“Wallace Creek.” She laughs. “You would fill notebooks just sketching out the birds.”
“Remember the fox?” I give her arms a squeeze before touching my lips to hers.
“The one that almost bit me? And you said I had rabies for a week? Yeah, I remember.” She shakes her head at the thought. “Wes?” She twists into me, landing her legs around my back. My dick perks to attention because the most intimate part of her is touching the most intimate part of me, and it wholeheartedly approves.
“What’s up?” I trace her lips out with my tongue, and a moan gurgles from her throat.
“What had Fletch morphing into a human chastity belt?” She tilts into me. “Did you tell him something was going to happen between us tonight?”
“No. I swear, I would never say that to your brother.” I twist my lips to the side. “I may have heavily implied it.”
“Wes!” She swats me over the chest with a bubbling laugh. “You’re a dirty dog, you know that?”
“I’m sorry.” I slip my hands up her sweater and tweak my brows. “But that’s not what I wanted tonight to be about. I swear to you. I wanted to be near you—hold you and tell you how damn beautiful I think you are until you couldn’t see straight.” I drop a kiss over her nose. “Then I wanted to hold you and watch you sleep. I swear, Laken. I didn’t plan on catching a wink.” I hold up a hand as if I were a Boy Scout. “I just wanted to watch over you all night long.”
“Wes,” she breathes my name, and not a sound comes out. “That’s the most beautiful thing I have ever heard in my life.”
“I want you, Laken. I won’t lie. But I want everything with you. And when the time is right, I want to do that, too.” I glance down at her cheer uniform. Her legs are prickled with goose bumps, so I wrap a blanket around the two of us.
“I want you, too, Wes.” Her eyes moisten with tears. Her lips quiver. “You’re the other part of me. When you came back—when you remembered—it was as if my heart was made whole again.” Her gaze falls to my chest. “Wes?” She shakes her head. “Can I ask you something?”
“Anything.” I lean back as her body molds to mine, warm and soft, and I drink down the sweet scent of her perfume.
“Are you mad at the Counts for everything they’ve done?”
“Hell, yes.” My head ticks back an inch. “I’m pissed that they have your family hostage. I want them back as much as you do.”
“Are you upset they rearranged our lives?” Her fingers zigzag down my chest, and my dick starts to rouse from its slumber.
“I don’t know.” I shake my head looking past her into the forest. “I mean, I want to know where my mom is, but, other than that, you’re my family, and you’re here with me now. We have wealth beyond imagination, Laken.” I bear into her, pleading for her to understand. “Back home I couldn’t afford to change the tires on my truck. I was probably one good blowout from a real casket.” I brush my thumb over her cheek. “Here we can live long satisfying lives—prosperous—educated. We have powers beyond our wildest imagination, Laken. Back home we were destined to a life of poverty and hardship.”
“So you think the Counts did us a favor?” Her voice drops to its lower register.
“I don’t know if I’d go that far.” I lean back on my hands, and Laken sits high on my lap as if she were riding me. I let the imagery soak in for a minute—Laken naked with her hair falling over her shoulders, her head swaying back and forth with pleasure.
“It’s not right, holding people against their will,” her voice breaks when she says it. “They’re nothing but a group of bastards, and I want to make sure each one of them pays.”
“Shh.” I touch my finger to her lips. Trust me, if they wanted to listen in they could. I give a sad smile because I’m pretty sure she heard.
Laken gives a slow nod.
They’re the reason the Spectators are the way they are, Wes. They experimented on innocent Celestra. They did this horrible thing to thousands, maybe millions of people. They’re beasts, through and through.
How about we focus on us? A slow smile cinches up my face. Wes and Laken, just like the old days. A wave of grief comes over me, and I shake my head. I’m so damn sorry I didn’t believe you.
You didn’t know.
“Please, Laken. Don’t leave me.” There. If I was at all afraid I was going to come off like a pussy tonight, now I’m sure of it, and I really don’t care. “Let me love you every single day. He’s not the one for you.” Done. Every word I wish to God I had never said just spilled out like a sea of secrets my soul was too weak to keep. At least I didn’t say his name. I put Coop in a jar and didn’t take the lid off. He’s like a freaking apparition. Say his name, and you can conjure him right here in the flesh.
Laken bites down on her bottom lip. A single tear rolls down her cheek like a star dropping from the tired sky.
“I promise you, Wes, I’m right here. We’re back.” She wipes a tear from my cheek that I didn’t know had fallen. “I just need all of you. No more secrets, no more lies. And, most importantly, I need to know you’re on my side.”
“As far as I’m concerned, there is no other side.” True as God. “We’re together, and not a damn thing or person is going to keep us apart.” I crash my lips over hers, and she gives a soft moan that sounds sweeter than any other sound on the planet.
As long as you love me, that’s all I need. I run my hands up her sweater and warm her back.
I’m glad you feel that way because by the time we’re done with the Counts that might be all we have left.
Laken channels her anger toward the Countenance into a steady stream of violent kisses, urgent and hungry. The Counts can be a fuel for a lot of things, a stepping-stone, the helping hand in life we need. Once we get her family back she’ll see the light. The Counts are a necessary evil—something we’ll both be grateful for in the long run. After all, it’s who we are. And to deny them would be to deny ourselves.
It’s never going to happen.
There are some things Laken and I can never change, and that’s one of them.
The Count’s aren’t all bad.
We’re living proof.
4
Don’t You Come Around Here No More
Laken
Melville House is thumping and pumping. The windows pulsate in rhythm to the bass as bodies stream in and out of the front doors. It looks as if every student on campus has shown up to support the team—including Wes and me.
“Wow, looks like everyone’s pretty psyched about the win,” I say as Wes leads us inside.
“Last game is always a big deal.” He warms my lips with a kiss. Wes settles those solemn spring-colored eyes over mine, and my heart swims because I really do have my Wesley back. “I’d better go check in with Fletch. I have a feeling he’s wrinkling the sheets with Carter. I’ll run over to Henderson and be right back.” He nods over to Jen and Blaine making out as if they were the ones in high school, never mind the fact they’re both at Trinity U, working here part time as the keeper of the carnal gates. It looks like things are about to get carnal all right. Ironic that both my siblings are getting down and dirty while Wes and I have to keep on the straight and narrow.
I let that last thought slip through and glance up at Wes wide-eyed and innocent, pleased that he heard.
“You think you’re ready for that?” Wes scoops me into his arms and presses his stomach against mine.
Cooper catches my eye from the side while talking to a bunch of guys from the team, and I pretend not to notice. I hold up my thoughts, easy as holding up a burning building. One of these days I’m going to crumble under the weight of it all, and my thoughts are going to come crashing around Wes and me like level five rapids. Our relationship might drown if that happens, and I’d die if it did. In every real way, I still need Wes.
“I’m getting close.” I burrow my gaze into him. “I think I’ve waited my whole life for that. I think we both have.”
Wes leans into me
with a kiss. His mind opens, murky at first then clear and light as if it were a dark cave, and he had invited in the sun. Wes shows me an image of a couple lying on top of dark sheets—two vanilla bodies writhing over one another. I recognize that dark-haired boy with his body of chiseled marble, hands as wide as baseball mitts as they travel down familiar thighs, mine.
I pull back, panting. “Wes.” A smile comes uninvited to my lips. “I’d say get your mind out of the gutter, but I sort of like it.” I look down because Coop is in the room, and I want nothing more than for the sparkling chandelier hanging up above to fall on my head.
Wes puts his lips to my ear. “I can teach you to feel through your mind, Laken. We can be with one another that way far before we ever are with our bodies if that’s what you want. But I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want the real thing. I’m going to die when I’m inside of you.” My stomach plummets like a stone. My toes curl, and my breathing picks up pace because a very real part of me wants this.
“Hang out.” He nods toward Jen who’s now alone by the fireplace. “I’d better find Fletch before he goes after my balls.”
“Hurry,” I say as he takes off.
I watch as Wes weaves through bodies before sailing out the door, and I walk over to the fireplace, warming myself, staring into the flames—contemplating the leap because I can’t believe who I’ve become.
Here it is, my nightmare realized. Wes has finally given me his heart. I have him back, and yet all I keep thinking about is Coop and how much it hurts to stay away from him.
After that night at Maria’s, Coop decided we stepped a little too close to the flames, and we should play a genuine game of keep away. It’s my job to convince Wes that that we’re real, and now I’m afraid we are—we’ve always been.
“Everything okay?” Jen wraps an arm around me and pulls me in.
She’s so beautiful with her milky blonde hair, her pale eyes that glow with the flames. She cuts a quick look across the room.
“This is about Cooper, isn’t it?” she whispers.
A groan dispels from me at how easy she pegged it. “How did you know?”
“Because”—she gives me a firm squeeze, the scent of her gardenia perfume threatens to choke me out of the vicinity—“sometimes a sister just knows. How are things with you and Wes?” Her lips tug down as if she’s already surmised the answer for herself.
“Better than ever.” Tears sting my eyes, and I take a hard sniff. “It’s not a big deal.” It’s a very big fucking deal, but I’m not about to go into the complicated logistics on how I accidentally fell in love with two guys. “Anyway, I think I’ll run some water over my face and get a drink. Wes will be back in a sec.”
“I’ll come with you.” Jen leads me to the kitchen, and we smack right into Jax and her bookend, Fallon.
“Girls.” Jen averts her eyes as she says it while trying to navigate around her nemesis.
“Watch where you’re going, bitch.” Jax pushes Jen a good ten feet back.
“That’s it.” A surge of anger ripples through me. It’s as if everything that was wrong in my world, everything that the Count’s had done to me and my loved ones, the fact that I was suddenly in love with both Coop and Wes had culminated into a perfect storm of rage, and Jax Easton just so happened to be on the receiving end. “You just messed with my family on the wrong fucking night.” I pull her in by the hair, and she lands on her ass in the common room.
Someone in the background shouts, girl fight! Jax and I pull and kick, teeth are employed to do their ass-kicking civic duty, fingernails are enlisted to scrape long bloodied tracts into flesh. I pull clumps of her hair out while jamming my fist into her jaw. A pair of strong arms pluck me off the floor, but I still manage to land a few good kicks to her thigh.
“I hate you!” I scream with all of the pent up aggression I have toward the Counts. I’m not sure I’m seeing Jax Easton in this moment—or that I’m even mildly cognizant of the fact she’s the victim of my delirium. “I’m going to hack you up into little pieces if you ever touch my little sister again!” It roars from me with a vengeance. A small titter of laughter streams from behind then an applause. “I said, little,” I pant under my breath at the realization. It was Lacey I was referencing—the fact the Counts keep violating her neck in hopes to empower themselves with the blood from her marrow. It’s like I can’t control myself or my thoughts anymore.
The strong arms drag me to the kitchen where the air is stale with a strange brand of silence. Gone is the noise from the party. The music filters through the walls until it sounds like driving rain. I wish it were. I wish the entire damn world was drowning in it so everyone on the planet could feel my pain—feel how desperate I had become to help those that I love survive.
A pair of hands land over my cheeks and pull my face up forcing me to look at him.
Coop.
“It’s over,” he whispers.
I don’t hesitate. I wrap my arms around him and hang on for dear life.
“I miss you.” It comes out in a bite of pain.
Jen comes barreling into the kitchen. “Are you insane? And you’re hurt!” Jen rushes to the freezer and pulls out an icepack.
Coop helps me sit at the table, and it’s only then I notice my body is sore as shit.
“It looks like Jax got a few good kicks in, too.” I touch my lips, and the entire left side of my face feels numb.
Jen looks up at Coop, her eyes widen a moment. “Um, why don’t you walk Laken back to Austen House. I’ll tell Wes what happened once he gets back.”
“I don’t know.” Coop looks down and shakes his head as if it went against everything he stood for.
“Please,” it croaks out of me.
His cheek glides up one side as he pulls me to my feet and wraps my arm around his shoulders. “Only because you asked so nice.”
Jen gives a sad nod as Coop gently leads me out the backdoor. In her own way, Jen wanted to give me this time alone with Coop.
I owe her one.
We step outside into the cool, night air, the mist clings to our bodies like a tribe of lost children. The scent of dirt and pines mingle with the wind, intoxicating, as if it’s casting some primal spell over us, and it makes me feel heady. Coop navigates us to the lip of the woods where the moon doesn’t dare shine its light, and not a soul will spot us.
I pull him into the forest and thread us in past the first few trees until we’re caged in by the evergreens, nothing but the sound of our beating hearts, our erratic breathing.
“Coop.” I jump up and land my legs around his waist, rubbing my cheek over his at a quickened pace because it’s taking far more resistance than I have in me to keep from kissing him. “I can’t do this anymore.”
“We’re almost there.” His breath rakes over me like a fire. Coop holds me against him with his strong arms, his lips grazing over my ear with a burst of passion that lets me know he wants me in far more erotic ways than a simple kiss can provide. “Everything is moving in the right direction. We just need to get our families back. We’re at the doorstep, Laken. You have to believe me.”
“Any news on who Demetri’s son might be?” Coop told me all about it that first night, and Wes has yet to breathe a word. It would figure.
“No.” Coop pulls back and takes me in with a pronounced sadness. “Wes thinks he’s protecting you.”
“But you know how strong I am.”
A smile cinches up his cheek. “Indeed.”
“I get it.” I nod because I really do understand Wesley’s need to keep me safe. “But what he doesn’t know is that I’m far safer with knowledge than I ever am in the dark.” I touch my fingers to Coop’s perfect lips. “You knew that from the beginning.”
A silent laugh thumps in his chest. “I did.” Coop never takes his eyes from mine. “Let’s get you back to Austen House before he beats us to your bedroom.”
I cinch my arms around his neck and pull him in close until his lips are just inches fr
om mine. “I don’t want to go.”
“This is too tempting.” He shakes his head just enough as if having me in such close proximity were making him insane. “I need to get you back to your room, Laken. I think we’re headed down a road we’ll both regret.”
“I could never regret anything with you, Coop.” The words bleed from my throat, raw and painful. In a lot of ways life was easier with Wes still lost in the Counts’ delusions. Coop and I were just about to cross that threshold and officially take our relationship to a whole new level before Wes went off in our faces like a bomb. We’re still reeling from the blast. The fallout was far more painful than I could have ever imagined. In a way it’s ironic because I wanted this very thing to happen, for Wes to remember everything. But deep down I didn’t think it would happen so quickly, if ever.
Coop nods as if he heard every word, and I know he did.
“When you were in my room last month you said something to me that I thought was wise and noble. You said you didn’t want to be that girl that ran around kissing two different boys.” His jaw clenches as he swallows hard. “I think it’s partly my responsibility to help you keep your word. Don’t get me wrong, it guts me to think of you with Wes but I get it. He was your past. You fell in love with him again the minute you saw him at Ephemeral. Laken I know you still have very strong feelings for Wes. I know there’s a place in your heart where Wes will live forever.” His eyes close for a moment as he takes a deep breath. “We may never be together. That’s just reality.” He drills those pencil grey eyes into mine and my body solidifies cold as ice, afraid to hear what he might say next. “I’m just here to help you, Laken. Think of me as a friend—nothing else.”