Claiming Serenity(43)

It still bugged him, though, the idea of her with any asshole but him.

“I want you to be okay with the idea of me dating someone else if that someone else happens to come along.”

He thought for a moment, considering her, ignoring the twist working in his stomach and the idea of Layla letting anyone else do to her what he did. “Okay. Fair enough. We have no commitment to each and that’s fine, Layla.” A quick blink to move away the image of all those times that Rent-a-Cop held her hand or kissed her in the café, at McKinney’s, all the moments that fucker touched her and Donovan felt sick to his stomach. “I’m, a, not cool with you sleeping with me and then running off to fuck someone else.”

He tried to hold back the smug smile he felt itching his bottom lip when Layla bunched her nose up as though she found the idea of being with more than one person obscene. “I wouldn’t do that. Donovan, that’s just… foul.” But the tempting smug smile left him when Layla narrowed her eyes, when one thin, single eyebrow cocked up. “Same goes for you. I don’t care if you date, if you hang out with other girls, but this body,” Donovan flinched when Layla grabbed his thigh and settled over his lap. “For as long as we want this, this body is mine. I’m calling dibs.” He let a smile slip, let his composure fall just an inch and it was enough for Layla to catch and quickly deflate his arrogance. “Until something better comes along.”

He felt the smile fall from his mouth and would have called her something insulting, something that would annoy her enough that they’d fuss and then move onto Donovan’s second favorite thing to do with Layla: argue, but she moved against his lap, slid over his dick and any ideas he might have had about pissing her off left his head and Donovan took her lips, hard, eager, fast.

They had become comfortable; the taste, the feel of that soft skin against his mouth was something Donovan didn’t think he wanted to do without. In the back of his mind he heard a warning; the fierce rage of conscious thought that told him to back away, that he was kissing her because she felt like his. The possessive roar that anyone else taking her lips was some sort of sin against what was building between them.

But that night, he didn’t listen to the warnings. He didn’t listen to constant refrain of sense that told him she had gotten under his skin. He liked her there, sliding against him, her pointed nipples rubbing against his bare chest. Even if he couldn’t admit it aloud, even if he’d never confess it to her, Donovan liked Layla hot and tight and throbbing. He liked it too damn much.





Sayo’s skin had always been pale. Alabaster, Layla thought, like porcelain, fine, fragile but strong. Like her friend. Now that skin was even paler and the only blemishes marring that perfection came from the shadows that showed beneath her eyes.

“You sleeping at all?” Layla nodded toward the bench just beyond the courtyard in the center of campus and both girls sat down, warming their hands against the take-away cups of piping hot coffee.

“Not really. My mom made me stay home last night and shoved two sleeping pills down my throat, but I just couldn’t…” Sayo’s dark eyelashes brushed against the swells of her cheeks and from the slow blink, Layla caught her pause. Something unspoken, thoughts she kept to herself remained silent behind her pink lips. “It didn’t work. None of it.” She sipped her coffee, cringing only slightly when she took in too much hot liquid, but then Sayo rested against the bench, forcing a smile at Layla. “I’m sorry I haven’t been around.”

“Sweetie, we all understand. Your family…”

Sayo silenced her with a sharp shake of her head. “You’re all my family too. My blood, it doesn’t run here, Layla. Everything I am, the person I try to be—that comes from the family that raised me and the family I chose when I found you and Autumn and Mollie.” Sayo didn’t look at her when she took her hand, threaded her fingers between Layla’s. “You’re just as much my family as my parents and all my brothers and sisters. I don’t share blood with anybody, but that doesn’t mean you all aren’t in my bones.”

Damn. Layla loved her friends. Even with all Sayo’s distance that semester and the burden she wouldn’t allow any of them to carry for her, Layla felt the emotion of the moment tighten in her chest. She could only nod once and look down at her feet, afraid that if she even glanced at Sayo the tears would start, would likely not end until they were both slobbering messes of ridiculousness.

Layla made her voice soft, shooting for gentleness, for tact that wouldn’t have Sayo upset at just the mention of her little cousin’s name. “Rhea is your family too, honey and she’s all that matters right now.” Sayo’s frown came quick, but she blinked back the emotion and Layla hurried to correct herself. “We missed you at Thanksgiving and you’ve been… busy, but I asked you to come with me tonight because I wanted to apologize for that shit with Donovan at McKinney’s.”