Until Fools Find Gold (Providence Gold 1)

There was silence from behind me, and then he started roaring laughing– the big fat turkey.

“A dream?”

“Yeah, you know– the little movies that play through your brain when you’re sleeping?” Why this explanation made him laugh harder I didn’t know, but the entire bed was shaking with the force of it. “If you’re just going to keep me awake with your ridiculous…” I struggled to find a word, so I gestured with my hand in his direction. Unfortunately, although he could feel my arm move, he couldn’t see what I was doing because it was so dark which only made him laugh harder. Always one to make the best of things, I gave him the birdy– repeatedly. “You can go back to your own room now!”

“There’s no electricity, baby,” he rumbled. His laughter had died down a bit, but it was still there.

Then his words hit.

“Oh, shit!” It came out choked, the fear behind it blatantly obvious, stopping his laughter altogether.

“I’m right here,” he stroked his hand down my arm trying to soothe me, but once the panic took hold there was little that would stop it.

I couldn’t see anything in the dark before, but I really couldn’t see anything now. It felt like all the oxygen had been sucked out of the room and the walls were closing in. Every breath I tried to gulp in only filled about five percent of my lungs and my heart had started beating in overtime making it worse.

“Luna,” I could hear the voice far away, but it wasn’t registering. That one word was followed by more, but all I could do was try to get oxygen into my lungs.

The faster I breathed, the less I got until my head was spinning.

I felt myself being moved and figured that the time had come, and wasn’t it just my luck that I didn’t get to see the light that everyone always spoke about in near-death experiences? The irony of the girl who was scared of the dark not having the light to walk toward would have been funny, but I was scared out of my ever-loving mind.

On my next attempt at a deep gasp of air, something closed over my mouth. It was soft, it was gentle, it was accompanied by a really fantastic smell. I was now relying on my nose for the oxygen that I couldn’t take with my mouth– and I’d be lying if I said that it beat the sucky light that those other losers had. Mine was way better!

Deciding to truly make the best of it, I opened my mouth and got to experience the taste too.

Holy flying monkeys it was better than Cinnabon and Funfetti mixed together.

Something gently brushed against my tongue and then swept over it. Its movement was confident but gentle at the same time.

I was lifted slightly and held against something warm and hard. I wasn’t actually sure what my body was doing in response, I could only focus on what it was doing.

All too soon it disappeared, and I tried to move to find it again. This time, something soft brushed down the side of my nose. Hoping that I’d be able to see what it was that had felt so freaking awesome, I opened my eyes. I could just make out the jawline and eye of someone and the newly found calmness started to freeze inside me.

And this is why we need oxygen– we don’t do stupid things when we have it. Well, no, that’s a lie. I did, regularly! But I was going to blame kissing Noah Townsend on lack of oxygen when he shoved me away and ran for the hills.

“It’s just me,” Noah’s familiar voice reassured me, telling me something that I already knew.

Then what he said hit me, followed by the fact that he wasn’t running out of the door to lock himself away in a panic room.

My next actions I could also blame on oxygen starvation if they were ever questioned, which I hoped they weren’t.

“Hmph,” was the noise that left him and traveled into my mouth as I slammed into him, trying to tip him onto his back on the mattress.

Unfortunately, I misjudged our positions on the bed thinking we were more in the middle of it than we actually were. I’d also thought it would take more force to get him onto his back than it did. When he fell relatively easily, my momentum continued, and I cracked the corner of my forehead off the edge of the bedside table.

Never a dull moment for me!

“Shit,” he snapped, moving the palm of his hand to my head.

Most people would have missed and hit another part of a person when it was pitch black in the room. Not with my luck! Nope– his hand landed right on the damaged and bruised part of my face making me squeal.