“Then he can blow that fucking thing up as far as I’m concerned.”
He chuckled, and it brought my attention back to him. “I’ll make sure he knows that after we’re done extracting what we need.”
I yawned again before rubbing at my eyes. “I need a shower.”
“You’re more than welcome to use mine,” he said as he pointed, “The door in the corner leads into my bathroom.”
I looked over at the door and the question was out of my mouth before I could catch it. “Do you wear your mask all the time? Even while you shower?”
I turned my attention back to him and found him staring me down with those green eyes of his.
“Well?” I asked with a tired shrug. “I don’t know. Maybe you do?”
His eyes crinkled, and it made me smile. “I wore it in the military as well. It’s a force of habit more than anything at this point.”
“Oh? Did everyone in your group or whatever wear one as well?”
He shook his head. “Just me.”
“Why?”
He shrugged. “Helped me to compartmentalize all of the things we did in the field. Taking it off meant I was home, and could be someone else. Putting the mask on means I’ve got work to do, and it just… helps.”
I nodded softly. “I get that. Like your own version of makeup.”
His eyes searched me. “What do you cover up with your makeup?”
His question stunned me before there was a knock on the door. It whipped my head in the opposite direction of Ghost, bursting whatever bubble we had created for ourselves.
“What?” Ghost called out.
“Oh, don’t be a meanie,” Amanda said as she cracked the door open and dipped in with Wrecker’s head towering over hers. “Wreck and I wanna go on a ride, but no one else wants to go with us. You guys down?”
I looked back over at Ghost, who was already looking at me. His gaze held mine, like our souls were having some sort of talk that our brains weren’t aware of. I swear, he could arrest me with those eyes. He could make me stop right in my fucking tracks with them. I watched him stand from his chair. I watched him peel the blanket off my body. And for a small moment, a vision flashed in my mind.
A vision of him hovering over me in bed.
I swallowed hard as he held out his hand. “We could get milkshakes.”
“Oh, hell yeah,” Amanda said.
And even though my hand trembled in fear of being on the back of that bike again, milkshakes did sound amazing.
Especially if they were with him.
21
GHOST
“Woooooo hoo!”
I watched Amanda throw out her arms in front of us while we rode. Wrecker wrapped his arm around her from behind, holding her against him while she laughed into the wind. The sun was almost done setting for the evening, and god damn it, it felt good to be out and riding. The wind on my face. Racing through my hair. Trying to hold us back while we soared toward the lookout point. I knew exactly where we were headed. Wrecker and Amanda weren’t very good at hiding what they wanted.
I didn’t care, though.
I had Jaz’s arms wrapped around me, and it felt fucking phenomenal.
She kept her nails short and blunted, but they still cut into my skin as she held on tight to me. She slid into a more comfortable outfit than that dirty blouse and pencil skirt she was wearing. She donned one of my leather jackets around her torso since all she put on was one of those flimsy little tank tops of hers. I felt her sweatpants pressing against me from either side as she kept sliding toward me until her front was fully pressed against my back.
