Sparrow - L.J. Shen Page 0,89

wild birds. Somewhere far from civilization would suit you.”

“I’ve already saved one wild bird,” I reminded her. “And she keeps me damn busy.”

“Saved, huh?” She laughed, the sound an unintended accusation. “Pick this wild bird up some Chinese takeout before you come home. I’ll open up a bottle. See you there.”

I was almost tempted to come clean to her, on the phone, out of nowhere. Luckily, I came to my senses quickly. I knew it wouldn’t do me any good—that she’d never forgive me. Or my father. Her mother. Any of us.

I turned up the volume on the radio. “In My Head” by Queens of the Stone Age blasted through the speakers. Was I pussy-whipped? Yeah. Literally. Spending time inside my wife had become my favorite hobby. I had finally found my weakness, and sure enough, it was between Red’s legs. That’s where I wanted to live, and that’s where I wouldn’t mind dying.

But it wasn’t just that. The thought of spending time with that little smart mouth tonight made me feel weird. Not exactly happy, but oddly excited. I hated liking her. In a sense, it was like handing her the keys to the pit of my soul while she was tanked as hell and telling her to drive carefully. No one fucking promised me that she would.

Our “arrangement” of fucking around without having any sort of relationship had me confused as fuck. There was nothing romantic in what we were. We didn’t go out, share gifts or watched fucking Netflix together. We didn’t make love, we made war. When she was pulling, I was biting. When she was scratching, digging her nails into my flesh, I slammed harder, faster. Our sex was furious, it was raw, untamed, wild…but it wasn’t selfish.

It wasn’t about who Red was that I liked—it was about who she wasn’t. She wasn’t a woman who wanted me because of my power, status, job or bank account.

Buying her shit only pissed her off, and trust me, I’d had my people filling her wardrobe with designer shoes and dresses. She gave them all away to the homeless shelter down the street like they weren’t worth a dime. In fact, there’s a crazy homeless woman in downtown Boston walking around in a Stella McCartney suit and a pair of Jimmy Choo’s, yelling at traffic lights that she was the real Messiah.

Yeah. Red either ignored my flashy gifts like they were contaminated, filthy, unworthy, or worse, tucked them under her slim arm and gave them all to charity. I wanted to kill and kiss the shit out of her in the same breath. It pissed me off and delighted me all at the same time.

She wasn’t a woman who cared for superficial shit, someone who was motivated by the wrong things. She was a blank, clean, white sheet for me to scribble on.

And I scribbled.

On her lips, on her jaw, her neck and collarbone. I jotted my hunger for her in vivid colors as I sucked on her pink nipples, grazing my teeth over them, at first slowly and very carefully, and then with more force, when I realized that inside little Sparrow, lay a wild bird waiting to be untethered. I rubbed her until she almost bled, until her moans became growls. I scrawled my initials all over her as I licked her up and down and made her cry my name. Again.

And again.

And again.

And the fucked-up thing was that I didn’t want her to be done. I wasn’t anxious to get it over with, to get my turn to climax. I let her have her fun. What’s more, I enjoyed watching her through heavy-lidded eyes. For the first time in my life, sex was not about me, it was about her.

Hell, sex, I’d been doing it wrong all these years.

This was not me. I was not the caring kind. Last time I cared, I let Brock, Catalina and a bunch of other shit into my life, and it didn’t end well.

Feeling a wave of angry heat wash over my skin, I punched Jensen’s number. Jensen was my guy for everything hacking-related. He had access to Sparrow’s bank account, among other things.

He answered the call but didn’t utter a word. Yeah, he was that kind of guy. Cheap with his words and generous with his actions.

“She cashed the check yet?” I asked. Paddy’s money.

“No,” he answered, “Still as broke as her hell, same as when you married her.”

“Beautiful. Let me know if that changes.”

I hung up, feeling