He propped me against the wall with his tall, lean body and trailed his lips down my neck, biting and sucking my skin, sending electricity jolting across my nerves.
“Pax,” I breathed, “we should stop.”
“I don’t want to,” he whispered, his mouth moving down to my chest. “Do you?”
“No.” I threaded my fingers into his hair and pulled his face closer. I couldn’t get enough of him. That peppermint and cedarwood scent he always emanated—mixed with the faint smell of sweat—flooded my nose.
“Then let’s—”
My phone buzzed, causing us both to jump.
Pax lifted his head, his eyes spearing me with lust and naked need.
The phone vibrated once more, and his phone buzzed at the same time.
He laughed, dragging in ragged breaths, pushing a hand against the wall, and ducking his head. “Saved by technology, CC.” Gently, he lowered me to my feet and palmed his phone from a back pocket.
“Moira’s here to pick us up.” He brushed his fingers through my hair then took my hand and gave it a squeeze. “Let’s go home.”
A flood of emotions tumbled in my head, from my earlier humiliation to anger at myself for not fighting back, to indignation at having been saved by Pax, to a sweet ache burning in my heart thinking of how he looked at me, how he touched me, how passionately he kissed me.
No guy had ever looked at me the way he did, and certainly no boy had ever tried to kiss me, much less come to my rescue.
And as much as I hated to admit it, he’d been right. Ihadto stand up for myself, stand up to my mother, and stand up for my future. I couldn’t let others fight my battles for me if I wanted to win the war. And the funny thing was? The war wasn’t with others, it was with myself, my beliefs, my entire way of life. Always trying to please everyone, desperate to fit in, wearing and doing and saying things that didn’t make me happy.
You were never meant to be stuffed into a box.
Paxton Ross had tilted my world on its axis, and I needed to decide if it was a good tilt, or a bad tilt.
Chapter eleven
Paxton Ross
Duetosomecrisisat Charles’s office, he and Mrs. Kingston didn’t come home for dinner.
With a wink and a devilish laugh, Moira ordered fast food delivery.
The four of us sat at the small, informal table in the corner of the kitchen.
I loved the comfy, close feeling compared to the formal dining room. When we ate there, I always expected an army of butlers and servants to sweep into the room with delicacies wafting from ornate trays.
Terri nibbled on a piece of pizza, her gaze never lifting to meet mine.
Earlier today, when Katrina and the rest of the students had treated her so badly, I’d wanted to punch the guys and yell at the girls. The only reason I didn’t was because I was even angrier with Terri for not standing up to the assholes.
“Well, kids. How did your day go?” Moira asked, squirting ranch dressing onto her slices of pepperoni pizza.
“We got to play a game called survivor,” Lana chirped as she chewed. “We made teams and had to go through an obstacle course. I kept imagining zombies chasing my team and we won.”
“And how many of the undead did you kill?” Moira teased.
“Five, but one ran away even though I chopped off his arms.”
Moira laughed and smoothed Lana’s bangs from her forehead. “I don’t know where you got this zombie obsession, but you better hide it from your mother or she’s going to have a heart attack.”
Lana frowned, then took a sip of her soda.
“What about you two?” Moira’s sharp gaze landed on me and narrowed. “You been staying out of trouble?”
