Lead Me Home (Fight for Me #3)(18)
Sydney pushed her hand out to Nikki. “We are three. Forever and ever, you and me.”
Nikki smashed her palm to Sydney’s. “We are three. Forever and ever, you and me.”
Ollie did the same with Sydney, and his sister beamed at him when they chanted the oath Sydney had made them swear back when he was in second grade.
He didn’t know why his stomach felt different when he turned to Nikki, but something shivered through him when he pressed his palm against hers.
Their eyes met, and they whispered at the same time, “We are three. Forever and ever. You and me.”
Forever.
9
Nikki
He didn’t say a single word to me on the ride to Pepper’s Pies.
The infuriating, brooding, fuming asshole who I wanted to wrap up and hold and keep was completely closed off.
As if I was putting him out.
As if he couldn’t be bothered.
After he’d been the one making all those overbearing demands.
His dumb, gorgeous face was held rigid, and those sexy, muscled arms rippled with tension, making the field of purple blazing stars shiver across his skin.
I thought maybe if I reached out and traced them, they’d be real. That the small touch would take me back to the days when we’d run through their fields.
Free.
Fly, fly, dragonfly.
Old grief tremored deep in my chest. Thrumming and pulsing out. I swore that I could see it clash with that furious, provocative sort of energy held in every inch of Ollie’s delicious body.
As if he rode a fine line between past and present.
Never fully surviving on one side or the other.
I wanted to reach out.
Be his lifeline. His savior when he’d forever been the one saving me.
Ruining me.
Keeping me.
Alienating me.
Push, pull, taunt, tease, take, leave.
My head spun.
Wanting him so desperately and still praying for a way to finally break free of his chains.
I was beginning to think that was impossible.
Not with the way I’d felt looking at him this morning.
The man standing at the end of his hall.
Wearing nothing but his boxer briefs.
Body big and thick.
Burly and intimidating.
His need evident where his cock had pressed so massively against the fabric.
Almost as evident as the power that had blazed between us.
Electricity that spun in sharp, spindly barbs. Stakes to my skin. A hook in my soul.
My wicked savior.
My beast.
Too bad he had to be such a jerk.
He whipped into an angled parking spot in front of the diner.
I yanked at the handle and pushed open the heavy door, fumbling out from the low car and onto the pavement.
Day was just beginning to dawn on the horizon, a gray glow breaking above the mountains in the distance.
I slammed the door shut, freezing when he finally spoke to me through the open window. “Pick you up at three.”
“That won’t be necessary.”
He whipped his face toward me as fast as he’d whipped his car into the parking spot. “Yeah, it is.”
“You can’t tell me what to do.”
So maybe he had me feeling petulant.
Off-kilter.
Could anyone blame me?
“Ah . . . ten-year-old Nikki. My favorite.” Mischief moved through those glittering eyes. “Feisty and stubborn. Don’t make me throw you over my shoulder the way I used to do.”
I shot him a glare while my tummy did a backflip. “You wouldn’t dare.”
“Wouldn’t I? Think you’ve forgotten who you’re talking to.”
“You’re impossible.”
“If you want to call being right impossible, go right ahead.”
Ugh. Of all the overconfident, presumptuous, cocky—
“That’s what I thought,” he said with a smirk, cutting off my internal tirade.
My mouth dropped open, tongue at the ready to protest, but he tossed me a grin, threw the gear into reverse, and revved the engine.
The sound had me stumbling back, and he jerked out of the spot.
Without a glance, he shifted into drive and gunned it.
The man just left me there, staring behind him, wanting to stomp my feet and throw a fit or maybe just scream.
Arrogant asshole.
“What on earth?”
I whirled around when I heard the voice coming from down the sidewalk.
What had I done to anger the gods?
Only a curse could explain this string of bad luck.
When it rains it pours and all of that.
Because there was Lillith with her hands on her hips, wearing one of her fitted pant-suits and heels that made her look like some kind of vixen who’d rolled around in a billion bucks.
Rynna, the owner of Pepper’s Pies, was at her side.
“Tell me you didn’t have a one-nighter with Oliver Preston.” Lillith went all power-attorney lecturer on me.
That’s what I got for picking a BFF who was gonna turn out to be a lawyer.
“I mean, I know you’re infatuated with him, but seriously, Nikki? That isn’t healthy. That man is liable to break your heart.”
I had to hold back the dubious laugh.