Lover Unleashed (Black Dagger Brotherhood #9)(116)

My father didn’t want me to reproduce.

That was pretty much all he’d had to say. And afterward, like a dead body that had rolled over faceup in still water, that shit had sunk down again, resettling on the sandy riverbed of the very core of him.

BJ, or Before Jane, he’d only ever had sex with his pants on. Not from shame—or at least that was what he’d told himself—but because he simply hadn’t been interested in going there with the anonymous males and females he’d f*cked.

AJ? It had been different. Naked was more than cool, likely because Jane had kept a tight head at his revelation. And yet as he thought about it now, he’d always held her at arm’s length, even if she’d been in his arms. If anything, he’d been closer to Butch—but that was male-to-male, which was somehow less threatening than male-to-female.

Shades of Mommy issues, no doubt: After everything his mahmen had pulled, he simply couldn’t trust females like he could his brothers or his best friend.

Except Jane had never betrayed him. In fact, she’d been willing to battle her own conscience just to save him from the unspeakable act his twin had been demanding.

“You are not my mother,” he said into his shellan’s hair.

“Damn right.” Jane pulled back and looked him right in the eye—as was her way. “I never would have abandoned my son. Or treated my daughter that way.”

V took a long inhale, and when he let the oxygen out of his lungs, he felt like he was expelling the myths by which he’d defined himself . . . and Jane . . . and their mating.

He needed to change the paradigm.

For them. For himself. For Butch.

Christ, the expression on the cop’s face when things had been going down here had been beyond tragic.

So, yeah, it was time to stop using outside shit to self-medicate his emotions. The extreme sex and the pain had seemed like excellent solutions for a long time, but in reality, they had been concealer over a pimple: The ugliness had stayed within him.

What he had to do was deal with the inside crap so he didn’t need Butch or anyone else to break him down just so he could let things out. That way, the kink could truly be only for pleasure with Jane.

Check his shit out—looked like he was finally prepared to try a psychiatric version of Proactiv.

Next thing he knew he was going to be on TV, staring into a camera and saying, “All it takes is a little dab of Self-awareness . . . and then I rinse with the patented Defining Yourself Wash, and my mind and emotions are clean and glowing—”

Okay, now he was really losing his damn marbles, true.

Stroking Jane’s soft hair, he murmured, “About . . . the things I have here. If you’re game, I’m still going to want to play . . . if you know what I mean. But from now on, it’s just for fun, and only for you and me.”

Hell, they’d had a shitload of good, leathered-up, freaky sex in this place, and he was always going to want that with her. Hopefully, she’d feel the same—

“I like what we do here.” She smiled. “It turns me on.”

Well . . . didn’t that get his cock pumping. “Me, too.”

As he smiled back at her, he recognized the one spanner in the mix: This turn-a-new-leaf resolution was all well and good—but how did he keep it going? Tomorrow evening he simply couldn’t afford to wake up and be that guy who went off the rails anymore.

Shit, he guessed he was going to find out how. Wasn’t he.

With a gentle hand, he brushed his shellan’s cheek. “I’ve never been in a relationship before you. I should have known that we’d hit a wall at some point.”

“That’s the way it works.”

He thought of his brothers and the number of times there had been fallouts and fights and arguments among that bunch of meatheaded fighters. Somehow, they’d always worked it out—usually by popping each other from time to time. Which was a guy thing.

Clearly, he and Jane were going to be the same. Not with the popping, of course, but with the bumpy roads and the eventual resolutions. After all, this was life . . . not a fairy tale.

“But you know what the best thing is?” his Jane asked, as she put her arms around his neck.

“I don’t feel like I died anymore because you’re not in my life?”

“Well, yeah, that, too.” She craned up and kissed him. “Two words: makeup sex.”

Ohhhhhh, yeaaaaaaaaah. Except—“Wait, is that three words? Or did you hyphenate it?”

“I had a hyphen in my head. But I think it goes both ways?”

“Or is it ‘makeup,’ one word.”

“That’s also a possibility.” Pause. “Have I mentioned you are the hottest geek I’ve ever known?”

“I resemble that remark.” He dipped his head and brushed his mouth against hers. “Just keep it to yourself. I have a reputation as a hard-ass to protect.”

“Your secret is safe with me.”

V grew serious. “I’m safe with you.”

Jane touched his face. “I can’t promise you we’re not going to hit rough patches again, and I know we’re not always going to agree. But on this I’m very sure—you will always be safe with me. Always.”

Vishous drew her close and tucked his head into her throat. He’d assumed there were no more levels to go after she’d died and then come back to him in her lovely, ghostly form. But he was wrong. Love, he realized, was like the daggers he made in his forge: When you first got one, it was shiny and new and the blade glinted bright in the light. Holding it against your palm, you were full of optimism for what it would be like in the field, and you couldn’t wait to try it out. Except those first couple of nights out were usually awkward as you got used to it and it got used to you.