“I don’t want to talk about it anymore, and I certainly don’t want you to feel guilty. I made that choice. I’d probably make the same one again if it got me to this rooftop.”

“You’re something else, babe. You really want that tat now?”

“Yep.”

“Then let’s clean up and head down.”

The woman never ceased to surprise me. And I’d found the surprises both good and bad so far—although mostly good.

The bomb she dropped about Titan made me want to dig my old sidearm out of my drawer and hunt the motherfucker down. But I was trying something new: trust. If Vanessa said she was going to take care of it, I was going to trust that she would. I’d gotten over most of my old issues, and the lasagna we’d shared indicated that she was getting over some of hers.

So this was what an adult relationship felt like? With any other woman, I might have missed the variety of my previous lifestyle, but with Vanessa in my bed, I couldn’t even remember a single one of those women. She was the ultimate prize. And I would do my damnedest to cherish her.

I helped her down the last rungs of the fire escape, and the ladder squeaked and groaned as it retracted up into its resting position. At eleven, I’d had to climb on a nearby dumpster and jump for it. To this day I didn’t know what it was about this building that called to me so strongly. All I knew was, once I had the money, I’d bought it. I’d hired a crazy talented, but retired, tattoo artist to spend a year teaching me both the art and the business. I’d always been able to draw, and it had been therapeutic learning to use my hands to create rather than to kill.

I tossed the trash in the garbage and opened the door, letting Vanessa precede me into the shop. She made her way directly to my room, and I flipped on a few necessary lights. I paused, remembering the drawing I’d been working on a few days ago. It was willful blindness for me to draw it and pretend that I didn’t know exactly who I was drawing it for. I ducked into the break room and grabbed it off my desk.

It was a fleur de lis resting in a crown.

Vanessa was waiting in my chair when I entered the room. And she was naked. Buck. Ass. Naked.

I think my heart stopped. But when it resumed, it thudded away in a heavy beat.

“What—”

“Once you told me the only way a woman got time alone with you here was to get a tattoo or get on her knees or back. I decided to go with on my back first and then the tattoo.”

Who the hell is this woman?

I dropped the drawing on the counter. Only a stupid man would turn that offer down, and today I was very, very smart.

“Well, aren’t you full of surprises tonight.”

“I’m going with my gut. It’s a new thing for me. Feel free to stop me at any time.”

That would be a hell no.

“No, I don’t think I will.”

I leaned down and pressed a kiss to her forehead, the tip of her nose, her lips, her chin. Her sharply indrawn breath kept me going south. A skim of my lips down her throat. A nip to her collarbone. And then finally my tongue laving the upper slope of her breast. I couldn’t keep my hands out of the show. I cupped her tits and lifted her nipples to my mouth.

Vanessa’s soft moan and tensing body urged me on.

“I love your tits. Love these nipples. Can’t think about them without my cock going rock hard. Can’t help but want my mouth on them all the damn time. Someday, I want to fuck these gorgeous tits and come all over them.”

Her closed eyes fluttered open. “Don’t let me stop you.”

I shook my head. “Not tonight. Tonight, you just handed me a fantasy I’ve had since the last time you sat in this chair.”

“Really? You wanted this… then?”

I laughed, and it came out rusty. “Why do you sound surprised?”

“You hated me.”

“I never hated you. Just didn’t want to want you so damn bad. And now I don’t care—because you’re mine.”

She buried a hand in my hair and pulled my mouth to hers. Her other hand found its way to my belt as she fumbled it open and worked the button and zipper. When her soft hand closed around my cock, I groaned into her mouth and pulled back. Even though I didn’t want her to let go of my dick, I had to make her. Otherwise I’d be way too eager when I got inside her.

“Slow down, baby. Gotta get you ready first.” I lowered my mouth back to her nipples and let my hand skim down her belly to her landing strip.

“Are you wet for me, princess?”

Her legs shifted slightly as she opened to me. “Find out for yourself.”

My fingers slid lower, parting her, desperate to find her heat. And fuck. She was soaked. My cock jerked as I groaned.

“So fucking wet.”

“Because of you.”

I dropped to my knees on the floor, aware that my pants were falling, but not caring. The only thing I wanted in that moment was my mouth on her pussy as she came against my tongue.

Shoving one arm of the chair down, I turned her and pushed her thighs further apart. “What—”

She went silent when my tongue found her pussy, and I plunged two fingers inside her. Fucking her relentlessly, I teased and sucked on her clit until I felt the fluttering pulses of her inner muscles. I crooked my fingers and stroked her G-spot.

She detonated.

“Con!”

I loved hearing my name on her lips almost as much as I loved the taste of her on my tongue.

She was it. The one. I was done for.

When I pulled my face away and took in her dazed look of pleasure, I knew I wanted to see it every day for the rest of my life. I palmed my cock. I wanted nothing between us.

I lifted her chin and asked, “You good with going bare again? Because I can get a condom.”

“No. Don’t. I want this.” Her arms snaked around me, and she pulled me closer. “Just you. Nothing else.”

So I obliged, fitting my cock against her entrance and slamming home.

“It’s beautiful. I… I love it.”

I stared down at the tattoo on my hip. It was beautiful, and I did love it. And not just because the fleur de lis and crown were intricately drawn and amazing. I loved it because Con had been the one to do it. Women everywhere would raise their pitchforks if they knew I considered it a sort of brand. No one could ever look at my naked body again and not see the mark that Con had left on me.