“Does that feel good, Allie girl?”

“I like it.”

“But . . . ?”

“But I need you to pinch them.”

“Like this?” He twisted the stiffening flesh between thumb and forefinger. She groaned. “I take that as a yes?”

“Mmm, yes . . .”

Hearing her moans, feeling her heat up beneath him, was making him hard again. He felt the desire like a pressure inside his body, his balls, his cock.

“Gotta fuck you again,” he said, as much to himself as to her.

He arched his hips until his cock pressed against her sex. She was wet, the lips slick and swollen.

He let the tip slide there, back and forth in the liquid heat of her body, before he pushed inside.

Yes, this was what he needed. To lose himself in her. In pure, mindless pleasure. In the primal nature of fucking.

He plunged into her over and over, his grip on her lush body tightening, his fingers digging into her hips. But it wasn’t about giving her pain. It wasn’t about kink at all. Maybe it wasn’t even about sex. It was more about forgetting.

He came, his body shaking, and collapsed on top of her. It was a long while before he caught his breath and realized he was probably crushing her.

“Fuck. Sorry, babe.”

He rolled off her and she turned onto her side, looking at him. She laid her hand on his chest.

“You okay?” she asked again.

“Fine. You keep asking me that.”

“I’m just . . .” She paused, bit her lip. “Checking.”

He wasn’t quite fine. Not yet. But he would be. There was just something about seeing his family—seeing them with Allie at his side—that made things more painfully clear. But he couldn’t think about it now. He didn’t want to.

Some things were just too dark and ugly to look at in the light of a Sunday afternoon.

CHAPTER Fourteen

HE WOKE AT six a.m., the morning gray and overcast. Allie was asleep beside him, unmoving except for the gentle rise and fall of her breasts. He’d kept her up late, had gone out to his truck to get his rope bag at one point and tied her up, practicing some complicated knots on her. This morning he had to admit it had been mostly so they didn’t have to talk more than it was the pure pleasure of the rope work—either hers or his own.

He hated himself a little for that.

Flash of that cold morning when he’d gotten up and left her sleeping all those years ago. His heart in his throat as he looked at her one last time, so fucking beautiful, her head pillowed on one arm, eyes closed, long lashes against her cheeks. That tearing sensation as he left her behind. The churning in his gut for days after. The bottle of Scotch he’d finished that night while he’d justified his actions to himself over and over.

He wasn’t good enough for her.

Never had been. Allie was a good girl. What the hell had he done?

He’d hated himself then, too.

“Fuck,” he muttered, sitting up in the bed and running his hands over his head, rubbing the grit out of his eyes. “This is different.”

But was it, ultimately?

He felt twitchy, and he hated feeling twitchy. It only meant one thing.

He got up and found his clothes and came back to the bedroom, intending to tell her he was leaving. But she looked too peaceful to wake—that was what he was telling himself, anyway—one arm thrown over her eyes, her hair spread out on the pillows. He watched her sleeping for several minutes before he turned to leave.

New Orleans was quiet this early on a Monday morning. The quiet was giving him far too much time to think. About everything he could have—should have—been. And he didn’t want to go there. But it was too late, wasn’t it?

His head was pounding, his heart racing, as he turned on some music, loud, head-banging metal, and let it drown out his thoughts as he drove the all-too-familiar route to the club on the Pontchartrain Expressway. He parked and jumped out. The warehouse doors were closed. He pulled and found them locked.

“What the fuck?”

There was always someone at the club. Unless it had been raided over the weekend and he hadn’t heard about it.

He kicked the door with his boot. It hurt, the pain reverberating up his leg, but he did it again, anyway.

“God fucking damn it.”

He needed the club right now. Needed to fight.

He jumped in his truck and gunned the engine, heading for his gym instead.

It didn’t take him long to get there, only minutes to change. The place was mostly empty this early in the morning. The before-work crowd would arrive any time, though. He found Antoine on his back, bench pressing as he came out of the locker room.

“Spar?” he asked him without preamble.

Antoine set the bar back on the stand with a puff of breath. “Sure. You want to warm up first?”

“Not really, but I will,” he muttered, ignoring Antoine’s curious stare.

He did a quick tape job on his hands and worked the speed bag first, really laying into it, working up a quick sweat. It felt good, that burn in his muscles, the impact of the bag against his knuckles. But he needed a challenge. He went to find Antoine, who was still working out with the weights.

“I’m ready,” he said.

Antoine looked up, set the heavy dumbbells down. “Okay. Let’s go.”

They ducked under the ropes and stepped into the ring. Antoine started to move right away—he was always good with the footwork. But Mick felt his brain settle into laser-focus. He threw the first punch, but Antoine ducked. And it pissed him off.

He went after him, managed to land a fist on his chest, a kick to the thigh, then another punch to the body.

“Hey! What the hell is up with you, man?” Antoine yelled.

But he didn’t stop. He couldn’t. His bad leg ached. It only made frustration boil through him. Made him think the words that had haunted him most of his life.

Failure.

He remembered in a flash the doctor coming in after his leg surgery, telling him he’d never be able to pass the physical required to be a firefighter. He remembered the look on his father’s face, the shock and dismay he’d tried to hide. But Mick had seen it. Had felt it every damn day since.

Fuckup.

He remembered all the times he’d come home after curfew. Cut school. Hurt Allie. Hurt his family. Hurt his own chance at the life he should have fucking had.

Antoine fought back, finally taking Mick down to the mat with a roundhouse. He held him down.

“What the fuck, Mick? You gone crazy?”

He was breathing hard, his airway partially constricted by Antoine’s elbow across his throat. “Let me up.”

“Not until you explain yourself.”

“I can’t.”

Antoine was silent for several moments before shoving himself off him. He stood up. “You need to figure your shit out, man. Go take a sauna or something.”

Mick glared at him.

Antoine crossed his arms. “You wanna tell me what you’re trying to prove? Fucking coming after me in a spar, man. If I didn’t know you, I’d think you had some kind of death wish.”

Hadn’t he thought the same thing not that long ago? Mick sat up, then got to his feet. “Nothing. It’s nothing.” He wiped the sweat from his face with the back of one arm. “Sorry I’m being an asshole. Rough morning.”

“Yeah, well go spread that sunshine somewhere else. I don’t need it.” Antoine shook his head and walked away, leaving Mick in the middle of the ring, anger still bubbling like some black cauldron in his belly.

He needed to fight. But the fight he needed wasn’t with Antoine.

He left the ring, left the gym, driving home too fast in the morning traffic.

What he needed was dirty and rough and illegal. He’d make some calls until he found it.