“But Michelle’s map has McDonalds,” Brad pointed out, and the class laughed as Michelle blushed prettily and pretended to be embarrassed.
West gave in, smirking at Michelle playfully. “Again, very nice work, Miss Camden. We’ll just add a Hilton in the Rome airport over here, to keep up with Michelle’s business development.”
He tapped his finger against Italy on my map, gazing down at me before moving on to the front of the class.
My mind drifted to a four-hour layover in a Hilton hotel room, and a heated flush began at my neck and crept over my cheeks.
We were told to add one new discovery to our maps for Wednesday. Before I left his classroom, he caught my fingers softly. His touch doubled my heartbeat, and I nearly dropped my books.
“I just wanted to tell you… don’t take any sleeping pills,” he watched the busy hallway as he spoke under his breath. “If the nightmares return, you’ll be… trapped.”
Widening my eyes in horror, I imagined not waking up in time as Troy sliced my throat. “Thank you… for telling me,” I covered my heart, willing it to beat normally.
He watched me struggle, his fingers pinching mine before letting them go. “I’m here. I’m waiting for you.”
I nodded, turning to hurry into the hall.
Working diligently that night, I added a star chart to my map, using a protractor to draw perfect circles and grids. Morgan came in around dinner time, bringing me a cup of hot chocolate and some buttered, white toast. “Grandma’s special,” I smiled, carefully moving the tray away from my map.
“I’ll let you get away with these skimpy meals for a few more days,” she said softly, her eyes fixed on my map. “This is beautiful, Socrates. Is this for map class?”
I could tell she was completely serious, so I refrained from laughing. “History. They didn’t offer AP Cartography this year.”
“Oh yeah… Mr. Hot History Teacher,” she rolled a colored pencil between her fingers. “I wonder if he’s single.”
I stiffened. “What about Jason?”
“I’m not married to Jason,” she gathered her shoulder-length hair into her hands, flipping it absently. “When I talked to Mr. History at the hospital, I didn’t see a ring. And I really think we hit it off, you know…,”
“Everyone likes him,” I snapped, turning back to my map. “He’s just really charming.”
She watched me carefully. “Apparently. He and Logan talked- a lot.”
The Morgan-knows-something sensor that I’d fine-tuned over the past seventeen years went from orange to code red. I pursed my lips, turning to her. “He has to write me an excellent reference for my applications. He and Logan both talk baseball constantly, so I’m hoping if they are friendly, he won’t mind writing one for me.”
She stared me down, finally sitting back in her chair. “Oh. I get that.”
I shrugged, non-committal. “This project is worth fifty points.”
“Get back to work,” she saluted me, walking to my door.
“Morgan, when does the quarter start for you?” I realized she hadn’t left to go back to college yet. She winked.
“I needed a break. Back to business in the spring.”
When she left, I stared at my map. Morgan is babysitting me, I realized. I stood and walked to my mirror, pulling the ultrasound photo out of the framed glass.
Empty did not singly describe what I felt inside. The tiny black dot physically hurt to look at; I folded the paper in half, glancing outside. A warm front had moved through, melting much of the snow and leaving the evening wet and mild.
Eat dinner, go back to your map, I told myself, staring at the streetlight as it flashed and flickered on. Tucking the photo in the back pocket of my jeans, I slipped a hooded sweatshirt on and went downstairs.
Morgan watched me slide my feet into my boots, slapping her hands together in excitement. “Where are we going? Let’s get out of this house! Wal-Mart? Dinner? The mall?” She squealed with feigned excitement.
“Can I just… take a drive? Alone?”
She froze with her keys in her hand. “Roam…,”
“I want to get some fresh air, and clear my mind. I’ll have my phone on me and answer it every time your text or call. Unless I’m driving- I promise not to text and drive.”
“If you don’t answer me within ten minutes, I’ll send in reinforcements.” I knew she meant Logan.
“Deal.”
“Don’t wreck my car.” She passed me the keys to her Malibu. “When are you coming home?”
“No more than an hour. I just need to clear my mind, and then back to my map.”
“Be careful.”
I nodded. Backing the Malibu out of the driveway, I mentally checked myself. Do not do this. You are not ready.
“Radio,” I tapped the buttons on Morgan’s dash. She had Sirius Radio free for a year, and I somehow settled on the nineties station.
I recognized Stone Temple Pilots from West’s nineties playlist, Interstate Love Song helping me ignore the thoughts in my head. In less than fifteen minutes, I pulled into West’s driveway.
Well, I almost made it to Wednesday.
The front door brought back memories of the terrible night of Troy’s attack. I lifted my hand to knock, and then pulled it away.
This will end badly.
“Give it to him, leave,” I murmured, lifting my knuckles to the door and giving three sharp raps.
The door opened. West, still in dress clothes from school, took a step back. Music filled the house, loud, as if he worked to drown his own thoughts out as I had. Nickelback… This, I know.
“Are you okay?” His voice was urgent as he reached for me. I backed out of his grasp, my feet firmly rooted on the front porch.
“Hi,” I shoved my fingers into my back pocket, pulling at the thin photo. “I didn’t want to… throw this out… without you seeing it, so…,” I cursed the unforgiving tears that dripped down my face. “This was the first one. The… only one.”
He accepted the photo, unfolding it. I wiped the sleeve of my blue and white, Madison Swim Team sweatshirt across my face. “The arrow points to the… dot, it’s hard to see. You can just throw it away. I didn’t want to bring it to school…,”
“I’ve never seen this before… I’ve never seen our baby like this before.”
He leaned against the frame of the door, as if for support. I watched his finger as he traced the image. How You Remind Me began, so loud I wanted to cover my ears.
A misty rain started to blow inside the porch, making me shiver. “That’s all,” I whispered, turning to walk back to the car.
His voice stopped me. “I dreamed about Eva last night.”
I reached for the railing of the porch for support.
“When I woke up, I could still feel her. In my arms.”
Without turning, I let the wet wind soak my face as I stood perfectly still.
His footsteps on the wooden deck sounded from behind me. I almost made the complete turn to face him as his mouth descended on mine. Crying out softly, the rain turned to icy pelts as he lifted me into his arms and tucked me up and against him, his hands supporting beneath my thighs with his muscular grasp.
I wrapped my arms around his neck, gripping his waist with my legs. He turned us both, pressing me against the wide, sustaining post of the porch.
His mouth urged mine to open, and I bit my lip to resist succumbing to his teasing tongue. The moment my teeth clamped, he gripped my forearms from behind his neck, his thumb covering the numbers through my sleeve as he pinned my arms up and over my head. His mouth turned fierce, devouring, tormenting as he refused to let me touch him with my hands.
Jolts of electricity left me gasping against his lips. He groaned and crushed me tighter to him, threading his fingers through mine against the rigid, wooden post. As he did, I watched the ultrasound photo catch the wind, blowing across the yard like a dead, fallen leaf.
His mouth tasted like rain; I licked at his lips, bli
nking away water in my eyes.
“Christ,” he growled, releasing my arms to slide his hand under my thigh, beneath the back pocket of my jeans.
“Let go of me,” I bucked beneath his torturing mouth, cringing as his tongue lowered to my bruised neck. The wind picked up in the darkness, tossing my hair in every direction. He caught a handful in his fist, tugging softly for better access to my neck.
“I can’t,” he moved up to my ear and I lost control. A primal need for him sent my fingers to his soaking chest; I scratched at the buttons, not caring that they tore beneath my grasp. Basking in the pain that the wooden post caused against my back, I dove for his chest, my lips touching the taut muscle beneath his searing skin.
“Roam,” he released my hair and gripped my face in his hands, forcing me away from his chest.
I stared at him through the darkness, panting, eyelids heavy. “Finish this,” I managed between clenched teeth.
He drew me against him, carrying me inside the house. The music crashed against my ears, erasing my ability to think. We made it as far as the stairs before he pulled my sweatshirt over my head, his mouth lowering to my chest. I gave in to the confusion, the unbalanced feeling of him carrying me with my legs wrapped around his back.
“I don’t want to hurt you,” he groaned against my ear.
“Don’t hurt me,” I repeated his words, shoving my fingers into his hair and pulling so that his chin lifted to my mouth.
He backed me against the wall in his bedroom, his fingers tearing at the button on my jeans. I wriggled out of them as he turned, dropping me to the bed.
Without the lamp, his silhouetted body was massive, towering over me in the moonlight that poured through his bedroom window. I heard him fumble with tearing paper, and I realized that he had a condom in his hand.
“What…?” I met his eyes in the darkness as the music slowed enough for me to hear his words.
“I just want you,” he hushed, pressing me back against the cool sheets. “Only you.”
The song finally ended. The bedroom filled with total silence, other than the sound of my rapid breathing and the rain striking the roof. He eased over me, and I backed against the pillow, watching his shadowed face as he lowered himself against me.
His body slowed, his mouth gentled, and languorously I writhed. As his kiss moved lower, lingering over my bare stomach, my back arched at the deliberate, perfect agony. My fingernails curled into his broad shoulders as his tongue traced my navel.
I tensed as I began to think, really think, about the repercussions of what I was doing. He sensed my resistance and lifted his face, his eyes piercing mine in the darkness. “Do you know how long I’ve been waiting to do this?”
“West,” I swallowed, licking my lips as his mouth lowered again.
“Since I saw your goddamn map.”
His words registered, and I let a breathy laugh escape, shaking my head in protest. “Don’t curse,” I ordered, dragging his face to mine.
Tenderly, he kissed me, guiding me through the storm raging inside. We made love like it was the end of the world, clinging to each other in shared fear and quiet anguish. “I love you,” he whispered against my lips, and I came apart.
The timeless bond between us left me grasping for reality; he held me as we mourned what we had lost… and all that we stood to lose. My body wrenched beneath the weight of my tears, but he held me in place, in the only place that I belonged.
In his arms.
Chapter Eighteen
“Don’t leave.”
“Morgan texted me five times. I just texted her back, but she’s so mad.” I shoved my foot into my jeans, tugging them over my hips.
“School is going to be… difficult… tomorrow.” He sprawled naked on the bed, and I turned to him, smirking.
“The feeling will be mutual.”
“Roam,” he sat up and looped his finger inside the waist of my jeans, tugging me toward him. “No more of this. You deserve to be respected. No more…,” he struggled to articulate his words, and I lifted my eyes.
“Booty calls?”
“Damn it.”
“West.” I straddled his legs on the edge of the bed, hugging him tightly. “There’s nowhere else I’d rather be. I just have so much… anger. And it’s not your fault… it’s not anyone’s fault. I have to work this out.”
“Taking you out is not possible while I’m teaching you. And I need to be at the school… with you, while you’re there. That’s about me.”
“Being my hero. I know.”
He glanced at the clock on his bedside table, sighing and reaching for sweatpants. “I have to go feed… the prisoner.”
I stared at him, confused, and the realization of his words left me staggering. “Troy… my God, how could I forget he was here?”
“I’m glad you did.”
I slipped my sweatshirt over my head. “I want to see him.”
“What?” He shook his head adamantly. “Absolutely not-…,”
“Stop me then,” I ran for the door. He crossed the room in seconds, catching me before I could make it to the stairs.
“He is not tied up. He’s in a cell that I had built for him. He has a toilet and running water, and I feed him twice a day. It’s better than state prison.”
I ducked out of his arms, running down the stairs. “Good, then he can’t touch me.”
“You want to take your anger out on him,” he stepped in front of me again, stopping me before I could reach the kitchen. “He knew about Eva.”
“I want to kill him,” I twisted my fingers together until my skin tore. “Show me how to break his neck.”
“That’s not you, Roam.”
“Maybe it is!” I dodged past him, running to the door and throwing it open. I almost made it to the first step when he caught me around the waist.
“No. I won’t let you become this.”
“Let me go now.”
He stared me in the eye, finally releasing me. “Go.”
I walked down the stairs quickly, turning to the movement that I caught from the corner of my left eye. Troy sat on a rudimentary cot, his arms crossed over his broad chest. West followed me down.
The basement, unfinished, was dimly lit by only a single, hanging bulb. The cement floor appeared to have been flooded in the past, and a bench with sawhorses and carpentry tools lined the wall to the right.
There were no windows.
“There she is,” he grinned, wagging his fingers in the air. “Hey kiddo.”
“Come closer,” my voice, throaty and harsh from the damage he’d caused, came out thick and heated.
He was on his feet in a flash, moving to the iron bars West had installed. Who does he have on his payroll who builds cells in basements in a little more than a week? I shivered, glancing at West.
“Madison Swim Team.” He read my sweatshirt. “Well, that brings back some fun memories.”
“You knew… Eva…,” my voice waivered at her name, “would disappear. Why didn’t you tell me.”
“Not sure if you’re aware, but we’re enemies.”
“You gave me a warning… but you didn’t explain. Why would you even warn me?”
His eyes bored into mine. “You gave me water.”
The basement echoed with stillness.
“Okay, Roam, come on.” West’s voice, over my shoulder, interrupted the reverie.
Coldness settled in my very immortal soul.
I took a step toward Troy, my eyes fixed with his. He watched me carefully.
“I would like to hurt you,” I breathed.
He tilted his head to the side, his eyes never leaving mine. “Another couple weeks until her meds kick in?” He asked West.
West walked to my side. “Roam.”
“Wait,” I lowered my voice to a soothing lull, vanishing in Troy’s icy stare. “I think he’ll let me.”
Troy ran his finger down the bar in front of him. “Will you like it?” He asked.
I n
odded.
“What would you like to do?”
“I want to cut you… throat to navel.”
“Roam, we’re going upstairs. Now.” West grabbed my hand, but I shook him loose.
“Go get me a knife.”
“She can’t do it.” Troy held his arms out at his sides, challenging. “Tie me to the bars. She won’t do it.”
“Get me a knife, or I’ll get it myself.”
“He can’t die, Roam.”
“He can feel pain.” I backed to the stairs. “Tie him up for me, or I’ll do it myself.”
“I’ll let her tie me up. This is the most fun I’ve had in centuries.”
“Roam, you’re losing it,” West followed me up the stairs and into the kitchen. I walked to the butcher block by the stove, pulling the largest knife from the top slat.
“Tie him up!” I screamed.
“This isn’t you. You gave him water. You wanted him fed and cleaned. And now you want to cut him up?”
“He took everything from me,” I gripped the knife in my hands until my palm was slippery. “From us.”
“If I tie him to the bars, will you stop this?”
I went back to the basement. West moved to the corner for rope, and Troy’s eyes lit with excitement.
“Game on.” He stood against the bars, facing outward. West grabbed each arm, one at a time, and secured him to the iron rods. “Wait, I need to be a little lower, judging by her height.” He laughed, sickening. “You couldn’t kill a fly.”
I walked toward him slowly and stopped, looking down at the knife in my hands. “This is too sharp,” I dropped it, jerking as it hit the floor. “When you cut me up in France, the blade was dull.” Walking to the wall with the tool bench, I surveyed what I had to work with. “It was long, and dull.” Finally, I grabbed a large, flathead screwdriver.
“You’re about one hundred pounds, soaking wet. Do you know the force it’ll take to stab me with that?”
Half running with adrenaline, I moved to him before I could think. Pulling my arm back as if I were pitching a baseball, I thrust the screwdriver between the bars and into his neck, backing up as blood spurted forth, drenching my face. His eyes bugged in pain and disbelief, and I screamed.
Fall (Roam Series, Book Two) Page 15
