Move the Sun (Signal Bend #1)(28)

She gave him her cell and her landline, writing them out on the back of her grocery receipt. When she turned around, Isaac was standing right behind her, his jeans closed again, but his kutte and shirt off. Jesus, he was hot—huge and muscular, with beautiful ink, those leather cuffs around his wrists, the medallion around his neck. It looked something like an upside-down cross, but not exactly.

Lilli handed him the paper, and he took it with a lift of his eyebrow. As he put it in his wallet, she reached out her hand and lifted the medallion. “What is this?”

“It’s Mj?lnir.” Lilli didn’t recognize the word, and she wrinkled her forehead at him. He laughed.

“Thor’s Hammer. You know Thor, right?”

“Yeah, I know Thor. I just wasn’t expecting you to say a word like that.”

“You really think I’m an idiot bumpkin, don’t ya?”

She didn’t. She knew he was smart. But he was more worldly and well read than she’d given him credit for, that was true. “No, I don’t. It’s just—”

He cut her off. “It’s fine. Underestimate me all you want. Just makes my job easier, figuring you out. A lot of us around here, me included, have Norwegian heritage. I like mythology, and, well, Norse god of thunder, Harleys, seemed like a fit to me. So, Mj?lnir.”

She smiled. “Viking stock, huh? Explains your size.”

Grinning, he put his hands on her hips, and she realized she was standing there naked. “Like my size, do ya?”

She shrugged. “It’ll do.”

He reached back with one hand and tugged on the band holding her ponytail. “Take this out. I like it loose.”

She did as he asked, nodding toward him. “You, too, then. I like yours loose, too.” He did as she asked.

He combed his fingers through her hair, fluffing it around her shoulders, laying it over her breasts. “You got sheets on that bed now?”

“I do.”

Trailing a finger down the middle of her chest, he murmured, “I want to take you back there and f*ck you in your bed. Take my time. What d’ya think?”

Lilli shook her head. “I’m not much for a sweet f*ck, love.”

“I said I wanted to take my time. Didn’t say I wanted to be sweet.” The gleam in his eyes was feral.

“Then I’m in.”

oOo

Lilli woke with a start and got oriented quickly. The room was bright with sunlight. Crap. What time was it? She reached over and grabbed her phone: 9:38. Jesus. She had no idea when she’d last slept so late.

She lay back and let herself wake fully up.

Then she noticed the bed was full. She looked to her left and saw a broad wall of back and a mane of sable hair. Isaac. He’d spent the night. How the f*ck had that happened?

No, she knew exactly how it happened. She and Isaac had essentially f*cked each other unconscious.

Holy shit, that had been one for the books. She was realizing that she was sore virtually everywhere now.

He was sleeping on his stomach, the pillow gathered under his head and chest. The sheet and light blanket were pushed down low, only covering his legs and the bottom of his ass. She reached to shake him awake and then stopped. She wanted to look for a minute. She’d not seen his bare back until now. That seemed strange; they’d been naked and enthusiastically intimate two of the four days they’d known each other, and he’d showered in her bathroom, but somehow she’d missed this view.

Inked across his muscular shoulders, one side to the other, starting just below the pieces that ran from his shoulders down his upper arms, was the word HORDE in thick, black letters six inches tall. He had no other ink on his back. The only other marks were several—maybe as many as a dozen—long, livid scratches. She looked at her hands and saw blood under her fairly short nails. She also noticed bruises forming on her breasts and belly. Arms, too.

It had been a wild night, definitely. She sat up, groaning at the sharp soreness between her legs. She’d grown accustomed to wanting more than the man she was with could or would give her. She’d had some encounters that had gone quite badly when the guy couldn’t find the line between rough and brutal. It looked, though, like she’d met her match. It also looked like they’d perhaps lost that line together.

She remembered every second of it, of course. She just hadn’t been aware they’d crossed a line. What she remembered was wild, unrestrained, enduring passion. Her throat was sore from her screaming.

Remembering, she felt herself getting wet. She was far too sore to do anything about that, but she indulged a stray whim and stroked the beautiful, broad planes of Isaac’s back.

He flinched at her touch and rolled quickly to his back. She watched his face move from alarm to confusion to understanding and back to confusion. He took a deep breath and blinked several times.

“Damn. Sorry—I didn’t mean—I don’t—sorry.” He sat up, wincing.

Enjoying that he was at a loss—and that he, too, was sore—she let him swing for a few seconds. Then she smiled. “If you’re trying to apologize for still being here, don’t. It’s fine.”

He reached out and lightly stroked her upper arm, where a large bruise in the shape of his hand and fingers was flowering. “Anything else I need to apologize for?”

She reached out and grazed her hand over the open bite marks on his neck and shoulder. “Seems to me we’re even.”