Page 38 of The Ashes of Summer

He's breathing heavily, too, and his eyes never leave me. They search my face with that same unsettling concentration, as though he's found the answer he'd been looking for all along.

He raises his fingers and parts them to admire the glaze of my arousal. Then brings them to his mouth and slowly sucks them clean.

The gesture twists something deep inside my stomach.

"You're ready." His voice is a quiet growl.

Before I can make sense of what he means, he's moving again. One arm circles my waist and hauls me effortlessly toward him. The world lurches as my stomach slams against his shoulder hard enough to knock the breath from my lungs. My hair spills toward the ground as I thrash instinctively, fists pounding uselessly against his back.

He simply turns and carries me out of the room.

Chapter 12

Just Like Her

Summer

One second my feet are beneath me, the next they're dangling uselessly in the air as Jackson carries me over his shoulder like I weigh nothing at all. The movement knocks the breath from my lungs, my stomach pressing painfully against the hard ridge of his shoulder while blood rushes to my head.

I don't fight.

Not because I don't want to.

Because I know exactly what it'll earn me.

His grip tightens fractionally around the backs of my legs as he walks, steady and unhurried, and I understand with sickening certainty that he isn't carrying me because he has to.

He's carrying me because he can.

Behind us, Donnie's boots strike the floor in slow, even beats that echo through the hallway. I count them without thinking, trying to focus on something—anything—that isn't the weight of Jackson's last words still circling my mind.

You're ready.

Ready for what?

The question repeats itself over and over, but every answer my mind offers is worse than the last.

I force myself to pay attention instead.

Left.

Right.

Another right.

Three doors.

A staircase.

I count the turns, the steps, the distance between them, clutching at the information as though it might matter later. Maybe it will. Maybe if I ever get the chance to run, remembering the layout of this place will buy me enough time to find an exit before they find me.

Or maybe I'm lying to myself because thinking about escape is easier than thinking about where he's taking me.

Jackson stops.

A lock clicks.

The door opens.