Chains by Kristine Allen

“I  Get  Off”—Halestorm

Insanity was my plea. Logically, it could be the only reason I was actively seeking Nico out.

After I announced myself, there wasn’t a peep from behind the scarred wood. It would seem he was going to ignore me. Shoulders slumped, I turned away but spun back when I heard the door open.

“What do you want?” he asked. The door was open, but his body blocked it—a nonverbal cue that I wasn’t welcome in his room. It hurt, but we’d made our choice years ago.

“I wanted to know if we could talk,” I said, trying my best to control the quiver in my voice.

He pulled his lips flat between his teeth before he released them on a sigh and stepped back.

Tentatively, in case he changed his mind, I walked in after a quick glance to see that I wasn’t observed. Though I was a grown-ass woman, my brother was ridiculously protective. As if I was helpless. I hated it.

He closed the door and leaned against it with his muscular, inked-up arms crossed over his chest.

Hungry, my gaze trailed over him, taking in all the changes a few years had made. It didn’t matter how many times I’d seen him since being forced to move into the clubhouse for my safety. Each time my hungry gaze swept over him, I noticed something new. When he wasn’t looking, I devoured every detail.

Gone was the close-cropped military haircut. In its place, his inky dark hair was long on top though still shaved on the sides. Tattoos covered nearly every visible inch of him except his handsome face. It made me wonder where all that ink traveled. Where before, he’d been lean muscle, he was now bulkier. Still chiseled and beautiful though.

One thing that hadn’t changed was that he was sexy as sin and my body screamed for his touch every time I was near him. Despite the hell I’d endured to keep my nephew and Lynda safe, I still wanted him. The fact that he’d never want me again cut deep.

“Well?” he asked, making me aware of how lost in him I’d gotten.

My gaze dropped, and I bit my lip. In a defensive move, I wrapped my arms protectively around myself.

“I hate my life,” I admitted, unable to look him in the eye. “I hate myself.” My chest ached, and I wanted to crumble to the ground and fall apart.

“What?” His arms dropped, and he moved off the door. Yet, he still kept his distance.

“There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t wish he had killed me,” I admitted in a whisper, barely holding on. My throat burned with the suppressed tears. Despair rained down, nearly suffocating me.

“Jazz,” he said, sounding shocked. The next thing I knew, he held me in his arms, my cheek pressed to his chest.

Anger had surged so many times, mixed with the despair. I had a stupid gift that did me no good. Not that anyone knew, but sometimes I dreamed things. Things that came true.

I’d dream of buying a purse on clearance, or maybe of a friend getting a promotion, that a traffic accident would happen in front of me, meeting the man I would give my virginity to, getting my website business up and running, but did I get a heads-up that my life was about to be destroyed? No. The universe didn’t see that as pertinent information I needed.

Tears ran unchecked down my face as silent sobs shook my frame. I’d been unable to sleep last night, ruminating over what he must think of me. He might not hate me, but I hated myself. Couldn’t look at myself in the mirror. Had come up with a hundred different ways to end my life. Yet every time I went through the motions to stop the torment, I saw Nico’s face.

Not my brother.

Not my nephew.

“I don’t want to live like this anymore. I’d rather die,” I cried.

“Goddamn it, Jasmine, don’t you dare say that.” His arms tightened around me until I was afraid he might snap my bones. His heart was pounding under my ear, and I drew strength from its rapid but steady beat. It was crazy, but with his arms around me, I was stronger.

Needy, I slipped my hands around his back and my fingers clutched that back of his shirt. Feeling grounded for the first time in weeks, I held on for dear life.

“I hated you. For what you let that girl do after you’d just been with me. But you didn’t want to, did you? That was you pushing me away because you think you know what’s best for both of us instead of letting me choose too. Now I’m all fucked-up, and it’s a moot point, huh?”

“Jazz, let me talk to Angel. We need to get you help. You need to talk to someone about this. Let me find a way for us. Fuck, let me be there for you. These last years have been hell but losing you would kill me. You’re mine, and I can’t deal with this anymore. Let me be your shoulder.”

Shaking my head, I pushed out of his embrace. I was so damn fucked-up. Despite needing him, I knew he deserved better than me. He thought it was the other way around, but he was so very wrong. The fucked-up shit in my head would destroy anything we tried to build. Knowing he would always see me as broken gutted me. Knowing if he touched my skin, he’d see everything that happened killed me. It was bad enough he’d seen Angel’s secrets.

“It was a mistake to come here. I don’t know what I was thinking,” I stammered as I backed toward the door. Except I did. I knew exactly why I’d crossed the hall. My soul cried for him—needed him in a way we could never be.

“Wait, baby, don’t go.” His eyes pleaded with mine.

My mind warred with my soul. My heart screamed at my body. Though I knew I needed to walk out the door and stay as far away from him as possible, that part of me that was tied to him won out.

I stopped.

Like he was approaching a wounded animal, and maybe that’s exactly what I was, he cautiously moved closer. With each step, my resolve melted. When he stopped in front of me, I sucked in a sharp breath.

He wet his lips and tentatively brought his hands up to touch me, then he paused. My heart crashed.

“I have an idea,” he said, then went to his bathroom, and I heard a drawer open.

My brow furrowed in confusion, wondering what he was doing. When he came back, he had something black clutched in his hands.

“They’re what I wear when I tattoo my customers,” he explained as he pulled on black disposable gloves. He gave me an apologetic shrug, and hope blossomed in my chest.

He cradled my face in his gloved hands, and I ignored the smooth feeling of the plastic separating us. Instead, I reveled in the fact that he was touching me. My lids fell when his thumbs circled up the sides of my nose to smooth my brows. Tenderly, his fingertips traced over my face like a blind man trying to visualize what he was feeling.

Then he wrapped his arms around me and pulled me into his warm, strong body. For several moments we simply held each other. Our souls rejoiced at being together, and my heart raced in time with his.

“I need you,” I whispered.

“I’m here,” he said as his lips pressed to my crown.

Knowing he misunderstood, I leaned my head back to look at him. “No. I need you. I need you to make me forget.”

“But you said….” He trailed off.

“As long as you keep the gloves on, you can’t read me, right?” I questioned as I searched his face.

He sighed. “Mostly. When my mouth touches you I get faint ripples of foggy memories, but nothing I can see clearly.”

“Something you can handle?” I asked, hopefully.

“Yeah,” he reluctantly admitted.

“Then give me memories to overshadow the ones I can’t shake. Let me remember us together instead of that… time,” I begged. Desperate, I clutched his wrinkled T-shirt and stood on my tiptoes to reach him.

When my lips brushed over his, I paused to gauge his reaction.

His answer was to swoop in and deepen the kiss. Diving in, he acted like he needed to coax me—he didn’t. I wanted this. I wanted him.

No. I needed him.

Desperate, I tasted him. I stroked my tongue along his and catalogued what pushed him over the edge. Hands on my ass, he lifted me, and I hooked my ankles behind him. He proceeded to fuck my mouth the way I was desperate for him to take my body. Consuming, desperate, bold, our tongues dueled and curled around the other until we were forced to break for air.

“Please,” I begged, needing him more than the breath I’d greedily brought into my lungs. Nico would never hurt me. He wasn’t like the asshole who’d hurt me. He was safe.

A few steps and we were against his bed. Lips fused to my neck, he laid me down and crawled up over me as he worked his shirt off. He kissed, licked, and bit every inch of uncovered skin, then he began to undress me to reach the rest.

My hands pushed at his sleep pants, and my feet took over when they got down too far for me to reach. Hungry for him, I kicked them to the foot of the bed once they cleared his feet. The heat of his erection burned into my thigh where it rested.

Unable to control my baser instincts, I sank my teeth into his shoulder as my panties were the last casualty of this war we fought to have nothing between us.

A groan escaped him as I licked over the tender spot I’d left. He reached between us and separated my folds with his gloved hands. One finger, then two slid through my wet lips before he slowly pushed them into my core.

“Nico, God, Nico. I need more than your fingers. I need you,” I gasped as I clutched him to my breast where he was flicking my nipple with his tongue before he pulled it into his mouth and sucked. When he repeated the action on the other, I wiggled my hips, searching for what I wanted.

Except, he kept his fingers stroking and scissoring inside my wet pussy.

“Dammit, Nico,” I whispered, because despite how good his fingers worked me over, I needed him inside me. In that moment, he was all I could think about. My only memories were the first time we were together. The way he’d owned my body that night and by doing so, stole my soul.

His fingers left me, and I whimpered. Lifting my hips, I desperately tried to line him up, but he pulled back and slid his length through my wet slit but not inside. The friction of his cock stroking over my clit had me rubbing against him, blindly seeking.

Slow and steady, he continued to slide along me as he buried his face in my neck. His hot breath fanned my throat, and I tilted my head, silently begging him to put his lips to my flesh. Gloved hands caressed everywhere he could reach.

As he moved his hips, I dropped my hips on his backward stroke, quickly shifting the angle of my pelvis to capture the head of his cock. Then I used my heels to press into his ass as I drove upward and impaled myself on his thick shaft.

“Yes,” I sighed in satisfaction.

“Oh fuck. God fucking damn.” He gasped. “That feels so good.”

He canted his hips, then drove hard into my heat. The warm, smooth feel of his cock stroking the walls of my pussy was sheer perfection. I’d never had anyone feel the way he did. In the past few years I tried to find that feeling with other people, but no one ever measured up.

This. This right here was the best—and proof we were made for each other.

He pushed up to brace his weight on his arms as his hips worked harder and faster. Dark brown eyes locked on mine and seemed to say all the things his words didn’t.

“Harder,” I demanded.

His eyes flared before they became intense, and he pounded into me in a relentless rhythm. The slap of flesh was rapid and punishing but wasn’t hard enough. It was in that moment that I realized I’d never get enough of him. He could never fuck me hard enough, or deep enough, or long enough. I’d always be greedy and want more of his cock in me. I wanted him everywhere. I wanted him to erase everything but how he filled me.

Yet, each bruising thrust drove me closer to something I hadn’t experienced since that first night—an undeniable soul-deep connection. With Nico, it was more than sex. This was something all-consuming and perfect.

Relentless, he fucked me as the ripples intensified and my muscles began to quiver. Suddenly it was there—an explosion of utter bliss. My body curled in on itself as I sought to wrap myself around that feeling and hold it as long as I could.

As my pussy clutched his shaft and spasmed violently, he slowed, drawing out that amazing ecstasy. Only when I collapsed back on the bed did he pause. Panting, he started down at me with passion burning in the windows to his soul.

Sweat left a sheen on his skin as he hovered over me. My fingertips trailed over the designs inked into his chest. Then my body shook with one last ripple of euphoria.

He slowly moved again, and I gasped. A wicked grin tilted his lips before he flipped us over so I straddled his hips. My hands slapped to his chest to balance me, and I let out a surprised “oh!” when he snapped his hips up and his cock drove so deep, I saw stars.

“Ride me,” he demanded as he gripped my thighs.

And I did. With each downward movement, he rose and his cock went so deep my face tingled as my eyes rolled.

“That’s it,” he coaxed. “Fuck me. Come for me, baby.”

My next orgasm built slower but was no less explosive as I felt the gush soak us both. My head hung as my chin pressed into my chest and my shoulders folded in. Nails digging into him, I shuddered with the force of my climax.

But we weren’t done. The man was a beast. He lifted me off, causing me to whimper at the loss, but it wasn’t for long.

Before I knew it, he had my face down, ass in the air, and he was plowing into my pussy. Nothing mattered but how good he made me feel. With each thrust, he drove out the bad and filled me with his light. As his rhythm faltered, I knew he was close.

His breathing became ragged, and his fingers dug into my flesh until suddenly he withdrew. I protested, but the hot splash of his cum as it hit my back and my ass reminded me we’d been foolish.

Too bad I couldn’t find it in me to care.

He rolled us to the side and wiped his release off me with what I assumed was his T-shirt. Then he cradled me in his arms. My fingers laced with his glove-clad ones, and I felt true peace for the first time in years.

As I snugged into his body, I saw what looked like a sketchbook on his side table. Curious, I leaned forward and grabbed it.

“You draw?” I asked, surprised.

“Hey, give me that,” he said as he reached to pluck it from my hands. “Of course I draw. I’m a tattoo artist,” he said with a huff.

I sat up to keep it out of his reach while I opened it. He sighed and fell back to the bed as he threw an arm over his eyes.

Flipping through page after page of my likeness, I was stunned by what I saw. Every so often there was a drawing of a wolf. I knew it was the same wolf because in each one there was a notch in one ear. Seeing those drawings reminded me of the dream I had of the wolf. That quickly faded when I realized he’d drawn me from memory and with incredible recall of those memories.

“These are me! What the hell, Chains? Does my brother know you have this?” The dates started after our first time together.

“I’m still alive. What do you think?” Extracting the sketchbook from my hands, he tucked it away in the drawer of the nightstand. His face remained frustratingly neutral.

“You’ve been drawing me since that first night?” I asked as I leaned on an elbow and looked down at him. A warm, protected feeling blossomed in my chest at the thought. He’d been thinking about me for years. It wasn’t only me that hadn’t been able to forget.

“Can we talk about this another time?” he grumbled, and a soft smile kicked the corner of my mouth up.

“You’re an amazing artist, Nico.”

“Thank you,” he mumbled. His arm tightened around me as I settled into his shoulder and curled around his side. In his arms, nothing could get to me.

Right as I slipped to the in-between of waking and sleep, I knew one thing with certainty.

He owned me body and soul.