In Other Worlds Read Online Free

long-ago night. He hadn’t wanted to explain the scars. To recount where they’d come from and relive the horror and agony of it. To have to face his lover in the early morning light where the scars stood out against his skin like nauseating beacons. He was thoroughly repulsive, and he knew it. He didn’t need to see his own disgust mirrored in the eyes of someone who regretted touching him.
    Perhaps that was why he’d chosen a stranger tonight. He owed her no explanation. Owed her nothing at all.
    He never wanted to see pity or repugnance on another woman’s face when she looked at him. If he lived forever, he’d never forget the sight of his ex-wife when she saw him in the hospital right after he’d been wounded. My God, they turned you into a freak. You’re revolting!
    But there was nothing in Livia’s dark brown eyes except curiosity and hunger. She didn’t seem to judge him in any way, and that he needed more than anything.
    Livia bit her lip as she ran her hand over the taut muscles of his stomach and torso. She’d never seen a man’s bare chest before, at least nowhere other than in movies. Fascinated by it, she ran her hands over the smooth, tawny skin that was stretched tight over hard muscles. Like velvet over steel. The contrast amazed her, and she had a strange urge to place her mouth on his skin to taste it. Her cheeks warmed over that thought.
    How extremely inappropriate . . .
    â€œYou feel so wonderful,” she breathed.
    Adron pulled back to look down at her. There was a peculiar note of awe in her voice, a gentle hesitancy in her touch. And in that instant, a feeling of cold dread consumed him.
    He was drunk, but he wasn’t that drunk. “You’re a virgin.”
    Her face turned bright red.
    â€œShit!” he snarled as he stepped away from her. His hard cock ached and his entire body burned. Leave it to him to find the only virgin he was sure had ever set foot inside the Golden Crona.
    Gripping his cane, he limped his way to the bar and poured another drink. But the watered-down alcohol did nothing for him except piss him off more.
    Suddenly, she was behind him, leaning up against his back as her slender arms wrapped around his waist.
    He shook all over from the sensation, from the feel of her small breasts against his spine as she laid her head on his back. And in that moment, he was lost to her.
    Damn it to hell.
    She stood up on her tiptoes to whisper in his ear. Her breath scorched him and sent chills skimming over his entire body. “I want you to make love to me.”
    â€œAre you insane?” He turned to look at her.
    She shook her head. “I want to give my virginity away. I don’t want it taken from me.”
    â€œTaken by whom?”
    She dropped her gaze. “Fine. If you don’t want me, I’ll go find someone who does.”
    A strange wave of jealousy stung him as he thought of someone else inside her.
    What do you care?
    And yet for some unknown, stupid reason, he did. He didn’t want someone else taking what she’d offered him. The thought of another man . . .
    It called out the assassin in him and made him want to kill anyone who even looked at her.
    He caught her hand as she moved away from him. “What’s your name?”
    â€œLivia.”
    â€œLivia,” he repeated. It suited her and those guileless doe eyes that stung him soul deep. “Why would you give yourself away so cheaply to something like me?”
    Livia paused as she saw the self-loathing in his icy eyes. He hated himself. It was so obvious, and she wondered why. “Because you seem nice.”
    He laughed bitterly at her answer. “I’m not nice. There’s nothing nice about me.”
    That wasn’t true. He had yet to be mean to her. He was hurting, she knew that. And it made him snappish.
    But it didn’t make him cruel.
    â€œI need to go,” she said quietly, regretting that he