Lead Me Home (Fight for Me #3)
A.L. Jackson
Prologue
I’d always wondered why people set themselves up for disaster. Why they put their heart on the line when they knew it would only be crushed. Why they led themselves toward the slaughter like blind, ignorant lambs.
Willingly.
I hurried down the short hall of my apartment toward the pounding at my front door. Somehow, I knew that was exactly what I was doing. Yet, there was absolutely nothing I could do to stop myself.
A storm battered the walls, and the windows rattled with a low rumble of thunder.
The door clattered with a fresh round of banging.
The knocking felt a partner to the storm—violent and unyielding yet so utterly distinct.
My heart rose higher in my throat with every pound on the wood. It was as if an accelerant had been poured directly into my blood.
It was close to two in the morning.
Someone showing up at this time of night—in the middle of a downpour, no less—should make me cautious.
If I searched myself, I guessed a little part of me was afraid, but only because I was sure of who was on the other side of the door.
He’d always been dangerous.
Dangerous to my sanity.
Dangerous to my heart.
Obviously, none of that mattered. I was drawn to him anyway.
Tied.
Nothing more than an offering.
I hoisted up on my tiptoes to peer through the peephole, and I sucked in a breath when I saw the tortured face pleading back.
So gorgeous in its hardened, chiseled way. Wind gusted through the longer pieces of his dark-blond hair, his shirt soaked and clinging to his massive body from having to make his way through the deluge that pummeled at the roof.
Quickly, I worked through the lock and yanked open the door.
Chills flashed.
A shockwave.
All brought on by the sight of him.
“Ollie,” I whispered, my spirit in an uproar.
Neither of us would ever forget this date.
It was the anniversary of the day his sister Sydney had gone missing.
That was thirteen years ago, and in all that time, he had never come to me. As desperately as I’d needed him . . . as desperately as I’d known he needed me . . . he never came.
He staggered in with a half-drained bottle of scotch clutched in his hand and kicked the door shut behind him.
He dropped the bottle to the carpeted floor, and there was no time to contemplate the thud before he was stalking my way.
Body massive.
A burly, beautiful, beast of a man.
I took a startled step back, sucking for the air his presence had stolen. Energy streaked through the room. Those big hands darted out and captured my face in the same second his mouth captured mine.
Lips and tongue and searing heat.
Liquor kisses.
My head spun and need blistered across my skin.
He groaned in misery and released the words between the manic scourge of his mouth. “I need you, Nikki. Need you in a way I haven’t needed anything in all my life. Take it away. Fuck . . . please take it away.”
If I could, I would.
It was all I’d ever wanted to do.
“Ollie.” His name was grief.
Love.
Regret.
“I need you, too. I’ve always needed you,” I told him, the confession striking the air between us with the force of a bomb. Blowing through my tiny apartment. “Why did you wait so long?”
It was a question that had him swooping me into the overwhelming strength of his arms.
He kissed me as he carried me the few steps down the hall. He kissed me when he laid me down on my bed. And he kissed me when he murmured, “You are everything I ever wished I could have.”
Desire blossomed in my body.
Full bloom.
So compelling it became its own beat, a thunder in my veins that rumbled as loudly as the storm that raged overhead.
The scariest part was the way my heart sang with the hope of it.
Because I had always belonged to Oliver Preston.
The problem was, he’d never fully belonged to me.
I owned his gazes. His protection. His regret.
But he’d never allow me to possess his broken spirit.
I knew it when he tore the clothes from my body and fumbled with his belt.
I knew it when his pants and underwear hit the floor.
I knew it most when he wedged himself between my thighs and his body met with mine.
I gasped, and he cursed, and for a moment, it was only the two of us. For a moment, we weren’t just another casualty of that horrible, horrible day.
Holding me, he moved in me. With me. He panted and touched and whispered, “You take it away. You take it away. You feel so good. So good.”
His fucks were deep.
Possessive.
And somehow, painfully tender.
Tears filled my eyes when he pressed his forehead to mine, and a confession fell from his mouth on a low moan, “I miss her. I miss her so much. When will it stop? When will this feeling ever go away?”
I clung to him.
Gave him my body.
If I could, I would have given him everything.
But I guessed maybe I knew better when his body went rigid and he grunted when he came, one moment behind me as he drew out my pleasure perfectly.
Knew better when he slumped to the bed and wrapped me in his muscled arms that were covered in weeping ink.