Page 58 of One Kiss Isn't Enough
The word “motherfucker” nearly leaves me under my breath. If I could pick a dream house, it would be this one. It’s set back deep under a canopy of mature trees, but with an opening for sunshine. There’s a wraparound porch and so many windows with pale blue shutters.
“This isn’t going to be like the last time, is it?” I ask him and he doesn’t answer immediately. “You’re not going to buy this house and wait for me to cave, are you?” I push him. Suddenly, that tick is becoming more of a slam with his ever-passing silence.
“Do you like it?” he asks me and I close my eyes, refusing to believe he did it again.
“You didn’t,” I whisper, praying he really didn’t.
“I bought it,” he tells me, letting the words slip out as if they don’t matter. Just like the last time he decided to have a house built here.
“Motherfucker,” I mutter, finally speaking the profanity aloud.
“I’ll sell it if you don’t love it, Chlo. We can up and leave and sell it no problem,” he’s quick to tell me, but that’s not the point.
“You can’t keep doing this shit!”
“Keep? It’s only here, only about finding a place to stay,” he argues back, letting his voice rise.
“Yes! Only here, the place I told you I never wanted to see again,” I retort, and my voice cracks with outrage. “Do I have to remind you what happened to the last place? Good things don’t happen here, and you should have taken that as an omen!”
The sky darkens at my words, the sun setting further into the trees, and I don’t like it.
“This isn’t okay,” I tell him in the calmest voice I can manage. I focus on taking one deep breath and then another.
“Don’t get worked up. I didn’t mean to upset you.”
“How could you have thought this wouldn’t upset me?” I bite back. And then snidely add, “Oh, that’s right, because you don’t listen to me. Because I say words that don’t mean anything.”
“Don’t do that.” Sebastian’s voice is low as he stares at me. His gaze is heated and so penetrating I can barely look at him, but I do. “Don’t make it out like I don’t care, Chloe. All I care about is you.”
“Then why are we here?” I can’t control the emotion in my voice.
The quiet forest seems to get darker with every minute we sit here arguing in the car.
“Because Carter needs me,” he answers me in a tight voice.
Carter. His best friend. The one he left behind in order to run away with me.
I could never relate to that friendship. A friendship he calls family. Because I had no one to leave behind. Friend, family, or otherwise. I only ever had Sebastian.
“And that’s his place?” I surmise. “The big one when we entered?” Big one doesn’t quite do it justice.
“This is all his property, but the place we’re going is deeper in the land. Private but safe and close. He lives there with his brothers,” Bastian answers, all the tension leaving him. He knows I have a soft spot for Carter. What he doesn’t know is how guilty I feel about everything that happened. But how could he, when he doesn’t even know I’m very aware of what actually happened all those years ago?
“And what did he need you for?” I ask him, meeting his gaze. I can already see that he’s going to lie. His tell is the way he narrows just his left eye, ever so slightly.
“You never tell me anything,” I say before he can disrespect me with another lie.
“What you need to know is that you’re safe here, and that I love you and I would do anything for you.”
My first instinct is to correct him and tell him it’s not about what I need to know, it’s about telling me everything because I’m his partner. And those are the words sitting there on the tip of my tongue until I look in his eyes and see a hint of worry, and I let his statement digest.
Safe here. Are we in danger? My hand moves to my belly and the fear of loss is all too real. The last time we left this place, death remained behind. The lingering memory of the nightmares and the fears creep into my mind. But I know what happened back then, and it can’t be that. I pray it’s not that.
I don’t know if it’s just being back here that causes chills to trail up my arms and down my spine, or if it’s something else. I swallow my question, knowing Sebastian won’t answer me anyway.
“Just come with me,” Bastian asks, holding out his strong hand for me to take.
It doesn’t mean I forgive him when I place my hand in his. And it doesn’t mean we’re okay when I follow him up the paved walkway to the gorgeous red walnut French doors.