clean,” Luca commented as he saw me staring at it.

Scooping me up, he carried me out of the shower and set me on the counter, wedging himself between my legs. My brain took that moment to register that we had an extremely attractive and naked man pressing himself against me. His cock was hard and ready where it rested against my stomach.

“Hey,” Luca urged, grasping my chin and directing my attention to his eyes. “Tell me what you need.”

“I don’t know,” I answered.

His grip on my chin tightened as he frowned. “Bullshit, I’ve been where you are, Astin, so don’t lie to me. I’m not scared of what I saw today, and I don’t think any less of you. In fact, I think I might have fallen for you more than I already had. You needed information, and that’s what you got… information that saved more lives than you took today. If there had been a true takeover at the gathering tonight, many more would have lost their lives. I’m not telling you to shake this off and not to feel sad or hurt by everything today because you have every right to feel how you do. I’m asking you to put aside your role as leader for just a moment and tell me how I can help you.”

“I don’t want to feel like this,” I confessed. “Everything feels like it’s my fault no matter what I tell myself. All that plays on repeat in my head is that I killed my family. Can you help me make it stop?”

Luca let his hand shift from my chin to my throat, gripping it firmly. “Do I have your permission to help you in the way I find works best? It won’t work for long, but it will stop the voices in your head for a time.”

“As long as it’s not drugs or alcohol, then you may do as you please,” I said, happy to let him take the reins right now. He asked me to set aside that I was the boss, and that was exactly what I planned to do—for a little while, at least.

“No, it will never be those things,” Luca shared. “Those two vices should never be something you turn to because they’ll steal what little life you have left. I’ve seen it happen to many people who’ve done the job I once did. Killing people for a living leaves you with a hole that you’re eternally trying to fix. Instead, I plan to do the opposite of what most think. I’m going to do everything in my power to make you feel alive.”

Before I could ask what he meant by that, he used his grip to drag me forward and captured my mouth with his. Nipping at my lower lip, he asked me to open to him, which I did willingly. I wanted this as much as he did, and to prove that, I wrapped my legs around his waist, locking him against me. My fingers dug into his back, making him moan, and his grip on my throat tightened ever so slightly. His free hand slid down my back to my ass, where he tugged me closer as he rocked his hips. The feel of his cock rubbing along my pussy was glorious in a tortuous way. It offered friction and teased my clit, but I needed more.

As if he heard what I was thinking, he released my throat and scooped me up by the ass. Twining my arms around his neck, I held on as he walked across the bathroom. I assumed he was going to take us to the bed, but it seemed he had other plans as he slammed me against the wall. I grunted at the abrupt action, but when he shoved me upward until my pussy was in his face, everything fell away.

His lips latched onto my clit, sucking on it sharply, making me cry out. “Holy fuck!”

My hands fluttered along the wall, trying to find something to hold onto as he slid his tongue up inside me. A keening moan escaped my lips as he tongue fucked me with another finger stroking my asshole. It was like my brain couldn’t figure out what it wanted to focus on with so many sensations crashing into me.

When the orgasm that had been building exploded, I screamed long and loud, my hips thrusting, trying to get every last second out of this moment.

“Fucking hell, Luca,” I gasped as he let me slide down the wall until we were eye to eye. “That was amazing.”

“Oh, that was just the warmup, baby girl.” He chuckled. “Now that I’ve got you nice and wet, I’m going to fuck the shit out of that pussy.”

My brows shot up, but I didn’t have a chance to say anything more as he flipped me so I was facing the wall. Grabbing my arms, he pulled them straight up then together so he could hold my wrists in one hand.

“Now, I’m gonna need you to be a good girl and keep your hands right here. If you drop them, there will be a punishment, and each time it will be worse than the one before,” Luca instructed, whispering in my ear. “Will you be good?”