“Ford,” she gasped as I moved to inhale her smell and drag my lips up and down the smooth column of her neck.
I decided then and there that I very much preferred her nickname for me over anything I’d ever been called. I wanted to hear her scream it. I wanted to make her cry out my name until she couldn’t breathe anymore.
I finally broke away. “I can’t kiss you anymore. I can’t blur the lines. My whole future rides on this. I can’t kiss you. I can’t.” I kissed her. “After this.”
“Okay.”
I kissed the area where her chin met her ear. “Okay.” I kissed her cheek. “After this, I’m stopping.”
“Yes.”
“I am.” I kissed gently next to her eye.
Her hands were twisted in my shirt under my jacket. “So stop.”
My lips weren’t kissing hers but they moved back and forth over hers, soft against soft, nuzzling them. “I thought I had.”
She laughed deep and sensual.
I groaned and dropped my forehead to hers. We grinned big goofy smiles at each other.
Belatedly, I registered that the sun was almost down.
She seemed to notice too. “We should head to the car.”
“Okay.” I took a deep breath in and counted the rocks I saw in my direct line of sight.
We grabbed our water bottles and headed back. I held her hand the whole way. Maybe because of the encroaching darkness. Maybe because I needed more time before breaking the connection. Either way, I held her until I was forced to release her, to allow her to get in the car. We smiled at each other again before I closed her door.
As soon as we had driven a few miles and our phones had reception, Suzie’s began to ring.
She frowned as the screen lit up her face in the dark car.
“What is it?” I asked.
“I don’t recognize the number. Local.” She chewed her lip then slid her thumb across the screen to answer. “Hello?”
The person on the other end was loud enough to be heard but not clearly. It was a masculine voice. Wherever they were the background noise came through. With each second that ticked by her body tensed.
“I’ll be there as soon as I can.” She hung up and said to me, “My daddy’s in trouble.”
* * *
Suzie
The second I saw the number my body tensed for bad news. First of all, anybody calling me and not just texting was usually bad news. Secondly, deep down I knew that number. It was a place I wanted to forget from a life that was no longer mine.
Anaconda-sized dread coiled in my gut and got comfy. All the warm fuzzies I had after my make-out session with Ford evaporated away. As soon as I told him where I needed to go, he started driving that way. It wasn’t even a question that he came with. I couldn’t process what that meant right now, too twisted up as I was.
“Ford, you can’t come with me to an Iron Wraiths bar. They’ll kill you for what you did to Rooster and Cueball.”
“Going by yourself is not an option.” He held up a hand when I started to speak. “They have no idea who attacked them. They were too focused on you. Even if they did, it changes nothing.” His voice was scary and deep. “If you’re going, I’m going.”
I didn’t answer. Not because I thought he would leave me to handle it, but because of the exact opposite. I didn’t know if he’d go all guns blazing or with a sharp tongue if trouble stirred up. I studied the trees the headlights illuminated as we drove the winding roads toward the Dragon Bar.
“You’re worried about your father?”
I made a sound that wasn't a yes or no. I wasn't worried about him. He'd probably gotten sloppy drunk and ran out of money, but was mostly harmless. I was worried about the Iron Wraiths bar filled with mean and vile men. Mean and vile men who did not like me—especially not after events that may or may have been caused by my temper.
