I go to get up, inwardly cursing myself. I’ve gone without a man since that night years ago in Skull’s bed. I’d like to blame my weakness on that. Trouble is, I’d be lying. It’s because it was him. Skull. If this were the movies, the man would be my kryptonite. He always has been.
His big hand grabs my hip, stopping me from standing. It flexes, squeezing me. It sends chills through my body, small electrical currents that travel from the base of my neck and spreads through my body right until it reaches my clit, which should be dead after the workout I just received.
“Kryptonite,” I mutter to myself.
“Querida,” he whispers close to me, so close I can feel his breath against my back. Having that and hearing his voice all deep and gravelly from his orgasm kills me. “We should talk,” he prompts again.
Totally fucking kills me.
“There’s not much to say, Skull,” I tell him. Except I’m a dirty whore who screamed for your dick while a bunch of men were outside—including the asshole who tried to destroy me, I mentally add in my head. I disgust myself. All that doesn’t even include the fact that I did this even knowing my sister was shot.
The only good news is that finally someone hates me more than Skull does now. Myself.
“Beth, we just had sex,” he says, like he’s explaining himself to a small child. Had sex, not made love. Could he hurt me any further?
I stand up quickly, pulling my pants up. At least he didn’t see my scars. I adjust my shirt and bra, glad I managed to keep those on. I might have worked up the courage to reveal them to him before. Not now. Would he compare me to Dr. Torres? Would I measure up? After all, my experience is limited to just him. All of these thoughts hit me all at once—all at the same time. I want to throw up, but instead I swallow down the bile.
“I need to go check on Katie and make sure they get her to the hospital. It’s just a graze, but it bled a lot at first.”
“Beth, we had sex,” he repeats with a groan as he pushes up off the floor.
“I know that,” I tell him, turning away from him. “I think it’s best if we just forget that ever happened.”
“Forget it?” he growls, grabbing me and making me face him. He’s mad, but then—but then that’s all I’ve seen of him since I’ve been back.
“Yes—forget it. It was a momentary lapse in judgment.”
“A lapse in judgment?” he asks incredulously.
I drag my eyes up to him. Hmm… I think I hurt his feelings. That thought brings me joy.
“Exactly,” I tell him. “It’s not something we’ll ever repeat. We’ll just forget all about it.”
“Got it all planned out, do you, cari?o?”
“There’s no planning! It was a mistake, one not to be repeated. In fact, we should never speak of it again. I’m going to check on Katie and then we can discuss what we’re going to do with Matthew.”
“We’re?”
“We’re,” I insist, finally looking at him. He’s buttoning his pants and, except for his hair being mussed up, you can’t tell that moments before he was fucking me to within an inch of my life.
Shit! I can’t think of that. The way the muscles of my pussy clench at the memory is proof that I cannot go there.
“I’ll tell you exactly what I’m going to do, querida. I’m going to kill him,” Skull announces calmly.
“You can’t!” I yell in a panic.
“The fuck I can’t.”
“You can’t, Skull. I mean, sure that’s what I was going to do to him, but that was before.”
“Before what? You mean before when you were planning on dying here?” he growls, showing me he is still upset.
“Whatever. Surely, you can see that now that we have Matthew, we can use him to smoke out Colin.”
“Smoke out? You’ve watched too many police dramas. Besides, I don’t need him to find Colin.”
“You do. We have to find both of them, Skull, so that this ends.”
“I’ll find Colin. I don’t need that sad fuck-bag outside to do it.”
“You’re sure?”
“Positive,” he confirms.
“Good,” I tell him, walking towards the door.
“Where are you going?” he asks, following me.
“I’m going to go kill Matthew,” I tell him, deadly serious.
“I don’t quite remember you being so bloodthirsty,” Skull says.
I stop and take a breath. “There are things that change you forever,” I tell him, trying to blot out the memories. “The girl you knew had to grow up fast.”
I expect him to say something in response to that, but he doesn’t. I’m almost to the door, congratulating myself. I extricated myself out of that relatively easily, and now we’ll be one step closer to me getting away from the club. And away from Skull. I may not want that, but it’s needed. I wonder if hypnosis can really make people forget things? Maybe there’s someone in town that does that.
“What are you doing?” I gasp when Skull grabs me from behind and brings me around to face him. I hold onto his hand to try and steady myself. “Skull! Stop!” I cry in outrage as he lifts me up and throws me over his shoulders.
“I’m saving you from yourself this time, querida,” Skull mutters.
“What does that even mean? Let me down right now!”