Settling Ashes: A New Adult/College Romance (The Ashes Series Book 2)

by Gardin, Diana

  “I’m serious,” Beau spat. “Don’t you care about her safety at all? She’s not okay here with you!”

  Gillian and Tima looked back and forth between us warily.

  “Guys,” Tima said quietly.

  “No,” I nearly shouted. “No! She’s not going anywhere. Especially not with you. You got her for a month, man. That’s only because I didn’t know where she was.”

  “Yeah, and when you did know where she was, she was being used as a battering ram in your damn car.”

  Beau’s hands were fisted at his sides, and his face was growing redder as our conflict ensued.

  “Stop,” Paige said, placing a hand on my good wrist. “Both of you. I can speak for myself you know. I say where I’m going to be, and I’m not going anywhere.”

  I sighed with relief at her words and her touch. Because truthfully, I knew that if she wanted to go with Beau I couldn’t stop her. I just didn’t want her to go anywhere.

  “I’m staying,” she said flatly, looking at Beau, and then at Gillian. “I now you guys want to protect me, but this could be all for nothing. We have no proof that someone is trying to hurt me. I think that car accident was just that…an accident. So Clay’s lawyer will look into it, but until we have something concrete to go on, I’m not running away from anything.”

  She looked up at me and smiled slightly. “Plus, I’ve been away from you long enough.”

  Beau rolled his eyes and blew out a puff of air in frustration. “Paige, you’ve always been stubborn as a--”

  “Hey!” I growled. “Don’t talk to her like that. She told you how she felt. The end. And don’t ever suggest anything like that again. She’s mine to protect.”

  He came around the table to stand next to Paige, and my arms twitched with the desire to put her behind me and not to let her talk to him. I held back, only because I knew she was safe.

  “Paige,” he said quietly, reaching out for her non-injured hand. “Will you promise me that if we find out you’re not safe here, you’ll come to Haygood with me? This is about you being okay, not about anything else.”

  The meaningful gaze he aimed at her made my stomach clench and my skin crawl. The dude was in love with her. It was written all over his face.

  She tilted her head, giving him one of the saddest looks I’d ever seen on her face. She glanced at me, and I was staring at her, too.

  She nodded at him. “Okay. If I’m not safe here, I’ll come back.”

  My mouth dropped open, and I whirled her around to face me.

  “You will be safe here,” I admonished. “I swear, I will never let anything happen to you.”

  She glanced between Beau and I, and then she sat back on the couch with a weary sigh. My jaw was clenching and unclenching with the strain of hearing her tell Beau “yes.” To anything.

  “Fine, fine,” Gillian said with a sweep of her hand. “I made my feelings known. Can we all at least keep our eyes open? Please?”

  “We’ve got you,” Drew said to her seriously. “And Paige.”

  “Good,” Gillian nodded briskly. “Meeting adjourned. Now, I guess I need to pack a bag. Paige kicked me out tonight so she and Clay can have alone time.”

  I watched Beau’s face fall, and he took a step backward. “Can I talk to you for a second?” he asked Paige.

  “No,” I said rudely, putting my arm around her protectively.

  “Clay,” she said, turning to me. “You don’t have to protect me from Beau.” She leaned up on her toes to whisper in my ear. “Do you trust me?”

  I looked down into her eyes, reaching out to brush the strand of her dark hair away from her left eye. A pang of sadness stabbed me when I though about how far she’d come with her self-consciousness; she never worried about strategically placing that patch of hair over her barely-there scar from the fire anymore. And now she had a large bandage in almost the same spot from that stupid accident.

  “Yeah,” I whispered back. “I do.”

  She smiled and leaned up to brush her lips across mine. “Love you.”

  I squeezed her hand tightly before I let her go, and watched her walk out the front door with him.

  I was so tired of watching her walk away from me.

  Twelve

  Paige

  “You are really starting to tick Clay off,” I warned Beau as we walked out the front door to stand against the brick wall across the walkway.

  “I don’t give a rat’s hindparts,” he retorted. “I’m worried about you, not him.”

  “I’m fine, Beau,” I said, looking up into his eyes. “You don’t have to worry about me.”

  “I know he loves you, Paige,” he said grudgingly. “But I love you, too. And you’d be safer with me.”

  “We don’t know that,” I pointed out.

  “I do.”

  I sighed. Then I reached up and wrapped my arms around his neck, squeezing him in a hug. “I’m grateful I have a watchdog like you, Beau.”

  “You’d better get used to it,” he said in a voice as fierce as hurricane winds. “I’m going home, because I have to work in the morning. But you know my number, and I want you to promise you won’t hesitate to use it if you need anything.”

  “I promise,” I said. “Goodnight, Beau.”

  “Goodnight, beautiful,” he answered, watching me as I walked back inside the apartment.

  I closed the door quietly behind me and noticed Drew, Rob, and Tima putting on their coats in preparation to leave. Clay hadn’t returned to his seat on the couch when I’d left; he remained standing. I caught him mid-pace when I walked in the door. He visibly sighed with relief when I approached him.

  “We’re out,” Rob announced, dropping a kiss on my cheek as he scooted by me. “See ya, Paige. We’ll always have your back, alright?”

  “I know,” I said, smiling at him. “I mean, I’ve got to be the safest girl in Rutherford, with y’all watching out for me.”

  “Damn right,” Drew agreed, kissing my other cheek.

  “Hey!” Clay exclaimed, holding out his good arm. “Why the hell can’t everyone keep their lips off my girl?”

  “Because she’s so darn cute,” Tima answered, hugging me tightly.

  Her black curls bobbed around her face; she’d pulled her hair up into a large pile of curliness on the crown of her head tonight. She looked gorgeous and exotic, as always, with her light brown skin and slanted eyes. “Love you, girl.”

  “Love you harder,” I smiled at her. “Goodnight, y’all.”

  I left the door open when I saw Gillian coming down the hall, towing her duffle bag. “Call me if you need me, chick.”

  “I will.”

  I was almost sick of the request; I wondered if the day would ever come that I was no longer the person who needed everyone to watch out for her. Ever since the fire, I’d been a burden: a burden on Gillian, a burden on Clay, and now a burden on Beau and the rest of my friends. I needed, for my own sanity, to reach a place where everyone was confident in my abilities to look out for myself first and foremost.

  I closed the door behind her and turned to Clay, aiming a sly smile at him.

  “Alone at last,” I remarked, leaning against the door.

  I saw his eyes immediately pique with interest. “Yeah. What are we gonna do with ourselves?”

  I faked a wide yawn. “I’m exhausted. I think I’ll just head on to bed.”

  He made quick work of the space between us, and gently took me in his arms. “Nice try, woman.”

  He bent his head and grabbed my earlobe between his teeth, eliciting a gasp from my throat.

  “You’re right,” I gasped. “I’m not the least bit sleepy.”

  “That’s good,” he murmured, his breath blowing hot against my neck. “Because I wasn’t going to let you sleep.”

  “No?” I asked, tilting my head to give him better access.

  His good hand came around me, pressing me to him with his palm flat on my stomach.

  “Yeah,” his lips found
the sweet spot on my neck and I sucked in a breath as he tasted my skin. I breathed out again, leaning my weight against him in surrender.

  His hand moved beneath my shirt, snaking up my abdomen to pinch the front clasp of my bra. It opened, and he cupped me greedily, kneading my soft skin with his fingers. A true moan escaped my lips.

  “See, baby,” he said, allowing his lips to leave my neck.

  The absence of them was cold, and I squirmed, wanting to feel his lips against me again. “You have to stay with me. So every night can be this sweet.”

  “So sweet,” I agreed, turning in his arms.

  I stared up at him, his bright blue eyes blazing with protectiveness and need. I reached for the hem of his shirt. Taking it off of him was much more difficult with my arm in a cast and his in a sling, but we made it work slowly but surely, and when he was shirtless I hummed with pleasure. I could live for a thousand years, and I’d never get sick of seeing Clay Forbes without his clothes on.

  He saw me eyeing his chest and his lips turned up in a crooked smile. “Are you done? Or should I stand here a little longer while you ogle?”

  “Not done ogling yet,” I said, a smirk playing on my own lips.

  He chuckled, and then carefully pulled my shirt up over my head. “Well, I want to ogle, too.”

  But he took one look at me and then took my hand, towing me toward the bedroom.

  “Clay,” I said, resisting his pull.

  He turned, raising an eyebrow in question.

  “We’re alone,” I pointed out, my smile growing. “We don’t necessarily have to be in my room.”

  He paused mid-stride, and turned around to walk back to where I’d stopped. He stared at me.

  “Damn arm,” he growled. “I just want to pick you up right now and put you on the fucking kitchen counter.”

  “Oh, well,” I smiled. “We’ll improvise.”

  He bent down and captured my lips, covering them with his and tasting me with his tongue. He backed me up until I was standing against the refrigerator, and then braced his good hand next to my head. He kissed me openly, and I was weak in the knees by the time he moved his mouth back to my neck. He caught me around the waist when my legs betrayed me, and we slowly sank to the kitchen floor.

  His lips were famished, and they moved from my neck to my collarbone as his hand slowly slid beneath the waistband of my leggings. His fingers curled around the waistband and he tugged. I reached down to help him remove them completely.

  He took his time crawling slowly back up the length of my body, giving generous attention to the imperfect skin on my legs. The remnants of my burns were still visible there, as they probably always would be. Clay had fallen in love with me and wanted me in spite of the mottled skin, the impure shell of my body. I loved him so much for that, it hurt.

  He paused on his way back up to my face, kissing the parts of my skin that were once a special kind of torture for me. I no longer hurt, and each touch of his lips sent a shiver of pleasure radiating through my body. He looked up at me after one of the shudders.

  “You’re so gorgeous, Paige. I wouldn’t trade any part of you, because all of this makes you who you are. And who you are is a woman who was created perfectly for me.”

  I sighed, closing my eyes with the emotion his words invoked. I told myself I wouldn’t cry, because tonight was about melding my body to his again.

  “Come here,” I whispered, tugging on his neck so I could have him beside me again. He hovered over me, staring down into my eyes.

  “I love you, baby,” he whispered. “So much.”

  “Show me,” I ordered gently.

  “Gladly.” He bent down and kissed me so slowly and deeply that everything else in the room just melted away into the background. Clay and I could have been on a mountaintop somewhere, or floating on a cloud in the sky. It didn’t matter. As long as I was with him, I felt safe and loved and wanted. Clay had an ability to make me feel that way in the midst of a storm, or in the total quiet of a moonlit night.

  I ran my hands over his stomach again, savoring the harness of his muscles and the way they tensed under my hands. I sat up on my elbow in order to lean forward and kiss him there. I placed my lips on his skin, and then I froze.

  “Clay?” I asked, my voice barely audible.

  “Yeah?” His voice was just as soft as mine.

  I stroked a finger over the inky mark on his skin that I knew had never been there before. It was located just below his ribcage, on the left side.

  “How did I not notice before that you have a tattoo?”

  He sat back, looking down at the mark and then back up at me. The corner of his mouth turned up in a rueful grin.

  “Because I didn’t have it before. This is a recent addition.”

  I peered closer. “Why did you get it?”

  “Can you read it?”

  I could. It was a picture of a large, detailed bird that I’d never seen before. The Old English script underneath had two sets of initials: ours. I gasped.

  “What kind of bird is this?” I asked in disbelief.

  He had my initials tattooed on his body. I struggled to catch my breath.

  “It’s a Phoenix.” He put a finger under my chin in order to tilt my face up to look at him. “Because the love we share will rise again and again. No matter what happens to get in our way. I will always love you, and I will always pursue you. So it doesn’t matter what the world throws at us. We’ll rise again. Just like a phoenix.”

  I gaped at him. When a lone tear rolled down my cheek, he brushed it away with his thumb. “That’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever heard.”

  He claimed my lips again, easing me back onto the floor. And then, in the midst of our heated kiss, he rose, grabbing me with him, wrapping my legs around his waist as he stood.

  “Your arm,” I mumbled against his mouth.

  “I got you,” he murmured, holding me up with one arm. “I’ve always got you.”

  He walked, still kissing me, to the couch, where he laid me gently against the cushions. He dashed back across the room, reaching into his discarded jeans pocket and pulling out a square of foil. Ripping it open, he approached me again. Rolling the condom on, he then lowered himself above me. He hovered there for a full minute, just taking me in with his eyes.

  “Beautiful,” he said quietly, to himself more than to me. Then he plunged inside me with one swift movement, and we both cried out at the pleasure of it.

  He paused, closing his eyes tightly, and I squeezed his hardness gently with unseen muscles to urge him to move. His eyes flew open again, and he drew a ragged breath.

  “Again, baby,” he said. “Do that again.”

  So I squeezed my interior muscles together again, and he groaned in response.

  “Jesus,” he said, his voice strained. “You are going to kill me.”

  We rocked together slowly, slowly, our eyes locked so that we could read the other’s emotions like the open books we both were. And as the pressure inside both of us grew and grew, I began to whimper Clay’s name. The moment of ecstasy washed over me like a wave I was riding, and I closed my eyes against it, just as I heard Clay cry out and felt him begin to tremble.

  When he collapsed on top of me, kissing my neck and my collarbone softly, I squeezed him so tightly I know it must have hurt his ribs.

  This man was mine again. And I couldn’t let him go. Not ever.

  Clay

  I basked in the sweetness that was Paige that entire night. I slept, and then I would wake up and squeeze her to me or kiss her shoulder or hand, whatever was closest. Then I would doze off again, only to wake later to repeat the ritual. She was too much for me. She was too good for me. She was everything I would ever need.

  When she finally stirred next to me, the sun’s rays glowing softly across her face as the morning stood upon us, my eyes were already locked on hers.

  “Good morning, my little phoenix,” I greeted her.

  “Hey,” she smiled a
nd stretched her good arm into the air. “It is a good morning, isn’t it?”

  I brushed her cheek with my fingertips. “Very.”

  “Do you want to get up and have some breakfast?”

  “No,” I answered nonchalantly.

  “No?”

  “I want to stay in bed all day with you.”

  Her smile grew, and she opened her mouth to speak. Just as she did, my cell phone jangled.

  I puffed a sigh, grabbing it off of the nightstand. “Hello.”

  “Clay,” my mother’s voice greeted me.

  “What is it, Mom?”

  “I hope you’re well this morning. Your father and I would like to take you out to dinner this evening. We have your car to give you. And we’d like to talk to you about some things as well.”

  “Alright,” I sighed. “Just tell me where. Paige and I can meet you around six.”

  “Actually, we’d prefer if you came alone. Paige would just be bored with all this business we’ll be discussing.”

  “Mom, you’ve lost your mind if you think I’m leaving Paige--”

  A tug on my arm gave me pause. Paige was sitting up in bed watching me. She shook her head slightly and pointed to the phone.

  I took it away from my ear. “What? I’m not leaving you to go have dinner with them. You can come too.”

  She shook her head again. “Don’t fight with her over me, Clay. I don’t want that. I have some things I need to do around here today, anyway.”

  I eyed her suspiciously for a minute, and then I put the phone back to my ear.

  “Okay, Mom. We’ll have a very short dinner. And then I have to get back to Paige. “

  “Delightful, darling. I can’t wait to see you.” Her voice almost sounded…chipper. Which was so unlike my mom that I looked down at the phone in surprise.

  We hung up, and I frowned at Paige. “You didn’t have to do that, you know. You don’t have to play referee between my mom and me. Our issues go way back; they have nothing to do with you.”

  “I know,” she nodded. “But this one was about me, and I’m not going to let that stand. She’s your mom and you love her.”

  A wistful expression appeared on her face, and I suddenly understood why she felt so strongly about not creating conflict within my family. I was an idiot.