Page 23 of Bloodstained Wings
When the smoke settles, he undoes the belt and throws it across the floor. I gasp, working to catch my breath and clinging to his body in the hot tub just so the harsh jet can finally stop hitting my asshole with such precision. He laughs as he stands up from the water, working hard to keep me upright and against his chest.
“Good, dove,” he whispers, kissing my cheek. “Now, let’s go to bed. I’m not nearly done with you yet.”
He sets me down and finds a spare towel in a moving box down here, wrapping me inside of it. He doesn’t care to do the same, pushing me to walk up the steps while he slides into his pants, still soaking wet. He doesn’t bother fighting with his shirt, and I’m happy about that, his chiseled physique driving me crazy.
We’re halfway through the living room when there’s a light knock on the door. Carter kisses my temple, points to the stairs to signal our bedroom, and makes his way to the front door. For some reason, perhaps due to my constant desire to defy him and be punished over it later, I hesitate to leave, keeping him in my sight.
He swings the door open, and an unfamiliar man stands on the doorstep.
“Who the fuck are you?” Carter asks.
The man slides his hands into his front pockets and looks at me through the clearest eyes I’ve ever seen in my life. Like glass, I can sense the resemblance in his features already, and it makes me far too afraid to move.
“You look just like—”
“Like Jacob Lacey?” the man interrupts, finishing my sentence. “He was my twin brother.”
Chapter Nine
Carter
I grab the stranger by the collar of his shirt, pushing his back against the foyer wall and pinning him there for safekeeping. Isabella is frozen in a panic on the stairs, watching the scene unfold.
“Dove, get my phone off the kitchen island and call Anita.”
She works quick to do as I say, this man’s eyes darting sideways while he watches her move. She’s wearing nothing but a towel, and it doesn’t do much to hide her stunning body. Her ass is nearly out when she reaches to grab my phone, and I move into his line of sight to prevent him from getting a glimpse.
His smile turns innocent. “Relax, Carter. I come in peace. Check me if you’d like. No weapons, wires, or otherwise.”
“I don’t need to check you,” I bite. “I’ll just have you killed for coming over here, whether you’re related to Lacey or not. You better hope you’re not. It won’t end well for you.”
Isabella speaks in a panicked whisper, my eyes catching the sight of my family spilling out of Anita’s house and crossing the lawn to get here. I’m even more thankful that I bought this house so close to my family’s hub, meaning that backup is only a few yards away.
I throw the stranger into Lorenzo’s chest, purely because he makes it through the front door first. A few other people manage to pin him down on the foyer floor, meaning I can shift my attention to Isabella in the kitchen. I take my phone from her, cradling the back of her head so I can let her lean forward into me.
I kiss her forehead, feeling her racing pulse, either from our sex downstairs or the new fear lacing through her body now. I want to calm her down, but my first concern is getting her out of sight… and fully dressed.
“Go upstairs and change. Don’t come down here, dove.” I release her, and she nods, but I take her arm and meet her eyes one last time. “I mean it. Stay up there, or we’re going to have a problem.”
She gives a more believable nod this time.
It’s not as though I don’t trust my little dove or that I enjoy punishing her more times in a day than I should in a week, but she’s very curious. She likes to be involved, and until she knows how to work a pistol and deal with some of these sadistic pricks in my line of work, then I need her to stay back.
Losing Isabella Julis would ruin me.
When she’s through the hall upstairs, and I’m sure she can’t hear the scuffle down here, I stand over the wiggling rat on my foyer floor. He is the spitting image of Jacob Lacey, which just makes my trigger finger too damn happy.
Lorenzo hands me his gun, and I’m thankful that he can read my mind, the barrel lining up to this prick’s chest while I consider how fast I want him to bleed out compared to how fast I want him to die.
“Give me a moment to explain,” he says, oddly calm for a dead man. “I’m not here to cause problems. I came alone and unarmed. Just give me the opportunity to explain.”
“A Lacey doesn’t get to explain,” I snarl. “You’re lucky you still have a tongue right now.”
He nods as if agreeing with me. His fucking gall is unbelievable, I’ll give him that, but it’s also increasingly annoying.
“What the fuck do you want, then?” I snap, needing to know what he’s thinking.
“Can I get off the floor to explain, at least?”