Touch Me Not (Manwhore, #1)(81)

“I promise.” He leaned over and kissed the top of her head. “Let’s get back inside. Janet wants to show you all her wedding stuff. She has it all over here for some reason. I’m not sure why.”

Janet attacked as soon as they came back into the main room. “I’m so sorry, Lily, I didn’t know until Mike told me. I swear I didn’t know.”

“It’s okay, Jan.” I laughed. “It’s fine, really. Now what’s this I hear about wedding stuff? And why is it all at a frat house?”

Jan looked madder than a wet hen. “Mike was trying to fix the sink and ended up flooding the apartment. We’re both staying here until it gets fixed.”

“Oh, my,” Lily murmured. That sure sounded like something Mikey would do.

“Come on, I’ll show you everything I’ve picked out so far. I need help with the flowers and the bridesmaids dresses…”

“It’s a party, Jan!” Mike shouted from across the room. “Let’s party!”

She shot him a death glare, and Lily giggled. Janet started muttering about stupid men on the way up the stairs. The three drunken guys who stumbled down the stairs past her suffered the same look. They didn’t waste time in getting out of her way. Lily laughed as she followed Jan down the hall, listening to her ramble on about colors and flowers.

Nikoli had his lips plastered to the blonde when he heard them. He’d know Lily’s voice anywhere. He tore his mouth from the girl’s and stared in horror as the door slowly opened. Jan looked up, her expression going from shock to outright rage when she saw him with his hands under the girl’s shirt, his knee pressed up against her. It was Lily he saw, though.

Her eyes widened. They went from him to the busty blonde he’d shoved up against a wall. Her eyes, while they had been shuttered, now pooled with pain and hurt. A single tear escaped before she turned around and walked away.

Nikoli cracked. Seeing her again, after all these weeks, all the lies he’d told himself laughed in his face. The pain he’d seen in her eyes, the pain he’d been responsible for putting there not once, but twice, was a the slap upside the head he needed. He loved her. He’d tried so hard to convince himself he didn’t, but she haunted him. He loved her, and dammit, it was time he told her. It was time he put them both out of their misery.

If she’d have him after this.

He started cursing and detached himself from the girl, meaning to follow Lily, but the little bit of fluff in the doorway stopped him.

“How dare you!” she shrieked. “Do you know what you did to her? Do you even care that she laid on my bathroom floor for two days? Do you care that she sobbed so hard she lost her voice? Who the f*ck do you think you are, Nikoli Kincaid? You’re nothing but a worthless, no good…”

“First this is my frat house, and I didn’t expect her to show up here. Second, I sure as hell didn’t mean for her to see that. Now get out of my way so I can check on her!”

“Check on her?” Janet yelled. “You stay the hell away from her! She doesn’t need you causing her any more pain.”

Nikoli simply picked up the pixie-like woman and set her aside, ignoring both women shouting at him as he ran down the stairs. He looked and didn’t see her anywhere, but everyone was staring at him.

“Where?” he barked, and several people pointed to the front door. He wasted no time and ripped the door open to bound down the steps. He knew exactly where she’d go. The small gazebo up the street in the center of the outlying buildings. She loved it there, said it was peaceful.

He stopped dead about twenty feet from the gazebo. There was a cell phone on the ground, with a trail of blood leading from it to the street. He took several more steps, and dread and panic froze his heart.

The phone was Lily’s.

***

A wave of nausea woke Lily up. She groaned and rolled over, but found she was in a small, tight place. She opened her eyes to darkness. The first thing she noticed was that she was moving. Calm down, she told herself. Calm down and focus. She listened and heard the sounds of the highway. She was in a trunk and moving. They weren’t going fast, probably under the speed limit.

Her head was killing her. She closed her eyes and tried to remember what happened. She’d been running, running away from Nikoli and the girl he’d been with. She’d run smack into someone. She’d mumbled an apology and tried to go around him, but he’d caught her arm and pulled her around. He’d told her to be quiet and come with him or he’d cut her. Her upper arm started to sting as soon as she remembered him saying that. She’d tried to get away, and he had cut her. That hadn’t quieted her down. Adam’s dad had taught her to scream and fight like hell if she ever got in this kind of situation, and that was exactly what she’d done. The last thing she remembered was the guy’s fist barreling down at her, and then it had been lights out.

If she panicked now, she’d end up dead and missing instead of just missing. She ignored the pain in her arm and started feeling around the trunk. The first thing she looked for was a trunk latch. All new cars had them in case someone got locked in. There wasn’t one, which said this was an older car.

Next, she examined the taillights, and this was her first bout of good luck. She turned and kicked the taillight several times as hard as she could, and it knocked the light out. Wiggling around, she managed to turn so her head was now looking out of the broken taillight. They were surrounded by cars. How to get their attention?