Never Sweeter (Dark Obsession #1)(27)

She kicked, and got absolutely nowhere.

She struck out with her right arm, and got tangled in her sleeve.

At which point she really began to panic.

Maybe this had been his plan all along—earn her trust and then murder her in a swimming pool. “Her clothes dragged her down, Officer, there was nothing I could do,” she thought, and almost lost it completely. That tight feeling was starting to happen, in her chest. Her arms just weren’t cutting through the water. It was entirely possible that she might die like this.

And then she felt his hands on her, strong, strong, strong. So strong he hauled her clean out of the water, then almost right over his head. She had to grab on to him just to stop herself going, when all she really wanted to do was murder him right back. She wanted to scream at him for doing that, but instead wound up with an arm tight around his shoulders and the other around his waist.

She was glad though, in the end.

If she had screamed and punched him, she wouldn’t have gotten the full extent of his apology. She might have heard him saying sorry twenty times in that frightened tone, but she would have missed the hand spread over her back. She would never have known what it was like to feel him stroking the back of her head in these little frantic motions—as though he knew he had to fix things super fast. He had to prove the whole thing was just a joke, before she escaped him forever.

And he succeeded, too. He succeeded because of this: “I just forgot I wasn’t always your friend.”

That was where they were now—on such good terms that he could pull a prank on her and assume that she would laugh. Their past had almost been erased for him, to the point where she was just his buddy and he was just her buddy and that was—good god, she didn’t know what that was. Soothing, her mind informed her.

Though it was possible that was just the feel of his hand on her back.

He was rubbing her in these soft, slow circles, so good she almost forgot they weren’t always friends, too. The only thing in her head was how nice it felt, to just give in to this. Every tensed muscle unwound and every nerve in her stopped fizzing, until finally she was just a boneless weight against him. Her cheek was against his shoulder and her arms were draped around his, everything so still and quiet suddenly that she could have almost kind of…kind of…

“Are you…are you falling asleep?”

“I was just nearly killed. I’m entitled to a rest.”

“Hey, I wasn’t complaining. Sleeping on me seems way better than never wanting to speak to me again. Or trying to kill me in return. I mean, you are fully capable of doing it now.”

“I was going to get you in a headlock.”

“Yeah?”

“But then I got comfy.”

“Is that what I am? Comfortable?”

There was amusement in his voice.

Good amusement. Warm amusement.

Plus, he was still stroking her back and her hair.

“Like a big couch.”

“Never thought being called a couch would make me feel so good.”

“Does it really? Make you feel good, I mean?”

“Nothing has ever made me feel better,” he said, then seemed to hesitate. As though whatever he was going to say next might cost him. And when he started speaking, haltingly, she could understand why. “Know how many times I wished I could have done this for you after the bluff? Must have been a hundred. A thousand. A million.”

It cost her, just to hear it.

“Well, you almost killed me again. But you saved me this time. You saved me,” she said, intending it as a half joke to lighten things a little. Only somehow, it didn’t work at all. Her voice came out brittle and broken, and when she was done he didn’t reply. He didn’t so much as whisper a word.

He just bunched her hair into his fist, like some kind of weird reflex.

Then pressed his face against her temple. Squeezed her hard in his big arms.

And he did it all for a long, long time. So long she could feel her throat starting to tighten. Her eyes starting to sting. This is what regret feels like when someone puts it in the form of an embrace, she thought, then suddenly that stinging sensation was twenty times worse. If she didn’t say something soon, she was going to lose it. Though even more frightening was the idea that he might.

“Tate? Are you okay?”

“Uh, yeah. Yeah, why? Did it seem like I wasn’t okay? Because I totally am. I wasn’t crying or anything. I’m way too manly and macho to cry about something so stupid,” he said, but she could tell he didn’t really mean stupid at all. She could hear the secret words behind it: something that means the world to me. And when she pulled back, she thought she could see it in his face, too. Just a little around the eyes, red rimmed, and in his tensing jaw.

Though she didn’t really get the full impact until she gave in to the urge to kiss him. Not on the lips, of course. Just on the cheek, to say thank you. The way a buddy might, definitely like a buddy—only it didn’t go like that at all. As she leaned in she saw the shift in his expression, from moved somehow to something else. His eyes closed and an arrow appeared between his brow, like it pained him.

Like it bruised him, to be touched so tenderly by someone.

He wasn’t used to it, she thought, but it was more than that, too. Different from that—and especially when she made contact. She pressed her lips to his cheek, feather light and barely moving, and heard a sigh escape his lips. So soft it was hardly there, but god it seemed loud to her. All of this seemed loud. Every sensation and feeling was heightened, from the tingle in her lips where they had touched him, to the way he looked at her as she drew back.