She dropped everything to come with me. She took care of my hand and kissed my eye and talks to me and has read my words. She’s gorgeous. And I left her in the room, naked and under the spray of a shower while I pretend to mentally check out, like I always do. When really, my mind is always, always going. Even if it’s for this night I want some peace.

They call our order. I grab it and speed my ass back to the room. I needed space this weekend, to clear my head, and I have the chance for even more than that sitting in the room waiting for me. I’m not talking about sex either. That night in the car and then in her room, I definitely enjoyed her body, but it was the first time in a long time I’ve really talked to anyone.

I want to talk to someone. No, not just someone—I want to talk to her.

Not about Ashton or Angel. I can’t go there, but fuck if I don’t want to open my mouth and say something. Tonight I’m going to wear someone else’s life and try to make myself believe things are different.

Chapter Sixteen

~Delaney~

What am I doing here? I’m scared to death this is wrong. That all I’m going to do is make things worse. I don’t have a right to be here… but I want to. Want to more than I ever thought I would. There’s something about Adrian that feels good. Feels right. I see the pain in his eyes and I want to extinguish it. To fight it until there’s nothing left to hurt him.

But it’s more than that, too, and that’s what scares me. I told him I like him, but the warmth he spreads through my chest and the pull I feel toward him are more than that. I can’t even blame that thread anymore. It’s just… Adrian. The words in his soul and his quiet nobility and the way he smiles. He’s special and I feel it in every part of myself.

And once he finds out… I’ll probably lose him. But do I really have him?

A rattle at the door tells me he’s here. I’m sitting in the middle of the bed that doesn’t have our stuff on it. My wet hair’s tied up in a ponytail and I have a sudden urge to run into the bathroom and put makeup on. It would look ridiculous to put it on after a shower, though, so I don’t. I did put a bra back on, but I’m wondering if I shouldn’t have.

I don’t sleep in them. And he said he wants me, but—

“You okay?” he asks. “You’re spacing off with a look of fear on your face.”

I hadn’t even realized he’d come in! “Yeah… fine. Just tired.” And scared, excited, nervous, and needy too.

“I got some Mountain Dew. I can go to the machine if you want something else. I don’t know what you like.” He sets the pizza, soda, and paper plates on the table.

“Mountain Dew’s my favorite.” I pull my legs out from under myself and stand up.

“Maybe I really am psychic, then. Or just really fucking good.” He gives me a grin and it slams me right in the heart. It’s playful, and though Adrian’s sometimes playful, it never really rings true. This grin? I feel it in my toes and my stomach and my heart and I think maybe that means he really feels it too.

We make our plates and Adrian fills cups for both of us. I’m not sure where we should eat, but then he steps out of his shoes and climbs onto the bed I just left.

“Sit with me, Little Ghost.”

Those words, that name sends a shudder of pleasure through me. I love to watch his mouth as he says it.

My heart is going crazy as I climb next to him. Looking at him now makes it almost possible to forget the ache in his eyes when he saw me with that little girl today. I want nothing more than to make that look go away forever.

“Why aren’t you in school?” he asks me.

Adrian’s not really one to ask a lot of questions. He doesn’t talk, but he’s trying to talk to me now and I’m not sure exactly what that means. “Money, I guess.” I shrug. “And my mom. Though that’s not really a good excuse. It’s not like she really cares if I’m around anyway.”

The thinker in him comes out. It’s almost a shift when he’s trying to figure out something in his head.

“Do you want to go to school?” is his next question.

I take a bite of my pizza, using it as an excuse for some time. I’d always planned on going away to college. Maddox too. He was going to be a football star one day. We all knew it, but when he and Dad stopped being close, Maddox stopped playing.

I wanted to help people. “Yeah… I want to be a nurse. I’ve always wanted to be one.” The words make the urge come to life inside me again. My dream. Don’t I deserve my dream too? Doesn’t Maddox and Adrian? Why did my father’s action get to take that from all of us?

“You’d be good at that. I can see you sneaking extra lollipops to little kids if they’re good.”

That makes me smile. It sounds like something I would love to do. “That would be very nice of me,” I tease.

“So sweet and innocent.”

“Hey!” I set my plate down and pretend to be annoyed by crossing my arms. “There’s nothing wrong with being nice.” Turning my head, I poke out my bottom lip.

Adrian’s hand cups my chin. In a smooth movement he’s turning my head so I face him again. “I never said there was anything wrong with how you are. And if you stick your lip out again, I’m going to bite it.”

His words are a syringe, injecting a pleasurable heat into my veins. I want his mouth on me again so, so much. “What… what about you?” I ask.

“You can bite me, too, if you want.”

I throw a napkin at him. “You know that’s not what I mean.”

“You know what I want. I write.” He doesn’t make eye contact with me as he grabs my empty plate, tossing both his and mine into the trashcan before coming back to sit on the bed again. Two urges bubble up inside me and I’m not sure which one to go with. I want to ask him more, want to ask him everything so I know every piece of Adrian, but I want to be quiet too. To wait… and listen in the hopes he’ll give those pieces of himself to me without my having to pry.

“When I was younger”—he takes a deep breath—“I wrote all the time. Read and wrote. I thought if I disappeared enough into the words, they would become my life instead of the one I was living.”

Oh God, oh God, oh God. That is a piece of him he never would have given me before. It makes me feel buoyant, invincible, but also like a fraud.

“It doesn’t work that way, though.” There’s seriousness in his voice.

I feel him starting to shut down again and I want to do, to say anything to bring him back to me. To open him up. “Maybe it can… Your words are beautiful, Adrian. The poem you left at the diner was wonderful and the one from the night at my house too.”

“You like them? Do you want me to tell you another story?” His voice is gravelly, husky, but manages to pour over me as smoothly as honey.

“Yes.” My voice sounds funny as well. He’s looking at me so intensely, as though it’s impossible to turn away. My heart is suddenly going crazy again and my skin tingles, burns, whatever else it can possibly feel.

He leans forward. “There once was a beautiful girl. She was sexy as hell.”

Closer. With each second that ticks by he gets closer to me.

“She met a guy. Of course there was a guy and he wanted her so fucking bad he could hardly stand it.”

I want to back up.

I want to lunge for him.

“And for one night, she was his.”

Adrian’s mouth comes down hard and fast on mine. Tender mixed with hungry need as his tongue is stroking and exploring my mouth. My arms wrap around his neck. Adrian leans me back on the bed, my head on the pillows as he lies on top of me.

“Tonight she was his,” he says again, and then kisses me thoroughly. His lips tantalize every part of my body. Somehow I feel him everywhere. Our lips the epicenter, but my whole body is under the same assault.