Now that I couldn’t see her scars, I shifted my gaze back to her.
“You have to accept me as I am.”
I clenched my jaw and shook my head. “You know that’s not the problem.”
She crawled toward me, moving on top of me so her hair dragged across my chest as she moved. “We’ve both done things for and to each other that change the way we look, but we’re still the same.” Her hand moved over my chest, over my heart. “You did what you had to do to keep me alive.”
“It still…” It still killed me.
“I forgive you.” She moved her forehead to mine and rested it there, her hand over my heart, her hair on my chest. “Now, be with me.” She pressed her lips to mine and gave me a deep and purposeful kiss, her mouth taking mine before she kissed me again and again, her tongue greeting mine and bringing me back to the moment. Then she pulled away, moved back to where she was, and looked at me over her shoulder.
I tried not to let the past come into that room and infect me with misery. I tried not to think about the way the whip felt in my grasp, tried not to think about the crack it made once it hit her skin. When it was just her and me, we forgot about our unfortunate existence and everything that had been done to both of us.
I leaned over her and pressed a kiss between her shoulder blades, my lips feeling the bumps over her scarred skin, the welts that had never really gone away. I listened to her breathe harder as she savored my kiss like she enjoyed it. I moved farther down her spine and to her ass, my face moving between her legs to kiss the area that was plenty wet.
She breathed harder, loud in the silence.
I straightened and placed myself inside her with a deep thrust.
She jerked forward and moaned loudly.
My hands gathered her in my arms, and I pulled her against me, my chest against her back, my arms across her tits and her stomach. I held her as I thrust, both of us on our knees on the bed, grinding together as the passion rose like heat to the ceiling.
Her hand moved to the back of my head, and she angled her body so she could kiss me as we moved together, her pants entering my mouth and filling my lungs with new warmth. Her fingers gripped the hair at the back of my neck, and she moaned as I thrust into her. “Magnus…”
One of my hands squeezed her tit, while the other slid between her legs and rubbed her clit.
She moaned louder and louder.
I could feel the scars against my chest as we moved together, feel the bumps that would never fade as long as she lived. But instead of carrying the grief on my shoulders, I saw them as a testament to her survival, of what we’d both done to get here…to have this.
Twenty-Two
The Count of Monte Cristo
When I opened my eyes and looked at the nightstand, I realized it was almost noon.
It’d been a long night.
I wiped the sleep from my eyes before my arm slid toward Raven on the bed. All I felt were cold sheets. She was always up earlier than I was, probably because she was excited to be in Paris. I got out of bed, used the bathroom, and then headed downstairs to make some coffee.
She wasn’t sitting on the couch.
And the coffeepot hadn’t been turned on.
I went to her old bedroom to see if she was sitting in the armchair so she could see the Eiffel Tower past the park.
She wasn’t there.
My heart started to pound. “Raven?” I raised my voice so she could hear me if she was in the apartment.
Nothing.
I checked the bathrooms—nothing.
I stood in the living room and dragged my hand down my face, feeling my jaw clench, feeling the terror grip me by the chest.
Did she run?
The alarm wasn’t set because it didn’t cross my mind anymore.
Maybe that was what she wanted.
Did she lie to me? Was this all…a stunt?
Was any of it real?
I moved to the window in her old bedroom to look down at the gate and the sidewalk, as if she would be standing there. Did she spend all that time earning my affection for protection in the camp, building up my trust, just so she could have this moment? When we were up late so she knew I’d be asleep for hours?
Was I that stupid?
Why did I actually believe this was real?
My heart pounded harder, and the pulse was vibrating in my temples. The blood was like a drumbeat in my ears. So many emotions ran through me at once. But then my eyes noticed the woman in a dress across the street. She checked both ways before she crossed, carrying two coffees, a bag hanging off her wrist with the bakery logo on the front. She moved through the open gate and approached the apartment.
I closed my eyes and pinched the bridge of my nose.
It was real.
The elevator hummed down the hallway until the doors opened. Her footsteps came a moment later, passing the bedroom and entering the kitchen, without noticing me standing in front of the window.
With my hands on my hips, I stood in front of the window and let the anger circulate out of my blood.
She must have taken a bite of a pastry because she said, “Oh man…that’s so fucking good.”
I left the bedroom and approached the kitchen.
She stilled when she spotted me, half a muffin stuffed into her mouth, crumbs and blueberry juice in the corners of her mouth, eating like a pig because she assumed I was still asleep upstairs. The food was already in her mouth at that point, so she chewed it quickly and tried to get it down. “I…” Chew chew chew. “Didn’t know…” Chew chew chew. Mumble mumble. “Awake…” She grabbed a napkin from the bag and tried to wipe all the shit off her face as she chewed the last of it and got it down her throat.
I stepped closer to her, my arms resting by my sides, still angry about the heart attack she’d just given me.
She balled up the napkin and left it on the counter. “I got you a muffin too, but you don’t have to eat it. I’ll eat it if you don’t want it.” When she looked at me, she realized that something was wrong, that the intense stare I gave her was a hostile one. “What is it?”
I stepped closer to her, exploding in fury. “Did I say you could come and go as you please?”
She stilled at my outburst, not anticipating this at all.
“I wake up and you’re gone, and I have no idea where the fuck you went. What the fuck, Raven?”
She stepped back slightly, recovering from the surprise and turning cold. “I just went to get coffee, Magnus. What is the big deal?”
“What’s the big deal?” I asked incredulously. “You didn’t tell me. That’s the big deal.”
“Where else would I have…” Her voice trailed away when she figured out why I was so angry. Understanding entered her gaze, and that softness was quickly replaced by anger. “I told you I wouldn’t run.”
She’d had the perfect opportunity to wave down a cab and go in any direction, but she chose to come back, her intentions completely innocent, so innocent that if I woke up and didn’t see her, the idea of her escaping wouldn’t even cross my mind. I rubbed my fingers across my jawline, letting the angry high dissipate.
“You need to trust me.”
I dropped my hand and looked at her again.
“I’m gonna come and go as I damn well please because I’m not going to run—and you know I’m not going to run. At least, you do now…because I’ve been awake for four hours now, and that’s plenty of time to disappear if that’s what I wanted. So, when I wake up, I’m going to walk to my favorite coffee shop and get a sugary, fattening, hot cup of coffee and as many goddamn muffins as I want, and you aren’t going to say a damn thing about it. If you’re gone in the evening and I’m alone, I’m gonna walk down there and get my dinner to go and eat it here because it’s what I want to do. Alright?”