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“Oh,” I say, exhaling with a little tremble. I swallow thickly. “I’m relieved. I thought the next words out of your mouth would be some combination of ‘punks,’ ‘kill,’ and ‘not in my backyard.’”
“If I were going to kill them, I wouldn’t want there to be any witnesses,” he rasps as he looks me up and down. “And since I’m not letting you get away from me…”
A shiver runs through me. My mouth becomes dry as a trickle of wetness glides through my folds. I sit helpless in front of him, my nipples twisting and seeking out the hard, rough contours of his chest under his shirt. I breathe in deeply as his hot, pure-sex scent winds its way through my brain and makes my body feel like I could just melt into the tub.
“Thanks,” I say in a low breath.
He comes over and puts his hand out.
“I’m Adrian,” he says.
“Emma.”
I stand up, and our eyes remain locked on each other’s. I feel like a queen rising to rule over her land with her king by her side, both ready to protect each other from the evils that lurk in the shadows.
Is it too soon for me to ask if this can be our couples’ costume next year?
“I should probably go,” I say as reality hits me.
This is not my house. This is not my boyfriend. There’s no use in asking him about a couples costume for next year. After today, I’ll probably never see him again.
“Absolutely not,” he says. I swallow thickly and nod. “Now come on. We need to get you warm and rested.”
Chapter Four
Adrian
A warm swellof pride clenches around my heart like a gentle fist.
She’s perfect.
I think I might be in love.
But there’s also anger inside me. Disgust.
I look out through the glass doors on the main floor of the house. That forest tried to take her from me before I even found her. Those asshole kids could have done serious damage. Someone could have even been killed.
Everything around me got fuzzy when I spotted her. The fire became as small as a candle. The tree looked like a splinter. She was the only thing I could see. The one and only thing that mattered. Everything else was blotted out.
When her friends ran away and the fire started to burn out of control, I blacked out and went into auto-pilot. I lost all sense of myself, and I was just in beast mode, tearing through the forest to get to her.
From far away, all I could see was a vague figure immobilized, bound in place, helpless. When she yelled for help, there was panic in her voice that I’ve never heard before. When I was an emergency room doctor, I had people wheeled through the ER door begging for my help, but this was different.
Hearing her scream for me felt different.
Like I was the only person in the world who could save her.
Like I was the one solely responsible for her.
Like she was mine.
“You don’t have a TV here?” she says as she walks in a circle around the living room.
“No, sorry about that,” I say.
“Oh, that’s totally okay,” she says. She runs her hand along the back of the sofa. “If I lived in a house like this, I wouldn’t want a TV, either. I’d just bird-watch, work on my sketches, sit in front of a roaring fire, or study. I really hope I can live in a house like this someday.”
“I’m absolutely sure you will,” I say. “Are you an artist?”
