Say It's Forever (Redemption Hills #2)(50)

She slowly shifted, her gaze soft as she carefully padded in my direction. Waves of energy rippled with each step. She stopped in the middle of the room, the girl warring, though she lifted that chin.

“And I see a man who found me in a storm where I was lost. A man who took the time to rescue me. A man who’s a protector. A man who’s good and kind. A man who’s also broken. I see the pain, Jud. I see it. I feel it because it lives in me, too.”

“Enchantress. You’ve got me transfixed. Don’t know what the fuck I’m doing.”

Energy crashed from her spirit.

Need fisted my guts, and the words left me on a low demand. “When do you feel the most beautiful, Salem?”

This fierce, unrelenting girl actually blushed. Heat exploded from that delicious flesh.

She lifted that stunning face. “I think I might have forgotten.”

I took a step forward. The air trembled and shook. “It’s all I see when I look at you. Beauty. You’re the definition of it. You don’t have to be shy. Don’t have to be afraid. You’re safe with me, darlin’.”

The savage promise stoked the flames. Truth that I wanted to erase that fear from her eyes.

The truth that I was asking her for some of that trust I didn’t deserve but wanted right then, anyway.

I should run from the fire.

But I took another step deeper.

Salem swept her tongue across her plump lips as those eyes were doing that thing that slayed me through.

Intense and wild and seductive.

Girl became a vixen in a beat.

Alive under my stare.

“I want to see, Salem, how you feel when I’m looking at you. Show me.”

Attraction blazed through the dull, dusky light.

Sparks and flames.

She hesitated—contemplated—then she stared me down as she reached around to loosen the zipper at the back of her skirt.

She let it go and it fell to her ankles.

Motherfuck.

I gulped. Tried to breathe.

She kicked the fabric aside, and the girl stood there in that loose, flowy, knit blouse and a pair of white underwear.

Those legs were bare.

Curvy and luscious and…fuck.

My mouth went dry.

Had to physically restrain myself from going for her.

She adjusted the swoop of the neckline, letting it drape off one delicate shoulder, and she slowly sank to her knees on the floor. She spread them apart, and a pant rasped from her mouth when she did, like the girl was impaled by the same bolt of lust that skewered through me.

“Shit.” It curled from my mouth hard and low.

She angled her head just to the side so that scar was exposed, her hair rolling down her shoulders like a river of black.

I felt held.

Compelled.

A spell rippling through the shadows that took me hostage.

Black-fuckin’-magic.

Salem smoothed her hand over her stomach, those eyes piercing as she stared at me from across the space. “This, Jud, this is how I feel when you’re looking at me. Like I matter. Like I don’t have to hide. Like for the first time in years, I am seen. Like I exist.”





SIXTEEN





SALEM





My throat locked with anticipation as I rested high on my knees.

Held.

Enthralled.

Enraptured.

Caught in a violent storm that had come from out of nowhere. A tsunami that had hit unaware.

Where both of us would drown.

Where I had become a piece of the torment written in the bold strokes of paint that covered every surface of his studio.

A piece of the agony weaved into the canvas.

The thickened air strained in and out of my lungs as I remained as still as I could. A picture for him to see. An element for him to piece together.

To carve and shape and mold me into an abhorrent beauty that matched his walls.

The man stood by the door.

His massive shoulders heaved with each harsh, hot breath that rocked from his wide, wide chest.

A monster.

A wraith.

A tower.

A fortress.

A dark, dark sanctuary where I wanted to disappear.

I was still struck by the images.

By the suggestions that swirled and whispered and screamed from the walls.

As if they were alive and crying out to be heard.

The chaos that littered this bad boy’s mind was written in blacks and whites and reds.

But I’d recognized it before, hadn’t I? Hell, I’d had the intuition that the paintings out in his living room had been more than personal the first night we’d met.

He was an artist, but I hadn’t been quite prepared then for what that really meant.

“You matter, Salem. You matter. Look at you, darlin’.”

There was the charm all mixed up with the disorder that was at the heart of this man.

My chest squeezed and the blood thundered through my veins.

“Beauty. The meaning of it.” The words fell on a harsh exhale from his lips, and the air that was barely skating up my throat died right there when he slowly toed off the dress shoes he wore.

Obsidian eyes flashed like a rush of the darkest night, rough as they devoured me from across the space.

Without looking away, he leaned down and peeled the socks from his feet.