“Alexis told me what you’re going to do for Liam,” I said, my voice quiet.
Lee exhaled and stretched his legs out as much as he could in the small space. “I take it from the way you’re looking at me now that you don’t approve.”
“Please don’t do it, Lee,” I begged, unable to hold back my desperation. A tear fell down my cheek, and he reached out to wipe it away.
“Don’t cry,” he murmured tenderly. “I’ve been breaking the law for years. It’s only right that I finally serve my time.”
I turned into him, burying my face in his neck as I whispered, “But I don’t want you to go away.”
“It won’t be forever,” he replied, stroking my hair as his lips pressed against my temple.
“I don’t understand how you’re just accepting this. Before you said it was going to be fine. You said your solicitor could get Liam off, no problem.”
He sighed. “Yeah, well, when I stopped working for McGregor, I lost a lot of privileges. One of those included my legal representation. So now we don’t have William Dunning on our side, and we also don’t have a hope in hell’s chance of getting Liam’s charges dropped. I can’t let my baby brother go to prison for something I got him into in the first place, Karla. It has to be me. You understand that, right?”
I looked into his eyes and knew I couldn’t argue with him. If I ever had a sister, I’d do the exact same thing, no question. God, he’d been right all along. We were the same. Too stubborn and brave to know what was good for us, out on a mission to save everyone but ourselves.
“Yeah, I understand.”
Soaking him in, I tried to comprehend the fact that in just a few short weeks he could go to prison. I wasn’t going to see him for years, and that terrified me.
A surge of desperation clutched suddenly at my heart as I smashed my mouth to his, kissing him like my life depended on it. He was only twenty-five, so young and handsome and clever, and all his best years were going to be spent in a prison cell. The worst of it was that I knew he wouldn’t come out the same man. He’d lose the spark that always shone so brightly in his eyes, would no longer be the flirty, carefree guy I was once met on a chilly London morning.
Lee’s hands clutched my face, his tongue sinking deep into my mouth as a loud moan escaped me. My fingers slid beneath his shirt, tracing his hard abs. When he grabbed my thighs and pulled them around his waist, his erection was hard as steel against my core. It’d been so long since I’d gotten to touch him like this that my need was close to maddening.
Gasping, he broke our kiss, trailing his mouth down my neck and unbuttoning my blouse until my bra was exposed. He buried his face in my cleavage, a growl rumbling from deep in his chest, and the vibration made me tremble.
“Lee,” I breathed right before a car went sailing by out on the road.
The horn honked as I heard a man shout saucily out the window, “Oi oi!”
Lee and I fell into awkward laughter after that, and I drew away, buttoning my top back up. “Do you, uh, have anything in your car we could use as a tow?”
His hand met my lower back. “Stay with me tonight, Karla.”
I was helpless to refuse, and only nodded my head in response. Lee placed a quick kiss on my lips, then got out of the car and jogged to his, which was parked just a few yards behind mine. Minutes later, he had my car secured, and I climbed into his passenger seat. All throughout the journey he touched me, whether it was to tuck my hair behind my ear or to squeeze my knee, and every time he did, my stomach fluttered with anticipation.
He didn’t bother going to the garage, but instead drove straight to his place, saying he’d have one of the boys come fix my car in the morning. I knew that tomorrow everything would change, but for tonight I just wanted to live in the moment.
Lee tugged me inside his hallway and immediately pressed his mouth to mine, his hands everywhere as we tried to find our way upstairs without stopping what we were doing. I giggled when we both simultaneously tripped and fell halfway up.
“Hush,” Lee whispered, his lips finding mine again.
I loved how he kissed me; whether fast or slow, he always made it feel like it could be our last. I tried to push that thought aside when I realised how sad it made me. Somehow we managed to make it to his room, and proceeded to strip one another of all our clothing.
Completely naked, he laid me down on his bed, his handsome features serious in the dim light. “I hate everyone who gets to be near you when I’m not there. And I hate it because I love my brothers more than anything, but you’re the one I’ll miss the most.”
My heart ached at his proclamation, fear and sadness gripping me tight and not letting go. I placed my hands on his cheeks, my eyes flickering between his, struck speechless. Closing my eyes, I showed him with my body the things I couldn’t tell him in words.
Flipping us, I climbed on top of him, bracing myself above his length and sinking down until he filled me completely. When I began to ride him, I lost all thought, totally consumed by sensation. Lee gripped my waist and held my eyes, never looking away once.
If this was the last time, I was going to make it count.
Lee reached down and found my clit with his thumb, rubbing intense circles with his practiced hands. His cock felt amazing, and it was only as I began to climb toward orgasm that I realised we hadn’t used protection. He was inside me bare, but surprisingly, I didn’t panic. I felt closer to him than I’d ever had, and if there was a single doubt in my mind that I loved him, it fell by the wayside.
I’d never loved before. Now I loved too much. And in the morning, I’d lose him.
There was a sweet sort of tragedy to it all.
When I came, I closed my eyes, dropped to his chest, and sank my face into the crook of his neck, whether for comfort or to hide my tears, I couldn’t seem to tell.
“I’m sorry if I ever hurt you,” I whispered into the dark room.
Lee was quiet for a long time before he whispered back, “Hurting with you is better than a painless life without you.”
His words penetrated deep, and I held him tighter, wishing I didn’t have to let go.
Twenty
Tony and I stood outside the Old Bailey, sipping on bad takeaway coffee and waiting out the last few minutes before we had to go inside. He knew just how difficult a day I had ahead of me, and he didn’t try to fill the quiet with random small talk. He let me have my time to think and prepare.
I’d left Lee’s bed early in the morning, my heart sore as I watched him sleep. My gaze traced the contours of his body, taking pictures to store in my memory. I was lost in thought when I felt Tony nudge me with his elbow, and looked up to see the Cross brothers arrive. They all wore suits, looking smart and professional. It was at odds with their usual laid-back, streetwise style.
My heart pounded when I locked eyes with Lee, flashbacks from the night before flooding my mind. I remembered how his lips tasted, how his hands roamed my skin, claiming everything they touched. It was a cold day, but I still felt too hot in my uniform. It was suffocating, and I suddenly found it hard to breathe.
Two men approached the brothers, their legal representation, I was assuming. Some words were exchanged, and then they all began to make their way toward the courthouse. The closer Lee got, the more my lungs constricted, and when he walked right past me without so much as a glance, I felt bereft.
“Come on, we better head inside, too,” said Tony, his voice gentle.
Knocking back the last of my coffee, I followed him in, and we took our seats in the court room. There were a number of cases being heard that day, and when the judge came in, he looked harried and stressed. Why did judges always look like that? Like the last thing they had in the world was time, and you were being intolerably rude by presuming you warranted even a moment of it.