Safe in Clua

NINE

Laia

I blow out a long breath and shove my key into the truck’s ignition but flop back into the seat and press my palms against my closed eyes before I turn it.

The dinner … it didn’t improve after the photo implosion. Felix barely looked at me again, and when he did that glower wasn’t just back in place, it was deeper and frownier than ever before. Even Kenzi kept on glancing his way, a worried pinch to her face that only intensified when she was looking at me.

I don’t care. I shouldn’t care. We weren’t even supposed to be having dinner together.

Shaking my head, I turn the key, the engine roaring to life in the darkness of the truck’s cab. Maybe I should’ve taken her and Mylo up on their offer of going for a drink. Mylo’s been staying at the hotel since he got here, and their flirty banter is the stuff rom-coms are made of. Easy, fun, not awkward at all—even after the photo wall revelation. All the more reason for me not to go. To leave when I did with barely a bye from Felix.

Pulling out of the carpark, I turn down the road towards the bungalow, my eyes constantly flicking to the rearview, to the back seat, my neck stretching to see further into the trunk. I forgot to check it. I always check the trunk.

Releasing another breath, I fix my eyes on the dark road again, cursing out the one downside to this island. As soon as you leave the town behind, you leave the streetlights behind too. And in the dark, even the lushest, greenest forests can look ominous.

Breathe. It’s paranoia. Just your garden variety paranoia. Dropping my hand onto the gear stick, I keep my gaze fixed straight ahead. Keep it on the truck’s double cones of yellow light. There’s nobody back there. Ten minutes and I’m home. There’s nobody there. Fifteen and I’m in my bath, with bubbles, and the glass of wine I didn’t have earlier, forgetting all about photo walls, and island superstitions, and glowering men.

I almost manage it too. Manage to relax, to stop checking the rearview.

And then the engine splutters. My shoulders and my heart rate ratchet up. Then up againwhen it just … dies.

No. No no no no no. I pump my foot on the slack gas pedal and twist the key even as the truck slows then creeps to a stop. In the dark. In the middle of nowhere. Alone.

I hate the dark.

Fingers still wrapped uselessly around the steering wheel, I wet my lips, fear stretching like a rubber band across my chest. Tight. Too tight. I can’t … this can’t be happening. Not now. My chin trembles and I blow out a shaky breath just as the truck lights flicker then fail.

Pitch black. It’s pitch black and I don’t have a flashlight. I don’t even have a cell phone to call anyone for help.

The panic’s almost suffocating. I don’t know what to do. I blow out, one two, three breaths. Back in. It’s no good. I’m still panicking. And it’s still dark. It’s still really fricken dark.

I press my shaking hands against my mouth. Think. Okay. My eyes start to adjust. There’s a moon. It’s not full. It’s barely even a crescent, but I can see. Just. Flashlight. There must be one somewhere, it’s a truck—a man’s truck.

I reach beneath the bench, blindly rooting around. Nothing. Another deep breath. It’s okay. It’s just the dark. I can walk. I’ll just walk home. It’ll take me half an hour, tops.

Head lights flash in my rearview mirror before I’ve even straightened enough in my seat to take my seatbelt off. My pulse thumps up into my ears. Another car. And it’s pulling up. Behind me. My brain flashes through a dozen scenarios, but they all end with one thing, regardless of how unlikely it is to be true. Damon. He’s found me.

Move. I need to move. Locking the door, I try the key again, and again, and again, pumping the pedal like a crazy person. The hysteria climbing up my throat is making it hard to swallow, never mind breathe.

Screaming. Not something I do. Not something I’ve ever done, no matter how bad things have gotten. Somebody should probably have told my mouth that, because when the window is rapped on, I let loose a shriek so impressive I’m almost surprised the windows don’t just give in and smash. Eyes squeezed shut, lungs open and fully functional, hoping like hell someone will hear me.

“Laia?”

I slam my mouth shut, slam my eyes shut too.

“Laia! It’s me.”

I turn my head, panic gone, mortification back—so back it’s not even funny. It’s not Damon.

It’s Felix, hands pressed against the glass, the head lights from his pickup cutting across the angles of his face in yellow. Because he needed another reason to glower at me.

I wet my lips and stare stupidly at him through the window.

“Roll down the window, Laia.” He taps his finger on the glass between us.

I close my eyes and release the air from my lungs in a miserable sigh. How many times do I need to run into this man on the side of roads? And why is every time worse than the last?

The window creaks its way down and he leans in, looking at me in a way I’m becoming resignedly used to. Like I’m a liability to myself and everybody around me. Because, let’s face it, he’s not wrong.

His gaze moves over my face, and I brace myself for it, the sneer, the wise crack, the insinuation that I can’t do anything right. Can’t even get home without help.

It doesn’t come. None of it comes because he’s not Damon. He’s Felix. Nothing but concern flashes across his face. “Need a hand?”

“No.” I glance around the darkened cab embarrassingly close to tears. “Yes. I don’t know. It just died.” I sniff and twist the key again, pushing my foot down on the gas pedal. “The lights won’t even work.”

Gaze still on my face, he leans back and grips the edge of the window. “Probably just your battery.”

“Great.” I drop my hands into my lap. “I don’t even know if I have jump thingies in this thing.”

“Jump thingies?”

“Yeah, the…” I lift my hands and do a ridiculous job trying to act out the pincer whats-its. “Thingies.” I blow out my cheeks. “Or maybe you could just call someone for me, and I’ll just wait here. You don’t have to wait or anything.”

“You don’t have a cell?” There’s no disguising the surprise in his voice, because seriously? Who doesn’t have a cell these days? People worried their crazy ass ex can track them by it, that’s who.

“I don’t have a cell. It broke. I lost it. I just…”

“—don’t have a cell,” he finishes for me, the corner of his mouth ticking up even though his forehead is creased with whatever it is that’s going through his head.

“Yup.” I moosh my lips together in an attempt to stop any more words from falling out. “I mean no. I don’t.”

“Come on. My jump thingies are at the bar. I’ll give you a ride home then come back in the morning for the truck.”

“Really?” My eyelashes flutter in the darkness as I turn to him. His up tipped brows. His ticking jaw visible even in the dim moonlight. His clean man scent tainted ever so slightly with the scent of barbecue reminding me that tonight didn’t end well. Tonight ended weird and uncomfortable with him barely even looking at me while I fidgeted like a chipmunk on crack. “You don’t have to do that. I can just call a tow truck, or you could call the tow truck. Or … or…”

“Laia.”

“What?”

“Stop.”

“Okay, sor—” My gaze jumps to his.

There’s no smile there. No malice either. What is there is something I have no idea how to put a name to, something that makes my insides flip and my fear twist and morph and slip into something different. Something that tempts me to be braver, something that warms me even more than the humidity of the night, something that wants me to stop with the damn apologies.

“I mean, thanks.” I glance up through a break in the forest’s canopy to the twinkly stars and take a deep breath of the woodsy air coming through the window. It’s fine. This is fine. He can take me home. He’s done it before, and we got there in one piece. But this time it’s dark. This time nobody knows I’m with him. This time I’ve sex dream kissed him. Seen his sex dream penis. Felt his sex dream lips on my sex dream—

“You gonna open the door?”

God only knows what my face must be doing, because the frown on his is part amused, part what-the-hell-am-I-getting-myself-into. “Okay. I should probably…” I reach for the window handle, glancing at where he’s still gripping the door.

Hands clasped in my lap, cool air blowing in my face, I stare straight ahead. Awkward. I’m awkward. He’s awkward. And he doesn’t even know what images I have on repeat in my head.

“So—”

“—music?”

Both our heads jerk around at the overlap of words.

“Yes. Please.” I try for a smile. It’s just as uncomfortable as my not-smile.

His jaw ticks, but he reaches for the console.

Meatloaf blasts from the speakers. Meatloaf? My laugh ripples from me, unexpected but not unwelcome. It’s the first non-nervous reaction I’ve had around him since I got into this pickup.

His chuckle is verging on embarrassed as he reaches for the stereo again.

“No, don’t. Leave it.” I reach for his hand without thinking, the tips of my fingers brushing his knuckles before he can turn it off. “I was practically brought up on eighties rock.” I’m grinning, I can’t help it. Memories of sitting behind the living room door, reading the lyrics from my dad’s Meatloaf record cover, and committing them to memory so that I could sing them with him wrap me in comfort.

“Okay.” Amusement flashes in his eyes when he puts his hand back onto the steering wheel.

It takes a minute for me to stop grinning. A couple more for my foot to start tapping. And when Like a Bat out of Hell starts up—I’m singing. I can’t help it. Quietly. To myself. To the window. In no way loud enough to be heard by the man tapping his thumb against the steering wheel.

By the time the song gets to the part about tearing down the road faster than any other boy has ever gone, he’s singing too. Surreal. He’s singing, I’m singing. Two almost strangers belting out the words to eighties rock together in the dark when, normally, we’re the epitome of uncomfortable around each other.

It’s over too soon. The next song on his play list fills the cab of the pickup and self-consciousness engulfs me tenfold. I lift my hand to my mouth and side-eye my unexpected partner in rock. I just sang. We just sang.

“Meatloaf.” He rubs the back of his neck and clicks his tongue off his teeth before another of those rough, melted chocolate laughs replaces the silence. And just like back in the restaurant, it disarms me, it momentarily blurs the lines between my past and my present, my fear of well … everything, and this shiny, new, kind of fledgling desire to actually move forward—no, not just to move forward—to stop looking back while I do it.

“You gotta love him.” My own laugh is goofy, more like a noisy exhale of air, but it’s there, and judging by the deepening of his dimples when he glances my way, it doesn’t bother him. If anything, it makes his smile even wider.

I sink back into the seat, a smile that matches his still hovering on my lips. “Next you’ll be telling me you’re a Queen fan too.”

His only answer is a smirk without looking my way as, eyes on the road, he taps the screen in the middle of the console a few times.

The first words of Bohemian Rhapsody sound from the speakers and my head snaps around to gawp at him. “Are you serious?”

“I never joke about Queen.” He’s still smirking, still watching the road too.

The rest of the ten-minute drive home is … well it’s completely not how I pictured it going at all. My jaw aches from laughing, my cheeks hurt from smiling and I’ve discovered that, if nothing else, we’re more than compatible road trip buddies. Who knew?

But the music dies along with the growl of the engine when he pulls up outside the bungalow. The silence is sobering, like the come down after a hysterical laughing fit. The usual, acute self-awareness I wear around, not just him, but everybody, slides right back over my shoulders like an itchy jersey that doesn’t quite fit right. I don’t have to look to know his face has slid into its usual glower too. So, I don’t. I press my lips together and reach for the door lever. “Thanks. Again.”

“You’re welcome.” He clears his throat, one hand resting on the steering wheel, his gaze meeting mine when I turn to close the door.

Gripping the top of the car door, my lips part … to say what, I’ve no idea. Seconds pass before I finally blink my stare away from his and close the door with nothing more than a weak goodbye before I make my way up the drive.

I spin at the sound of footsteps behind me just as I make it to the door.

“I’ll need the truck keys if you want me to bring it over tomorrow.” Felix is stalking up the narrow path towards me.

Back against the door, my heart thumps. In the pickup we were eye level, and, I don’t know, kinda safe. Upright he’s … well, he’s much bigger than me.

“Oh. Yeah. Of course. Sorry.” I unclip the truck’s key from the house key with embarrassingly shaky fingers, then hold them out to him, blinking up at him.

“No worries.” His gaze drops to my mouth. “Laia, I don’t know what your story is, but…” He trails off releasing his breath. “I…” He wets his bottom lip, and his gaze flicks up to find mine.

I should look away. Flinch back. Turn around and walk away. I don’t. I can’t.

It’s like everything slows.

I’m not imagining it, there’s something there. Something that resonates somewhere. Something that I think might be making me—him—both of us—slightly insane.

“You?” I finally manage to make my mouth work.

He puffs out something between a laugh and a sigh, lifting his hand to the back of his neck and his gaze to the star strewn sky above us. “Nothing. I should probably go.”

“Yeah.” I nod, still staring even when he lowers his gaze back to me.

The moment stretches, unfurls, lays itself out between us, silent but not uncomfortable, neither of us making any attempt to end it.

And then he lifts his hand slowly—so slowly I’ve time to look from it to his face and back again before he brushes my hair from my face. “I had fun tonight.” His stare is probing, questioning—looking just as stupefied by this as I am. “With you.”

“Me too.” Drawn by the warmth of his nearness and something way, way bigger than common sense, I lift my chin as his head dips. It’s just a fraction of a millimeter but it’s enough to have my heart beating wildly in my chest.

He’s going to kiss me.

And I’m going to let him.

I wait for the fear to kick in, for the panic to pull me back and send me running. It doesn’t come. His hand moves to my jaw, his thumb stroking my cheek, those questions, that confusion, still bright in his eyes, even as he leans in.

And then he brushes his lips over mine. His lips are smooth, soft, barely touching me. My eyelids flutter closed and my breath hitches.

And when the fear still doesn’t kick in, I do the unthinkable. I kiss him back. Cautious at first, my insides flipping and swishing in the best sort of way, overriding the part of me still waiting for the other shoe to drop. For him, or me, or both of us to pull back.

We don’t.

He groans, and it vibrates in every single nerve ending below my belly button—nerve endings I had almost convinced myself were no longer a part of me.

I part my lips and lean closer, tilting my head when he slides his tongue over mine in teasing strokes that steal every messed-up thought from my mind, except one—the man can kiss.

His teeth graze over my bottom lip, and my back hits the door. I pull him with me by fingers I hadn’t even realized I’d threaded into his thick black hair. I arch my body into his chest, boldened by the intense sort of numbness that’s blanked out my mind. His mouth seems to have had an erasing effect on all of the memories that play on constant repeat in my head. The fear. The paranoia. The everything.

I pant against his lips, and his kiss turns harder—surer. I feel drunk on him. I feel good. I feel brave.

His hand slides down my side to my hip, his big body pinning me into the door. I forget to breathe. Forget everything except the feel of his tongue against mine, the rough catch of his stubble on my chin, and the solid weight of him against me.

It takes me over. And I let it. He tilts my head back and pushes closer until there’s not even a millimeter of space between us, lips to knees, heavy breaths and so much pressure. I lift higher onto my toes, suck his bottom lip and open to him again, falling into the feeling. The escape. The freedom.

But, way, way before I’m ready, he pulls back, and the delicious mind melt his mouth brought with it recedes almost as quick as it came around.

I unwind my fingers from his hair—open my mouth and try to get my brain to come up with something, anything to explain it.

He shakes his head, a black curl falling forward onto his forehead. “Laia—”

“That was a mistake,” I finish for him and tug his hand from where it’s still curled around my jaw, every reason, every iota of self-preservation ramming back into place with a thud that almost winds me. That most definitely should not have happened. “I don’t? … can’t … that wasn’t supposed to happen.”

His brows do that quirk up in the middle thing, and he presses his lips together. I can’t tell if he agrees or disagrees. It doesn’t matter. What was I thinking?

“You … I…” I blow out my cheeks and lower my eyes to his heaving chest. “I’m sorry.”

“No apologies.” A ringing from his pants halts whatever else he’s about to say. Probably for the best. He steps back, scanning my face like he’s searching for some sort of sane reason for what just happened too.

He won’t find it there.

I clear my throat and jerk my gaze from his. “You should probably get that.”

He nods and pulls his cell from his back pocket, dragging his hand over his mouth as he glances at the screen. “It’s the bar.”

“Take it.” I pull my, still tingling, bottom lip through my teeth and curl my fingers against the sudden desire to brush the hair from his face. To kiss him again.

His eyes narrow. “We should talk about this.”

“Take the call.”

“Laia.” His jaw ticks, his eyebrows lowering.

“I’m fine, honestly. Please, just take the call and forget about” —I flap my hand in the space between us— “that.”

With a frustrated sigh, he swipes his finger across the screen and lifts his cell to his ear.

He watches me as he listens to whoever it is calling him. I should go. Now. Just turn around and go inside. I don’t. I stay. And stare. I watch his lips move, watch his eyes as they flick over my face. It was a mistake. It has to have been a mistake.

I’m still staring when he cuts the call and shoves the phone back into his back pocket. “I have to get to the bar to lock up. I’ll be around tomorrow with the truck. We can talk about this then.”

“Okay … I mean, no, we don’t have to talk about … that, this. There’s nothing to say.”

“But we probably should.” His low-browed stare scans my face once more before he nods almost to himself then turns and stalks back down the path.