Chapter 24
Rowe
We are dead meat.
Before I can think, Pane unlocks Stella’s door, picks up Tallulah, and ushers us both inside.
Days ago, I would’ve argued with him. I would’ve wanted to head into a different stall, but now I’m letting him pull me in, shocked that Pane is actually—willingly—picking up Tallulah and guiding the three of us to the back of the unicorn’s stall.
“Those roses were a dead giveaway,” Sally Ray sneers as she shoves the barn door open.
Silvery light floods into the barn. Even in the darkest corners, there’s enough illumination that Sally will find us this time. I swallow past a knot in my throat as I realize that we’re done for.
“First, I’m gonna sniff out your ass and have you arrested,” Sally declares, her boots thudding heavy on the floor. “Then I’m gonna take your farm, and when I do, I’m gonna have every last piggy slaughtered and turned into bacon.”
She cackles like a maniac.
I start to charge forward, but Pane hooks his arm around my shoulder and pulls me back against him.
Tallulah sits on the floor, somewhere by my feet. I hope she didn’t understand Sally. I don’t know any animal psychologists who could treat her for the trauma of hearing she’ll be turned into bacon.
But the pressure of Pane’s arm captures my attention because it’s resting just above my breasts, and once again, I’m pushed against him, my butt to his crotch.
Oh, wow.
He’s got an erection, and it’s pressing into the curve of my ass cheeks.
Pane shifts, probably because his pants are uncomfortable, quietly turning me around so that now my chest is against his. But his erection isn’t gone. It’s now digging into my stomach. And none of this helps my nipples, which are tight and pinched, scraping against the fabric of my bra.
Sally snaps on her phone light and starts whipping it over the stable. The light gets ever closer, and there’s nowhere to hide. No place to go. Sweat trickles down my back. It sprouts on my forehead. She will see us, and we will be arrested.
My fingers dig into Pane’s arm, silently telling him that we’re screwed. In response, his hands circle my waist.
Somehow I don’t think his body is saying,You’re right, Sally’s totally going to find us.
I look up at him, and his lips drop to within an inch of mine.
My heart blooms with the feeling of love that Stella has seeded inside me. I don’t know what Pane’s feeling. It could be that. It could be the need to run. But as I tip my face up to his, his lips drop even more.
Why am I thinking about making out when imminent doom is approaching?
But I can’t help it. The cottony scent of his breath washes over me, wrapping me up and making my core tighten.
Behind me, Sally’s light creeps ever closer. We’ll be found for sure. Sally will call the cops. We’ll be charged with trespassing. She’ll make bacon. Ugh. I can’t even think about it.
All those thoughts and more, like ones I’m trying to ignore about Pane’s generous erection, fill my head.
The roses rustle and I stiffen. Are they pulling back? But no, I look up just as vines shoot out next to us, growing at turbo speed, creating a lattice that stretches and pulls around us. In the blink of an eye, they’ve created a thorny wall, forming a tight web between the three of us and Stella.
We’ve been camouflaged, hidden safely inside something akin to a hunting blind that Sally can’t see into.
Inside the lattice, it’s pitch black. All I can hear is Sally’s muffled mumbling—something about stupid roses and how she’s gonna get me. Then her feet slowly make their way back to the front of the barn.
Oh, wow. She’s giving up!
I hope.
As the sounds of her footsteps become more and more distant, I’m suddenly intimately aware that Pane’s nose is pressed against mine, and that his lips are hovering less than an inch away.
