I pinch his stomach, but when I struggle to grasp enough skin, he chuckles, making me smile.
Then I take a deep breath. “Where do you go on Saturdays?”
His heartbeat quickens beneath my ear. Muscles tensing, he swallows, and the sound fills the gap between us.
I lift my head to look at him, but his heavy-lidded eyes are locked on the wall across the room. My heart falters at the hard expression taking over, because I know that look. His walls are going up.
“What about your childhood? Or hobbies?” I’m grasping at straws, I know. But ever since dinner, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about how little I actually know about him. “Tommy said you guys used to play basketball together, right? Did you play before moving here too?”
His eyes close, but he holds me tight.
When he speaks, his voice is deeper than usual, hoarse from sleep. “It’s late, Blue.”
A weight crashes from my chest to my stomach. “We’ve stayed up later.”
Finally, he looks at me. His expression softens as he inspects my face.
“I told you.” His thumb moves in small, soothing circles over my side. “I’m not that interesting.”
“And I told you. I want to know you.”
Keeping one arm locked around me, he rolls onto his side so we’re facing each other. His gaze darkens, burning like flames around the edges, and I suck in a breath. “Don’t you get it?” he asks, quiet but firm. “You do know me. When I’m with you, none of that other shit matters. My past, my future. The constant stress, the worry.” His grip finds the back of my neck, and he leans close. So close his breath warms my lips. “When I’m with you, all that shit melts away, and I can just ... be. Right here, right now, with you.”
My heartbeat fluctuates so fast it buzzes in my ears.
“You know me, Blue.” He rests his forehead against mine, and my eyes fall shut with his. “More than you realize.”
My throat’s thick. Even later, when his breathing slows, becoming heavy with sleep, the wild rhythm in my chest doesn’t let up. I wonder if it ever will.
Hunt
Bang, bang, bang.
Bang, bang, bang.
“Fuck,” I groan, throwing my forearm over my closed eyes.
My other arm stretches toward the opposite side of the sofa bed, searching. But the space beside me is cold, and the sudden throbbing in my right side reminds me why.
I haven’t slept apart from Blue since our first night together, and it doesn’t feel right. All I wanted when I got home was to sneak into her room and wrap my arms around her, pull her close. But last night’s fight was more brutal than usual. There’s no way I was going to worry her by letting her see me like this.
She’s never outright said she doesn’t like me fighting, but she doesn’t have to. I can see it in her face whenever I come home with a new bruise, and if she’d kept up with those questions last weekend, fighting would’ve come up too. I know it. Pulling a pillow over my head, I start to drift again as I think of that night. Picturing her disappointment when I wouldn’t answer; killing the light in her eyes. I clench my jaw, irritation flowing through me like a poison. Iwantto talk to her. But wanting it and doing it are two different things.
I’m sure she won’t let me get away with it much longer. Especially if she sees me now. I imagine I look worse than I feel, and, shit, I feel like I’ve been hit by a truck.
The new guy I fought was good, better than I expected, but I was better. If I’ve been hit by a truck, he’s been hit by a freight train. And it was definitely worth the payoff. I earned every fresh dollar sitting in my safe.
BANG, BANG, BANG.
“Jesus. I’m coming.” If that’s Mac, I’m gonna kill him. It’s the middle of the damn night. Kicking my blanket off, I carefully sit up and scrub a hand down my face, trying to wake up.
Searing pain shoots through my ribs when I stand, but I ignore it, squinting through the dark as I walk the few steps it takes to get to my front door.
I swing the door open, and my heart stops dead.
Bitterness, anger, and every other emotion I hate floods to the surface, but somehow, I manage to keep my expression neutral, my voice monotone. “What are you doing here?”
Draped in the night’s pitch-black shadows, slumped against the side of the doorframe, Conway slowly looks up from the ground.
