The Perfect Husband - Lisa Gardner [84]
At long last his lips quirked. “Yeah, I suppose that’s true.”
She took another step forward, but he moved away to the table next to the sofa. He picked up Marion’s gold cigarette case, then pulled out a quick ticket to cancer.
“Go away, Tess.” The match flared to life. He brought it to the end of the cigarette and inhaled deeply.
“I can’t.”
“Haven’t we had this conversation before?”
“Yes, and I won it then too. It’s one of the only things I do well—argue with you.”
“Doesn’t count. Everyone seems to win at that.”
“You really love Marion, don’t you?” She wanted to touch his hand. She wanted to wrap her arms around his shoulders and hold him tight.
It took J.T. a long time to reply. “Yeah. But I’m getting older and wiser every day.”
“Your iguana,” she reminded him. He always told Marion she couldn’t smoke in front of Glug.
His gaze went from her to the pet to her. She could practically see the darkness suddenly bloom in his eyes. The wild self-derision that had been beaten into him by his father and stoked by his sister’s rejection. The self-destructive rage that knew his sister was right and he had failed at everything. In fact, he had planned his life just that way.
The darkness scared her. It touched her. It brought goose bumps to her arms and shivers down her spine. Jim’s rage had terrified her because it had been so cold. J.T.’s anger moved her because it was so real.
“J.T.,” she whispered, and reached out her hand to him.
“You’re right,” he said abruptly.
He lifted the cigarette from his lips. He admired the glowing red tip with mock exaggeration.
He held out his left hand.
“Don’t,” she cried, but it was too late. As she watched, he ground out the red tip in his palm.
“What are you doing?” His pain was in her voice.
“What I was taught.”
“J.T.” She took a step toward him.
“Don’t do it,” he growled. “I am a bastard and I am a son of a bitch and I am so on edge, I don’t know myself anymore. You step into this room and I will not be held responsible for my actions.”
“I’m not asking you to!” she cried. Then she took another step and another step.
She planted herself in the middle of the living room. “I have seen evil, J.T. I’ve seen bad and I’ve seen worse. You are not it, J.T. You aren’t.”
“Goddamn you,” he said. “Goddamn you.” He threw the cigarette case across the room in a fury, and it landed with a ringing thud.
She held her ground.
He flung out his arm and swept the side table clear. The porcelain lamp shattered. The clay coasters cracked.
She held her ground.
“You’ll wish you never met me,” he warned. Then right on top of that, “Goddamn us both.”
He stalked toward her and she was ready.
His hands wrapped around her waist like a vise. Not soft. Not gentle. She didn’t murmur one sound of protest as he shoved her back and pinned her against the wall.
If she was going to run, she should’ve done it earlier. Now she was committed and there would be no stopping.
He lifted his hands and planted one on each side of her face.
“You think I won’t take what you offer? You think I’ll come to my senses at the last minute and walk away? You think I’m good? You think I’m decent? You haven’t listened to a word of what Marion said.”
He caught her lower lip furiously, pulling on it with his teeth.
She wrapped her arms around his neck and bit back. It was rough and crude. He attacked her mouth, she fought back. Her life had been passivity and coldness, fright and rejection. Now she met passion head-on.
His body pressed against hers, his hips showing her exactly what he wanted and exactly what she would give him, because the time for no had come and gone and baby, this was it.
He sank his teeth into the tender flesh above her collarbone. She cried out and he stuck his finger in her mouth like a plug. She bit it, sucking it, rubbing her tongue along its length.
“Christ, you’re greedy.”
His fingers slipped up her shorts, dipped into her panties, and thrust into her.
She cried out again, shocked in spite of herself. Unprepared, in spite of him. He slowed. His head come up.