“I will. Love you too.” I glanced away from the road long enough to end the call, then exhaled a combination of relief andremorse.
“Damn.” Justus whistled. “You knew just what buttons to push. You’remercenary.”
“Yeah, and I feel bad about it,” I snapped at him. “So, don’t rub itin.”
Justus went quiet for so long that I glanced at him, worried by his silence. He was staring at me. No, he wasstudyingme.
“What?”
“You weren’t playing her, were you? You really think no one will ever wantyou.”
My face burned like it was on fire, but there was no use denying the truth. “You’re too new to understand this yet, but the least lonely people in the world are tabbies. They’re needed. They’re wanted so badly that most of them have had several marriage proposals by the time they hit eighteen. Which is messed up, and not what I want. But therehasto be some happy medium between child bride and the way our enforcers look at me like I’m something the dog hacked up under the backporch.”
I heard my own words as they hung in the air between us, and suddenly I wished I could shove them all back into my mouth. I was driving a stolen car with the first tomcat to ever even look at me twice, and instead of acting cool and funny, I had to vomit needy bullshit all overhim.
I must sound likesuchaloser.
Justus exhaled slowly. “Stop thecar.”
“What?” My pulse spiked painfully, leaving a bruising ache in my chest.He’s going to get out.He’d rather hitchhike than ride with me to theairport.
I flicked on my blinker and shifted into the righthand lane, then slowed as I pulled as far onto the shoulder as I could get. “I know you can take care of yourself, but at least call a cab or something, okay?” Thethunkof the gearshift settling into park echoed like regret in my head. “Don’t walk down the side of the highway. Not even shifters can win a wrestling match with a car going eighty miles anhour.”
Justus lifted my hand from the gearshift and laced his fingers through mine. “I’m not getting out of the car, Kaci. I just wanted to kiss you without causing anaccident.”
“You wantedto…?”
He leaned over the center console, and our mouths met in a soft press of his lips against mine. His hand slid over my jaw into my hair and he tilted my head one way and his own another, deepening the contact. Prolongingit.
“Oh my god,” he murmured against the corner of my mouth, while my heart slammed against my sternum hard enough that it seemed to shake the whole car. “You taste sogood.”
Then we were kissing again, an almost desperate exploration of lips, and tongues, and even a little teeth. And when he finally pulled away, his hand slid down my arm and he looked right into my eyes. “I would sit next to you even ifnoneof the other chairs were taken. Hell, I’d just pull you into my lap and share my chair withyou.”
It took me a second to realize I was grinning like a fool, just staring at him. “So…” I cleared my throat, struggling to make myself grab the wheel again. To focus on the road. “Vegas?”
“Unless you’ve already had enough adventure for onenight.”
No. No I had not. The taste of adventure—the taste of Justus—had merely awakened an appetite I hadn’t even known I’d had. And suddenly I wanted nothing in the world but to satisfy this newhunger.
* * *
Justus’s phonestarted ringing as we were going through security at the airport. The first call came from Vic. Then came one from Marc. When both their texts and their calls went unanswered, Faythe called Justus. Once. Then she called me, but I didn’tanswer.
ThenTitusstarted calling Justus, and I knew the shit had hit thefan.
“They’re going to kill us,” I whispered as I buckled my seatbelt on theairplane.
“They’re going to have to catch us first,” Justus whispered back as he took my hand beneath thearmrest.
Then the plane took off, and a spike of adrenaline hit me with such a burst of euphoria that I no longer cared what would happen when we got back. Or how mad Marc and Faythe would be. I hadn’t left Texas except to go to school or Pride functions in more than five years. I’d lost my family, and my friends, and my home, and my own name when they'd found me in the woods in Montana, and while I knew they’d done all that to save my life, to save mysanity, taking this trip with Justus was the first thing I’d done for myself—for the Kaci Dillion I’d once been—in my entirelife.
And I’d be damned if I was going to feel guilty aboutthat.
* * *
“So,wait, what name’s on your diploma then?” Justus whispered as a man walked past us to get to the bathroom at the front of the plane. First class was prettynice.
“Karli Sanders. Officially, I’m Faythe’s cousin, who came to live on the ranch when her parents died a few yearsago.”
