AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I look in the mirror and see a girl with a red, puffy face staring back at me.
“Thanks,” I groan, fresh tears streaming down my face.
“Look.” Brooke takes me by the shoulders and spins me to face her, grabbing up some tissues to wipe my face. “This was a bad idea. None of this is worth it. We should get out of here.”
Defeat spreads its icy fingers through my chest, and all I can do is nod. I’ve failed. Brooke takes me by the hand and we slink back out into the hallway and run the gauntlet back down the stairs.
Her fingers tighten around mine as she pulls me toward the front door, shame sizzling in my stomach. Before we can make it, I take one last look at Hunter, and see his head is tipped back in another joyous laugh. Something about the sight of him calls me.I can’t surrender. Not like this.
Pulling free of Brooke’s grasp, I slice my way through the throng on a direct collision course with Hunter. My heart beats higher and higher in my chest, and before I know it, I’m standing right beside him. The three-headed dragon guarding him is miraculously absent as if cleared away precisely for this moment.
I put out my hand to touch his arm, but before I can—
KABOOM.
A staggering crash of thunder rattles the rain-spattered windows, and the lights go out. Blind instinct forces a petrified yelp out of my throat, and I lurch forward, reflexively clinging to Hunter. Suddenly, his arm is around me, firm and protective. If the house caved in this instant, I have no doubt the towering man embracing me would keep me safe.
This is it,a tiny voice in my brain screams. It’s as if fate has opened the door for me and shoved me through.
Moving on its own, my hand slides up his chest, I get up on my toes and reach for his mouth in the dark with my lips. I find them as if drawn by a magnet.
At first, he seems surprised, almost pulling back as I brush his lips gently with my own. But, when the tempest in my blood pushes me further, he answers every move of my passion. My lips part, and his tongue slips into my mouth, tenderly showing me the ropes. When he withdraws again, he rakes my lower lip between his teeth, sucking it just enough to send a shower of sparks glittering up my spine.
I kiss him deeply, pouring all my pent-up passion into his mouth, moaning so that I can feel my own voice vibrate back to me in his chest. It’s cataclysmic. My whole body shivers with electric need, longing and satisfying itself all at once.
Our mouths part, but I can still feel his breath on my face.
“Who are you,” he whispers.
I can’t answer.
Instead, I give his lips one final brush with mine then slip out of his embrace and weave my way through the invisible revelers. I’ve only made it five steps when the lights cut back on, and I see Brooke standing by the front door. We lock eyes, and I tell her without a word what I’ve done.
A look of pride and crashes over her, and she twists the knob. Rain batters the pavement outside, and the people standing closest complain and move away as if getting their clothes wet is the end of the world.
“Holy shit,” Brooke whispers as I fall in step beside her.
“Yeah,” I agree. “Holy shit.”
“I can’t believe it,” she says in giddy wonder. Just before the door closes behind us, I steal a look back to see Hunter standing right where I left him, scanning through the faces around him with his eyes, utterly bewildered. For a brief second, our eyes meet, but then, the door closes, and the connection is severed.
“I can’t believe it either,” I mutter, and we head out into the rain.
Chapter Seven
ABBY
The whole plane jumps and bumps as the wheels touch down at Houston’s George Bush Airport, jolting me out of yet another dream about Hunter. It’s like I can still feel the pressure of his mouth on mine, and I glance at the woman in the seat next to me, wondering if I’ve been moaning in my sleep.
Thankfully, she seems disinterested.
I have plenty of things to get wound up about, considering I just left the town where I’ve spent my whole life, but everything else seemed to pale in comparison to what transpired between Hunter and me.
The only other time I saw him after that last glimpse through the closing door was at graduation, and he barely looked my way twice. I wonder if he’s thought about our kiss at all. Chances are a guy like him gets kisses like that all the time, so I bet it wasn’t even a blip on his radar.
Just thinking about him kissing other girls makes my stomach all queasy, let alone that ours probably didn’t matter all that much to him. It was so monumental for me; I can’t help but wish it had the same impact on his life.
Not that any of it matters now, really. I’ve got a whole new life to worry about stepping into.
