His lips graze my forehead. My breath stops completely, but not because I’m panicking.
I’m actually… not.
I’m not sucking for air. My lungs aren’t overheated billows. I’m entirely too focused on the gentle warmth that radiates from the spot Maverick just touched. I feel… like that kiss was a bit of a benediction after all those words that shifted down past all the layers, calluses, walls, and guards, and settled into the marrow of my bones and the channels of my heart.
“Are we here?” There they are, the first words I’ve been able to get out.
“We are. Do you need a minute?”
I don’t want a minute to think. I just want tobe. I want toberight alongside Maverick. If I wait, it will only give my brain time to regroup and freak out.
I shake my head. He kisses the tip of my nose then he’s gone, ejecting himself out of the driver’s door. It slams shut. My lungs empty out and fill too rapidly. My chest rises and falls. I thrust myself back hard against the seat, bracing for the worst. The panic is swift, but it doesn’t catch me off guard. I knew this was coming.
While I heave and hiss, Maverick throws open my door, gets my seatbelt off, and sweeps me into his arms. He has me tucked against his chest in an instant, and there I can feel his heart beating. It thrums steadily right under my ear.
I count the beats, the whomp-whomp-whomp.
While I listen to the sound, he takes a few steps and then a big door is thrown open. The whoosh of air glides past my cheek, and then it’s all hot heat and chill music and we’re inside.
Chill music. In a place that has rage rooms.
I might not be breathing properly, but I do have the urge to laugh. I swallow it back, knowing how wrong and even hysterical it might sound, and then I might burst into tears and start sobbing.
Maverick sets me down but doesn’t unwrap his arms yet. He makes sure that I can test my legs to see if they’re going to hold me. He slips the blindfold off and undoes my hands, but he lets me lean against him. I can see that he’s angled me towards a big front window, away from the counter where people will be standing or sitting and working. He shields me, giving me privacy.
He’s so gentle, so tender, so infinitely understanding and kind.
If I wasn’t halfway in love with him already, I have zero doubt that I would be now.
Chapter 17
Maverick
We were given the choice of what room we wanted. There are several, believe it or not. The building is one of those flat, long office places that used to be used for telemarketing. It shut down years ago and didn’t reopen until last year. There’s not just rooms for breaking dishes and appliances and stuff. There’s also axe throwing, and in the basement of the building, there’s a whole gym set up where they do boxing and martial arts lessons in the evenings. It’s a pretty awesome place.
It’ll probably be my favorite place for the rest of my life, given that it’s put a smile on Loreena’s face from the second we walked in here. We’re both still just standing, taking it all in—the flat screen TV mounted on the wall on the far side of the room, immaculate, but without a picture. Our eyes sweep to the stacks of plates, cups, and jars sitting on a shelf on the opposite end of the room. On the wall closest to us, a piece of thick plywood is mounted over stacks of tires, and on it are several old electronics. Computer monitors, towers, printers, and an old stereo. Probably all things that have stopped working or gone obsolete. The parts likely get recycled, if they can be. Next to the table rests a maul and a sledgehammer.
It’s pretty barren in here other than that and all the padding and reinforcing on the walls. I read that the rooms are soundproofed and those walls are obviously reinforced behind the blue foamy stuff and black coated panels of wood nailed up. We were told that we can scream in here, yell, melt the fuckdown, cry—whatever it is we need to do—and then we were given matching gray coveralls, hard hats, ear protection, and safety glasses. We both did have to sign waivers, but that was it and we were led down the hall and turned loose in here.
Loreena stands right beside me, smiling softly to herself, but she also looks a little bit lost. She recovered the minute we walked in here and doesn’t seem to be suffering any lingering panic. If she’s anxious about having to leave here eventually and head to the clubhouse and then go back home after that, I can’t tell.
My eyes go straight to her lips. They’re so full and so pink. They remind me of cotton candy. I haven’t had it since I was a kid, when my mom somehow got enough money to take me to the fair. We only did a few rides, but it was nice just being there, surrounded by the flashing lights and the music and the pressing swell of excited humanity. The best part came at the end, when she set a bag of blue and pink fluff into my arms and instructed me not to eat it all at once. I saved it for weeks, pinching off just a little bit each day to savor.
I know her lips taste just as sweet.
I purposely turn my attention to the dishes lined up on the metal shelving. Now isn’t the right time, although I’d like to gather Loreena close, draw her into me, and kiss her so hard that our safety glasses and maybe even our teeth would mash together.
“Should we start over there? Maybe throw a few plates?”
She still doesn’t seem entirely sure about the whole thing, but she ambles over and picks up a dinner plate. Most in the stack don’t match. The one she’s holding isn’t thick and lookslike the kind of glass that would shatter into an explosion of shards.
She brushes past me silently, arcs her arm back, and lets the plate fly at the black painted wood on the wall. It hits and bursts apart into tiny little pieces.
Loreena’s breath quickens. Twin spots of color appear on her cheeks. Her eyes flick to my face, glowing brightly with unexpected excitement and her lips curl into an even wider smile.
“Do you want to go again?”
“Yes please.”
