She pointed across the roof. “My plants. I grow stuff up here.”
Now it made sense. I knewsomeonemust be growing those plants, but I’d presumed it was some old lady—gardening’s a retirement thing, in my mind. That’s why I’d hidden the weed where you had to climb up to get to it. “Which ones are yours?” I asked.
She blinked at me. “All of them.”
Allthose?There was a small forest of greenery there, plants I didn’t even know the names of. If it was all hers, that meant we were probably the only two people who came up here—good news for me. My weed was safe, as long as she didn’t blab. It wasn’t the law I was worried about—I only had three plants and that’s legal, these days. It was the fact they’d get stolen, if anyone knew about them.
I realized I was still holding her arm. I let it go and she slowly dropped it to her side, crossing it protectively over her chest. God, she was terrified—terrified ofme.My stomach lurched at the thought.
Wasn’t that what you wanted? To scare her away?
Yes. Damn right I did. But my eyes were drawn to her lips—sofull, so soft, and the lines of her cheek and neck were so delicate. She really was like some statue carved hundreds of years before—classically beautiful.And from what I knew of her, she’d kept herself clean of all the crime around here. She really was innocent.
I wavered for a second. But she wasn’t like one of the women I took home from a bar. She was so much better than that. I wasn’t going to taint her, however much I wanted to. I could control myself.
Then a warm breeze blew across us and suddenly the scent of her was in my nose—flowers and warm spices andnature,a smell totally unfamiliar in the middle of the city. She was staring up at me with those huge green eyes and breathing just a little too fast with fear, those full breasts lifting and straining at the tight fabric of her t-shirt. I felt a sudden, overwhelming urge to just slide my hand across her cheek and kiss the fuck out of her, tell her it was all okay, that she didn’t have to be scared of me. I wanted that to be true. And then I wanted to peel those tight jeans off of her, get my knee between those milky thighs and plunge my fingers into her, jerk her t-shirt up to her neck and go to work on those breasts with my lips—
“Just stay away,” I grated. “Stay away from my stuff.” And I jerked my head for her to leave.
Her throat worked as she swallowed. She nodded silently and hurried away—I watched her ass sway with every step, a perfect heart shape that made my palms ache with the need to get hold of it. I dug my nails into my palms.
Then she was climbing down the ladder, breasts bobbing and swaying, and running across the roof to the door that leads to the stairs. She put her hand on the handle and I knew that this was it—once she’d gone, I’d probably never see her again.
And then she did the one thing she shouldn’t have done.
She turned around.
3
LOUISE
What are you doing?Louise, what the hell are you doing?But I couldn’t seem to stop myself. My body was twisting, my eyes searching for him. I found him still standing on the raised section of roof, silhouetted by the sunset. “Your plants are dying,” I blurted.
He just stood there. The sun behind him meant I couldn’t see his expression. “They’ve grown too big for the pots, so the roots are being strangled. You need bigger pots, like three times as big.” I nodded towards the stack of pots by my plants. “I have some spares. You’re welcome to them.”
He just stood there. I still couldn’t see his expression but I swore he was staring at me. With hate? Anger? I was painfully aware that he could jump down the ladder and be on me before I could get down the stairs. He could grab me....
Grab me...and do what? I could feel my heart hammering in my chest but there was something else, too, a giddy, fluttery feeling that left me light-headed.
He took a step towards me. Just a single step. And suddenly I was bolting down steps two at a time, and I didn’t stop until I’d reached the tenth floor and was safely back in my apartment.
“Dirty Dancing?” asked Kayley. “I’m fourteen, not eight.”
“You need to watch more wholesome movies,” I told her. “Be glad that there’s kissing.”
Kayley crossed her arms grumpily, but settled down to watch. Movie nights were one of our favorite traditions, even if it did mean a few compromises. I hadn’t been kidding about thewholesomething, though. It felt like she was growing up too fast. Fifteen would be bad. Sixteen, seventeen—urgh.I remembered what a pain I was when I was that age and Kayley was way more of a party animal than I ever was.
Kayley was our parents’ “miracle child.” Complications after me meant my mom thought she couldn’t have any more children. Eight years later, out of the blue, Kayley comes along. The fact I was so much older meant that I was sort of a mom to her even before the accident.
Don’t think about that.
I tried to bury myself in the movie and that kept the memories at bay until I turned in. But alone in my bedroom, with Kayley’s soft snores coming through the wall, I lay awake and worried. We were close to broke. Kayley’s basic medical insurance would cover the blood tests but if itwassome hormone thing that needed regular treatments we were going to start running up some big bills.
I lay there for a full hour, staring into the darkness with my brain working overtime. I needed to sleep. We had the follow-up appointment at the hospital and I had work in the afternoon.Think of something pleasant.
Sean’s face swum into my mind.
No! Not him!Sean was everything dark and forbidden. Dangerous, destructive, illegal…
