Danger! Bad Boy(25)

Too hyped up and upset to go back to sleep, I stood at the end of the bed staring down at Gianna. She was curled up in sleep, blissfully unaware of her mom’s latest threats. If I told Julie to shove it, she'd send Gianna to Houston. I could always try talking my parents into letting me follow her, but what if Julie sent her somewhere else where I couldn’t get to her?

If she got Gianna’s dad and his money on her side, they could decide to send her to boarding school in England, or some crazy shit like that. In addition to leaving me, she'd be ripped away from the friends who were so important to her. I didn't know how she'd handle losing that support system if she lost them.

I pictured some preppy British prick hitting on her with his pretentious accent and ran a hand over my face to keep from losing my shit. Not that some cowboy with a Texan accent doing it would be any better.

At least in Denver she’d still be near. I’d be able to watch her from afar. Christ, that sounded lame. If I broke up with her, then I’d lose her and she’d lose me, but she'd still have her friends. In Houston she’d be starting completely over.

The selfish thing to do would be to call Julie’s bluff, try to hold on to her. But at what cost to Gianna? She'd possibly lose everything and we’d be separated anyway.

The unselfish thing would be to let her go. She’d lose nothing except what we had.

In this moment, I knew without a doubt that I loved her because I could feel my heart being ripped apart in my chest.





CHAPTER SEVEN




“You know it’s love when all you want is that person to be happy,

even if you’re not part of their happiness.”

-Julia Roberts



GIANNA



I woke up in our Las Vegas hotel to a slight headache and a serious looking Caleb. He was propped up on his elbow in bed next to me, staring down at me.

The boy wouldn't admit he loved me, but he watched me sleep? If that didn't scream I love you then I didn’t know what did. Okay, well maybe the actual words would be more effective.

He'd come around. I had all the time in the world to wait for him to vocalize his feelings.

I gazed at him silently in return, adding a small smile. Then I noticed the bags under his eyes and the weariness on his face. Reaching up, I touched his cheek. He hadn’t shaved since yesterday morning and his stubble was rough under my hand. I liked it.

"What's the matter, Caleb? Didn't you sleep?"

"I couldn't." The defeated look in his eyes was weird. We’d made up last night, so it couldn’t be that.

I tried to lighten his mood. "Well, I slept like a baby. You wore me out, stud."

It didn’t work. Still silent, he leaned down and surprised me with how passionately he kissed me. My eyes went wide in shock, only to see an uncharacteristic intensity in his. I wrapped my arms behind his neck and welcomed the unexpected intimacy.

I loved him so much. I was lost in the feel of his hands roaming my body. Touching more than just the outside, I felt like he was stroking the inside of me as well, my heart and soul.

For the first time, Caleb made love to me.

His face turned away from me, I was sure he’d gotten tears in his eyes, too.

Afterwards, holding me in his arms, his face pressed into my neck, I basked in the afterglow. I tried moving my head to the side to look at him, but he jumped up off the bed and disappeared into bathroom, still not saying a word.

Okay. What the hell was going on with him?

He came out fifteen minutes later, showered and changed. I laid there in bed, feeling unsure about what was going on in his head, when he finally said, "Get ready. We're going home."

With that, he grabbed the room key off the nightstand and left the hotel room.

Okay. What the hell was going on?



CALEB



I had to get away from her. Even looking at her was painful. Each of her smiles clawed at my heart. I tried telling myself we were going home because it was time, but I knew the truth. I was being forced to let her go.

Unless I could think of some way to hold onto her it would be the end of us. I needed a plan that didn't involving poisoning her mother. Prison would separate us more permanently. I loved Gianna so freaking much that the feeling of being apart from her for any period of time had me panicking.

I sat down with a bottle of water in an armchair in the hotel lobby, obsessing over the situation. An idea came to me. Julie could just think we’d broken up. We’d snuck around behind Julie’s back before. She’d been completely ignorant before Josh opened his big trap. Now we'd simply have to be even sneakier. I tossed the empty bottle into a trashcan and rushed back up to the hotel room, feeling much better about the situation.



GIANNA



Hair wet from a shower, I was pulling a shirt over my head when Caleb came back in a much better mood. He pounced on me, dragging me into his arms and swinging me around.