He laughed so hard at my sarcasm he almost drove us off the road. My stomach flipped many times over. I still couldn’t believe such a sexy sound came from a mouth that could say the meanest things. Despite what his laugh did, I stayed on topic.
“I’m sure half the people in Newcastle wish they had your life.”
The laughter stopped.
I glanced back at him. “What’s with the quiet?”
A muscle jumped on his jaw. “You don’t know anything about my life,” he said. Then he looked at me with piercing sapphire eyes. It almost hurt to stare into them. “You know what they say happens when you assume. You make an ass of you and me.”
I swallowed the prickly lump in my throat. “Why so defensive?”
“I’m not defensive.” He sighed, loosening his grip on the steering wheel. “I just don’t wish my life on anyone else. I’m compassionate that way.”
The corner of his mouth curled up as we pulled onto the road leading to the farmhouse. He shifted moods from zero to sixty in less than three seconds. I was beginning to see that he said mean and snarky things as a defense mechanism.
“Why didn’t you want Kyle to drive you home?” he asked after another couple seconds of stiff silence between us. “I thought you were besties.”
I wanted to kick him for being so perceptive. “Don’t say ‘besties.’ It sounds weird coming from you.”
He leveled a pointed stare at me.
“Kyle’s been lying to me,” I said plainly. “We’ve been best friends for so long, and this is the first time he’s ever lied to me.”
“That you know of.”
“Excuse me?”
“Fun fact about life, Selena: everyone lies.”
Anger wrapped my stomach in prickly brambles. “I don’t know what kind of a life an Illumenari lives, but around here, friends don’t lie to friends.”
“Even if it means protecting each other?”
“Even then.”
“Then you’re naïve.”
My mouth opened, but my anger blocked my comeback. He had a point, even if I refused to accept it. My friends didn’t lie to me just like I didn’t…my heart twisted. I’d kept my vision a secret. I didn’t tell Kyle about the puppets or what happened today with the needles. I lied by omission. My righteous indignation crashed, landing as a pile of rocks in the pit of my stomach. Again with the stones in my glass house. Frustration blurred my vision. I had no right to judge.
“Shit. Are you seriously crying?” He pulled over onto the side of the road and turned off the engine. “I’m sorry, Selena. It was a jerk thing to say.”
“You’re always a jerk.” I used the heel of my hand to wipe away the tears that refused to stay in my eyes.
“Shit. Don’t cry. Please, don’t cry.”
“You’re the weak-against-tears type, huh?” My voice hitched. Still, the tears came.
“Occupational hazard.” He hauled me into a fierce hug, sending the now familiar electric current all over my body.
About fifteen minutes later, tears dry, I led the way to the front door of the farmhouse. It was dark inside. No one was home yet. Being alone didn’t bother me as much as Dillan staring at me like I was a crystal swan about to shatter. After my mini breakdown, he kept asking how I felt. So un-Dillan like.
It was the truth. I really did feel better. After all that crying, my head cleared and I saw the Kyle situation in a new light. We needed to talk. The sooner the better. If I wanted him to be honest with me, I had to tell him everything.
The quiet of the prairies magnified our footsteps on the wooden porch. I turned to take my bag from Dillan, but he had already lowered it to the floor. I studied it like it was a UFO, with some curiosity mixed with a little fear. And then, I lifted my eyes to his face. A mistake. I’d been making a lot of those lately. The striking cerulean his eyes became took my breath away. Who knew blue eyes could have so many shades?
“Dillan?” I hated that my voice trembled when I said his name.
“Shhh,” he said, and with a hand on my hip, pinned me against the screen door.
I stared at his gorgeously serious face. “Dillan, what are you doing?”
“What I should have done at Valley View,” he said.
Slowly, like the moon rising, he bent his head and kissed me. First, a tentative touch, then a second, and when I thought he wouldn’t fully commit to the kiss, his lips claimed mine possessively. Forget fireworks on the Fourth of July. The electricity that sparked every time we touched gathered on our lips and exploded. The second his tongue touched mine, the contact felt like Pop Rocks in my mouth. I couldn’t get enough of it. Heat and energy flowed from his lips to mine. Just when I thought he’d pull away, he tilted his head and nibbled at the corner of my mouth until he reached the center of my bottom lip. He parted them with his tongue. But, when I let him in, he stopped, resting the tip between my upper lip and teeth. In one experienced move, he traced the sensitive valley. It curled my toes. Only at my gasp did he go all the way in again.
Dillan didn’t just kiss. He slow danced. We moved in sync. I wanted to lose myself in him. In his touch. Right then the world seemed like such a perfect place. He had one strong arm around my waist while his other hand gripped the back of my neck. I slid my fingers up his chest and into his hair, linking them behind his neck. I couldn’t get close enough. I wanted to drown in his fire. His clean scent enveloped me completely, replacing my worries with hunger. My only concerns became taste, smell, touch. But when I reeled my senses from the abyss, I pushed him back while leaning heavily against the screen door.
“What?”
I sighed, scrunching my nose. “We can’t do this.”
He tilted his head in confusion. “This?”
Gesturing between us, I said, “You and me and the kissing.”
“You don’t like the kissing?”
“Oh, no. I like the kissing. The kissing is good.” I bit my lower lip. “I mean, I just got out of a relationship.”
“Okay.” He pulled back a little farther. “If you want me to stop, I’ll stop.”
Unable to take the cold caused by the growing distance between us, I grabbed his shirt front and pulled him back to me. He went willingly, a devilish grin on his face. “Maybe five more minutes.”
Chapter Thirty-One
Dillan
Little Ghost of Mine
It took everything Dillan had to leave Selena that afternoon. Kissing her…he couldn’t compare it to anything he’d ever experienced in his life. Forget the shocks. If sitting on an electric chair had a mind-blowing counterpart, sign him up. He never knew a million volts felt so good. If it weren’t for the case and her grandparents coming home, he would have stayed with her all night. Unfortunately, the second he left the farmhouse, everything quickly spiraled into a dark pit of frustration.
He stumbled into his room after investigating with Sebastian, bone-tired of all the dead ends. He was no closer in finding the Manticore than when his partner discovered the first carcass. The tracks they’d previously found hadn’t helped at all besides identify what they were dealing with. The sheer expanse of the prairies was a clear disadvantage. It seemed like he and the hellhound were just running in circles.
Feeling useless for only the second time in his life, he toed off his boots and fell into bed face first. He groaned into his pillow. Screw a shower. He could do it tomorrow.
Sebastian had no leads on the Maestro either. The conjurer bastard hid himself well. After what happened at the field trip, he couldn’t let his guard down for a second. He left investigating Penny to Kyle since he knew the girl better than he did. Without a shadow of a doubt Selena was the target. He hated to be right, especially after that kiss. A danger level this high usually meant a higher class of Illumenari took over. Hell if he’d let Rainer take over now. He’d protect Selena if it killed him.