at it but I’m most fucking definitely not fluent yet but fuck. The words coming out of her sound like fucking foreplay, like she’s desperate for my cock to rearrange her organs for a few hours but she’s busy with her oils and canvas.
The woman was fucking made for me.
Put on this Earth just for me to find and protect, teach and fuck and own. She’s mine for all of time the same way I’m now hers too.
I have to remember the men tied to chairs in my workroom, this is not the fucking time for my dick to take over the fucking conversation, no matter how badly I want her.
"I had a busy night, baby girl. I have something to show you downstairs."
Chapter Eighteen
Odie
I'm painting something dark and surreal when mon Monstre arrives home for the night. My eyes are sore and my head is a little hazy, the long hours of working in a daze taking their toll. I set down my brushes and paints with a smile, lifting the little stray tendrils of my hair that have escaped the ponytail away from my face.
“Bonjour, mon Monstre. How was your night?" I say in French. Now that he’s trying to learn I’m conscious of speaking it to help him.
He shucks off his jacket and I see the blood and gore still streaking his arms but he doesn't move towards the bathroom, something he always does straight away. It doesn't matter that I know all about his work and the life he leads when he goes out every night, he never comes to me dirty.
"I had a busy night, baby girl. I have something to show you downstairs."
I frown a little but I nod. Of course, whatever he needs me to do, I'll do it. His gruff demeanor still worries me though.
I step forward but he holds out a hand to stop me. "Wash up, baby, and throw on one of my sweaters. I'm taking you down to my workroom. I've found Mecedo and some of his men. I need you to see them, make sure I've got the right psychopath, and then I'll deal with them."
My stomach bottoms out.
Mecedo. His men. Here, at my safe place, the place that put me back together, the home I know is mine forever.
Illi grimaces. "I know, baby, I don't want them here either but I'm not taking you out there. I need you safe here and I need them all having the worst fucking death I can give them. That happens here, in the basement where all of my tools are. They'll be dead before I come to bed, I promise you, I’m not going to have them alive downstairs in our house for long.”
I nod slowly, I trust him with far more than my life, and I rush to the bathroom to wash the paint away from my hands. I pick out a sweater I don't love, one I'll be okay with throwing out the second I come back upstairs in case it's... well, in case I lose my mind the second I get down there and kill Mecedo myself. I grab my knife just in case.
I know mon Monstre would never try to stop me from getting my own vengeance. I remember the pride in his face when he found Lord Devareux dead on the carpet back when he rescued me.
When I step out of the bathroom, I find Illi still standing in front of the door. He sees the knife and nods at me. "Good choice, baby girl. Fuck, I want to hold you right now but I'm not going to get this shit on you and I want to put these assholes in the ground already. I don't want them here either."
I smile at him, soft and warm because this intensity and anger is for me. He's always brought his work home and never cared about it before. With the extra security he's got set up, I know that I'm perfectly safe here but he's not worried about me physically. It's my mind and my heart he's trying to protect.
I’ve come a long way so there’s much further to fall now.
"Lead the way, mon Monstre. I will always follow you."
He smiles, a genuine one that softens his fierce features. "Baby girl, you follow no one. Let me wash my hands so I can at least hold your hand down there. Fuck, I want you in my arms but that will have to do."
So we take the stairs