Chapter 176 Beneath the wreckage

Chapter 176 Beneath the wreckage
Lily

His fingers curled into the back of my cut, knuckles grinding against the leather, and he pulled me onto his lap in one motion. My knees landed on either side of his hips. The position sent a bright flare of pain up my side, stitches complaining, bruises screaming, but I swallowed the sound before it could escape.

He wouldn't have heard it anyway.

Jinx was somewhere far away, eyes glassy and unfocused, still leaking tears that carved clean tracks through the dust and blood on his face. His breathing came in wet, uneven gasps.

I cupped his jaw with both hands, thumbs brushing the stubble along his cheekbones, and he finally looked at me. Really looked. Like I was the only solid thing left in a world that kept dissolving around him.

I kissed him. Soft. Just a press of lips, a question more than a demand. His whole body went still beneath me. For one heartbeat. Two. Then his mouth answered, parting with a sound that was half sob and half hunger, and his hands fisted in my shirt like he was drowning and I was air.

Someone behind us sucked in a breath. A bottle crunched under a shifting boot. The clubhouse held its collective tension, thirty-odd people watching their most volatile brother unravel in the arms of a girl who could barely stand.

Jinx pulled back just far enough to look at me. His pupils were blown wide, dark swallowing the grey. Whatever he found in my face must have been enough.

He stood.

I barely had time to wrap my legs around his waist before he was moving, one arm locked under my thighs, the other a steel band across my back. My fingers dug into his shoulders. The crowd parted like water around stone.

Victor's mouth opened, maybe to object, maybe to offer help, but Jinx was already past him, boots thudding heavy down the hallway toward the back rooms.

No one followed.

The door to his room swung open with a kick and slammed shut behind us with a crack that rattled the frame. The lock clicked. Then I was airborne, landing on a mattress that smelled like motor oil and him, the blanket rough beneath my back.

Jinx stood at the foot of the bed, chest heaving. The tears hadn't stopped. They dripped off his jaw, catching in the weak light from the single bulb overhead, and his hands shook as he grabbed the hem of his shirt. One violent tug and it was gone, fabric tearing at the collar. His cut hit the floor with a heavy thump, patches and pins glinting.

Belt next. Then jeans, shoved down with the kind of desperation that had nothing to do with arousal and everything to do with needing to feel something other than grief.

I watched him, propped on my elbows, and my own body felt like a stranger's. Distant. The sting in my ribs, the pull of stitches in my thigh, all of it muffled behind a fog of exhaustion and adrenaline. But I was here. I was present. And I wanted this. Him. Not as a distraction, not as an escape. As an anchor.

My fingers found the button of my jeans. The denim was stiff with dried blood... mine, Lucien's, soaked in so deep I doubted it would ever wash clean. I worked them down my hips slowly, carefully, the movement sending fire through the wound on my thigh. A hiss slipped through my teeth.

Jinx's hand closed around my wrist. "Stop."

I looked up. He was staring at my leg, where the bandage had soaked through in three places. Along the edge, two stitches had torn free, leaving angry red punctures in skin that was already purple and swollen. His thumb traced the edge of the wound, feather-light, and his jaw clenched so hard I heard his teeth grind.

"I can't go slow." His voice was wrecked, scraping out of him like gravel over glass. "I'll hurt you."

"I know."

"Lily—"

"I said it's okay." I sat up, ignoring the scream of my ribs, and grabbed his wrist. My grip was stronger than it should have been, given everything. "This is what you need. I'm here. I want to be here. "

For a long moment, he just stared at me. Something warred behind his eyes, guilt, maybe, fighting against the raw need that vibrated through every muscle. Then his hand moved from my leg to the collar of my shirt, and he ripped.

Cotton tore like paper.

My shirt fell away in two pieces, and his mouth was on me before the fabric hit the bed. Lips crashing against mine, desperate and bruising. No finesse. No patience. Just need, pure and consuming, the kind that burned everything else to ash. His teeth grazed my lower lip and I gasped, which only gave him more room to claim.

He didn't stop at my mouth.

His lips moved to my jaw, open-mouthed and searing, teeth scraping the sensitive skin beneath my ear. I arched into him, a sound catching in my throat. He bit down, not gentle, not testing, but hard enough that I'd wear his mark for days. The pain was sharp and clarifying, cutting through the numbness like lightning.

Again. Lower. The curve where neck met shoulder, and his teeth sank in with a growl that vibrated through my collarbone.

My fingers tangled in his hair, pulling, and he groaned against my skin.

He found the spider lily.

The tattoo covered my left shoulder, ink petals curling toward my heart. His mouth slowed there, lips tracing each line of black and grey, something almost reverent in the way he lingered. A kiss pressed to the stamen. Another to the outermost petal. His breath shuddered out, hot and uneven.

"Beautiful," he murmured, so quiet I almost missed it.

Then his hand found the clasp of my bra, and reverence vanished.

He didn't fumble. Didn't hesitate. The clasp snapped open, maybe broken, maybe just undone, I couldn't tell and didn't care, and the straps slid down my arms. The cool air hit my skin for half a second before his mouth was there, closing over my nipple with an intensity that pulled a cry from my throat.