“I should have realized...it’s not your fault, okay?”
She squeezed past her seatmate and out into the aisle, but she didn’t walk towards me. “It is,” she said.
“It’s not! This is him, this is Volos. It’s on him, not you.”
She swallowed. “Ox—”
“We knew what we were getting into. We said we’d protect you and we will.” All around me, people were looking back and forth between us, following the conversation and trying to figure out what the hell we were talking about.
She sniffed. “If I go away, you won’t be in danger anymore. The club won’t be in danger.”
I started marching down the bus towards her, boots clumping on the metal. “If you go away, I can’t protect you. And I made a promise.”#p#分页标题#e#
She swallowed again as I reached her. Her voice caught. “Is that—Is that the only reason?”
I shook my head savagely. “I need you to stay...because I’m in love with you.” I pushed my fingers up her cheek and into her hair, leaving wet trails across her skin.
She took a big, shuddering breath. “I can’t love you if you won’t let me know you.”
I felt that black, oily sac of poison inside me throb and glisten. I’d been hiding it away from her, terrified I’d lose her if she saw it. And partially, I realized now, scared of how much it would hurt, to split it open. But if I didn’t do this, I was going to lose her for sure. And that would hurt way, way worse. I took her hand and knitted my fingers with hers. “You come back with me,” I promised, “And I’ll tell you every fucking thing.”
She looked up at me, eyes swimming...and nodded. And then we were kissing, raindrops falling from my hair and splashing onto her face. We brushed lips, tasted, then kissed hard and desperate, hands coming up to entwine in each other’s hair. The iron band that had been constricting around my chest since the hospital finally snapped and I could breathe again. I drunk her in in big, hungry gulps.
“If he’s local,” said the woman who’d been sitting next to Annabelle, “I can see why you put up with the rain. They don’t make ‘em like that in LA.”
Annabelle turned, flushed and grinned all at the same time. Then she bit her lip. “I hate to tell you this, but I think you’re on the wrong bus.”
39
Annabelle
When the slightly reproachful driver had opened up the luggage bays and I’d retrieved my bags, when I’d pressed a $10 bill into his palm for all the trouble and the bus had driven off, I turned to Carrick.
We were in the middle of nowhere, halfway between Haywood Falls and the next town, nothing but a two-lane road with thick greenery on each side of it. The rain, if anything, had gotten even heavier and we were both soaked. Volos was still out there somewhere, plotting against the club.
And I didn’t care about any of it. Carrick was in love with me. And I was—my whole chest lifted as I let myself think it for the first time—I was in love with him.
He grabbed me under the ass, hands squeezing the rain-soaked denim and the warm flesh beneath. Then he swung me up into the air and clasped me to him with my groin grinding against his abs. He started kissing the rain from my neck and then my bare shoulder, pushing my wet hair away and kissing up my cheek to my ear. I sighed and twisted, squirming against him as his lips laid trails of heat along my chilled skin. I kissed his forehead, his cheekbones, bent to kiss his jaw line. And finally, our mouths met and we kissed full on the lips.
It was even better than before. Raw and unrestrained because he wasn’t holding anything back, now. His lips, dripping with rain, hard and bold as he kissed mine, savage against my softness. The slight scratch of his stubble as we twisted and pressed, the brush of his tongue as he swept it across my lips.
His tongue pressed for entry and I welcomed him in, dancing with him, panting together as our bodies began to move in rhythm with the kiss. His hips began to rock and my thighs squeezed in response as my groin ground against the hardness of his body.
Cars were tearing past us, their headlights painting our bodies white. I was so caught up in it, I barely thought about the people watching us. But when a truck tore by only a few feet away, Carrick walked us off the side of the road and into the trees, where we’d be safe.
The next thing I knew, my ass hit something hard and Carrick was pressing between my legs, wedging me between him and whatever was behind me so that he could use his hands. I wriggled my shoulders and felt rough bark.#p#分页标题#e#
Carrick’s face was inches from mine. “I can’t wait,” he told me and that rich seam of Irish in his voice was like a ribbon of silver, whipping my mind and sending a deep rush of heat straight to my groin. “I need to have you right here.”