He licked his lips, then gave a single shake of his head, like he was answering some question she hadn't heard anyone ask. "Cora," he whispered. Two more strokes of his thumb and he withdrew his hand. She was on the verge of protesting or pleading or launching herself at him when he said more, keeping her from doing a thing. "You should go back to sleep."
Chapter 5
"I feel like I haven't seen you in forever," Haven said as they lay together on Cora's bed in her old hotel-like room in the Ravens' clubhouse. Her friend wasn't entirely wrong. It'd been four days since Ben had been discharged from the hospital, and Cora had been at Slider's house more hours than usual.
"I know," Cora said. "Ben has just been a bit of a handful and Slider's needed the extra help." While the poor kid had weathered the injury and the hospital stay like a trooper, once the pain meds had worn off, he'd been miserable-unable to sleep and too uncomfortable to make it through a whole day of school.
"They're really lucky to have you. I hope Slider realizes that," Haven said. "Which reminds me, what was with you walking home the other day?"
Cora bit back a groan. She'd hoped Haven would've forgotten that. "It was just me making sure Slider realizes it," she fibbed with a dismissive wink she prayed would throw Haven off the scent. Lying to her bestie made her feel like crap, but the alternative was coming clean about why Cora had been equally desperate to run away from home . . . and that made her want to vomit. "Besides, I don't mind helping them out. It's not like I have anything better to do," she said. She'd meant for the comment to come off flippantly, but she'd failed, if the sympathetic expression on Haven's face was any indication.
"Whatever happened to your idea of checking out volunteer opportunities at the animal shelter?"
"Oh," she said, wishing she'd never voiced her pie-in-the-sky dream of one day becoming a veterinarian. Growing up, her parents had never let her own an animal, so she'd become the queen of the stray cats, once sneaking a little gray tiger-striped kitten into her bedroom for a whole weekend when she was about nine, and routinely leaving out bowls of milk or cans of tuna for a pair of orange tabbies when she was a little older. At first, they'd been too scared to approach if she moved at all, but eventually they'd gotten brave enough to sniff her hand. And the moment when they'd finally let her pet them remained one of her fondest memories. She'd wished she could do more for them, that she knew how to do more, because those cats, even with all their standoffishness, had made her feel more loved than anyone who'd lived inside her house . . .
But what was the point of talking about her dream when it required, somehow, coming up with enough money to afford college, and then doing well enough there to get into a vet school? It remained as far out of reach now as it had when she first met those tabbies. She'd only shared it in the first place a few weeks ago in the hopes of getting Haven to admit and pursue her own much-more-realistic dream to open a bakery. The woman could be printing money with her cookies alone. "I have to save up for a car first," Cora said, "and probably also for an apartment, before I can think of doing anything like that. More importantly, what happened to your idea of-"
"Wait. Why do you need an apartment?" Haven asked.
"It's not like I can live in the Ravens' clubhouse for the rest of my life," Cora said. No one had said a word to her or Haven about moving on, and honestly, she didn't think they would. It also probably didn't hurt that the club's president was in love with Cora's best friend. But they were currently the only two permanent residents at the clubhouse, though members and the Ravens' other protective clients sometimes crashed here, and there was always someone around. And Cora wanted more for herself than being some biker groupie, even if she was still figuring out what exactly that was.
Really, it was the first time in her life she'd ever realistically had the chance to consider it. Her dad had made it clear there'd be no money for after she graduated high school, and he'd been true to his word, forcing her to get a series of part-time jobs to pay for food, clothes, the bus, and her phone. The only thing he'd done to help her was let her keep living in her bedroom. Some favor that'd turned out to be . . .
"And I'm no dummy. At some point, you're going to move in with Dare."
Haven's gorgeous face went immediately and cartoonishly red.
Cora flew into a sitting position and gaped. "No freaking way!"
Looking like she'd swallowed her tongue, Haven sat up more slowly, the pretty waves of her hair falling over her shoulders. "So, this was one of the reasons I've been dying to talk to you."
Cora bounced up onto her knees, her grin nearly making her cheeks hurt. "No freaking way, Haven. Are you serious? Details, woman. I need all the details! When did he ask you? What did he say?" She picked up a pillow and smacked her friend's shoulder with it. "Start spilling now!"
Haven laughed and yanked the pillow away. "It was Monday morning right after you called for a ride. We were at his place getting ready to come here and I was packing my bag from the weekend. And he said that he never minded me having things of my own to do, but that he absolutely hated that I didn't come home to his house every day after doing them. And that he wanted his house to be my house, too. To be ours." She reached into her jeans pocket and held up a set of keys on a little silver ring. "And then he asked me to move in."
"Oh, my God, you have keys to a house, Haven. And a man who loves you so much. Wow," Cora said, her heart overflowing for her friend. "I never doubted for one minute that Dare would be good at the sexin', but who knew he'd be so good at the romancing, too?"
Haven hugged the pillow to her chest as a little blush turned her smiling cheeks pink. "I know. It's really true."
"Wow," Cora said again, the reality that Haven was truly putting down roots here in Frederick-roots separate from Cora and the escape plan they'd hatched when they'd run from Georgia so many months before-really sinking in. "So when are you moving in? Why are you still sleeping here?" She sucked in a breath. "Please tell me it's not because-"
"I didn't want to leave you here alone," Haven said, finishing Cora's thought.
An uncomfortable whirl of emotion settled in Cora's belly-jealousy, irritation at herself for being jealous, panic over what she was going to do with her own life, uncertainty about where she belonged, and even a little feeling of abandonment, too, as unfair and ridiculous as that was when truly she was happy for Haven, too. So she masked that whole mess with sarcasm and humor, as she always did. Cora pointed her thumbs at herself and arched an eyebrow. "Big girl over here. A big girl who will hate you forever if you let her hold you back."
Haven grasped her hand. "You could never hold me back, Cora. Hell, if it wasn't for you, none of this would even be real. I'd still be stuck in Georgia, either trapped in my criminal father's house or married off to some equally criminal dirtbag in a marriage over which I had no say. You're my best friend. I wasn't making this decision without at least talking to you first."
"But now you're free from all that, Haven. And you deserve to be happy and have all the things you want. And that starts with Dare."
"I always thought we'd get an apartment together," she said, blue eyes so earnest.
Cora smiled and swallowed the selfish disappointment she felt, because she'd thought so, too. "Yeah, well, life is what happens when you're busy making other plans. Right? Besides, Dare lives ten minutes away. We'll still see each other here, and it'll be easy enough to visit. And when I finally get my own place, the door will always be open to you." Hesitation still colored Haven's expression, and Cora wasn't having that at all, so she pushed a little harder. "By this weekend, you'll move to Dare's, and then on Monday, you'll start laying out the plans for your own bakery. I've got it all planned out. Consider me your taskmaster."
Haven laughed. "Slow that down a little, won't you?"
"No way. You have a man willing to do anything for you, a safe place to live, a God-given talent you can't waste for one more day, and you've inherited enough money to get started with a business. Why go slow?" Cora asked, so badly wanting her friend to have all the things about which she'd dreamed. The only good thing Haven's dad had ever done for her was die and leave her that money to start a new life. At first, Haven had hesitated to accept it, because it was clear that at least some of it was ill-gotten gains from her dad's various illegal activities, but then she realized all the good she could do with it-and not just for herself. She'd donated some of it to the Ravens to assist in the protective duties the club undertook on behalf of people in bad situations with no other way out.