Stain (Stain #1)(30)
“Let’s go,” I barely manage, still shaken. When he fails to move, I tighten my hold and tug. “Don’t be stupid.” That gets his attention as he spears me with sterling eyes. I don’t look away. Not this time. Why I choose now to hold that intense stare I can’t quite say, but I’m glad for it. I’m glad for the momentary backbone. “I think you’ve out road raged him. I also think it’d be really stupid if you ended up in jail because of it. All this would be pretty much pointless.” I’m not sure how effective my words are until he walks away a very small eternity later. I rush behind him, hop back inside the passenger seat, and close the door just before he takes off. I don’t stop looking at my side mirror till long after we leave the scene.
***
“You can take the next left and drop me off at the corner of Birch Drive, my house is right around the corner. I’ll walk from there,” I say, into the silence, when he turns on the street that parallels mine. We didn’t speak about what happened earlier at all throughout the ride. The last fifteen minutes have been spent in repressive silence charged with tension thick enough to cut with a knife. This time there isn’t any music to fill the silence. I’ve been going back and forth on whether or not to ask him exactly what happened back there. The sort of rage he displayed had to stem from something. And I want to know. I want to ask. But I won’t because I’ve been unable to work up the courage to do so for namely two reasons: 1) I know I have no right to pry since I was so reluctant to talk about my own issues earlier. And: 2) Fear of his derision as he’ll most likely charmingly tell me to “f*ck off” keeps me reasonably quiet.
“You live on Birch?”
I shake my head. “Denton. Just the street over.”
“What number?”
“At 76 Denton Avenue.”
He says nothing more after that as he turns right on Denton. Soon we’re idling in front of the white and blue single-family house with the two-car garage and the pretty perennials lining the cement walkway leading up the four-step porch with the light on. My heart jumps to my throat at the sight of the Durango in the driveway.
“You hold your blades a little too tightly and I always want to smash someone’s face in.” When I look at him, the reason for my fear temporarily vanishes like vapor and he becomes my only concern, the only thing my mind wants to orbit around. His glance is lazy, slightly narrowed, and yet the intensity in it remains unparalleled. In this truck, this space, up so close, his striking features are made even more so by the shadow and light caressing his face as softly and as sweetly as I want to do. “Guess we have to satisfy our demons somehow,” he quips. There’s a self-deprecating resonance to his tenor that pulls one side of his mouth into a humorless grin. “Looks like your old man is waiting.” I follow the path of his gaze over my shoulder to find Tim leaning against the porch railing with his large arms folded across his barrel chest. With the brightness of the porch light beaming behind him, his facial features remain obscured. But I don’t need to see his face to know the expression he’s sporting. Anger is his default emotion. He’s looking in our direction, and I’m praying he doesn’t see much.
The sudden urge to remain in the truck and beg Maddox to keep driving is so strong that I have to chomp down on my bottom lip to keep the words from tumbling out. “Thank you,” I reply, tugging on the string on my shirt sleeve from earlier and mindlessly twirling it around the tip of my index finger once I pull it free of my shirt. “Thanks for the ride.” By the time the string is gone, I’ve wrapped it several times around the tip of my finger, effectively cutting off the blood from circulating to the area.
“So, not just blades then.”
I blink before pulling my hand out of sight. “Will you pose for me?” I ask, ignoring his remark.
He shrugs. “Haven’t decided yet. Like I said, I don’t have time to waste. You gotta make it worth my while.” I’m a target locked at the end of his loaded stare.
My tongue darts out to lick my lips nervously. “How?” I’m not altogether sane, but I’m not stupid. I know what he’s implying. I know where he’s steering this conversation. Even now, his unspoken words charge the air in the truck. It’s heavy and stifling. Every breath I take is saturated with his unrepentant sex appeal. A flush bursts in my cheeks when he reaches out a hand to cup my jaw and languidly grazes his thumb across my damp bottom lip. His gentle caress forces me to acknowledge the part of my flesh I refused to pay attention to before. It’s awareness that’s too strange, too foreign, and yet remarkably familiar. He makes it familiar. I’m a girl and he’s a boy and the suggestion of his touch makes me cognizant of that. It’s electrifying. I want more of it. My breasts feel so full that every time I breathe my tight, pebbled nipples chafe with the sweetest torture against my bra. My pulse is racing, fluttering to the same maddening cadence of my beating heart.
“You’re a smart girl, Aylee. I’m sure you can come up with something.” The dropped octave of his voice coaxes a slickness that runs hot and wet in the valley between my legs. The way it dampens my panties is both embarrassing and oddly alluring.
His sensual mouth forms a grin like he knows. Like he understands exactly how his touch is a sweet devastation. “You should go now.” I mourn the retreat of his hand. “Wouldn’t want to get you in trouble.”