Hell Fires (Age-Gap Romance)

Maverick was quiet. He really didn’t like this neighborhood.

“I think we’re here. I’ll walk you to the door,” he said gruffly. Either this guy was moody or something was up with him. I got a flicker of fear thinking maybe he was the real predator. I didn’t know him from Adam and I’d already made myself exceptionally vulnerable to him.

He helped me off the bike and pulled my helmet off too, like I was too small to figure it out for myself. With the giant bobble head off, I felt like even more of an easy target. I kind of liked how protective the thing felt, like an astronaut’s moon-suit, built to withstand the harshest conditions. I liked feeling protected, maybe because over the last several years, I’d felt anything but. Without the helmet, I felt vulnerable again and I wasn’t sure why his vibe had shifted so much.

“Thank you for the ride, I really appreciate it,” I said. It didn’t come out convincingly. Did I appreciate it? I wasn’t sure. I loved the bike, his eyes seeing for me, the way he treated me, but somehow in the last few minutes, things had gone south quite quickly. Halfway here, I’d imagined a kiss. Now I kind of wondered if he was going to chop me up and eat me—or even worse, fire me for real.

“I’m sorry, Sophie.”

“No need to apologize. See you tomorrow!” I said cheerily. I turned and tried to bee-line for my front door.

“Hold on a second.” Maverick grabbed my wrist hard. Then he let go like I was a hot potato and I could see him bring his hands to his face. This guy was more unstable than I was. And they told me at the clinic that I had severe emotional problems. “This isn’t how I saw this going.”

“Me either. It’s funny, I’d imagined you kissing me at the door like a Lifetime movie or something,” I told him. Maybe that was crossing the line. My weakness was sight, it didn’t mean my strength was tact.

“Oh Jesus,” he said. I could feel his eyes boring into me even though I couldn’t actually see his eyes in the dark. It felt good to be looked at the way he looked at me.

He stepped toward me and I instinctively stepped back. There was a rock or a branch and my backpack was heavy; I stumbled. Maverick was super-fast and he caught me. I was in his arms and he was close enough that I could feel his pulse beat and my nostrils filled with the scent of honeyed wood smoke. I closed my eyes to the shapes and shadows and let blackness fill my mind.

He brushed his nose over mine.

“You’re too young for me,” he told me.

“That’s the least of my problems.”

He grazed my lips with the tip of his nose.

I wiggled out of my backpack and it fell to the sidewalk with a thunk. I let my arms wrap around his neck as I continued to breathe in his exhales just centimeters from his face. I was memorizing the story of him. His heartbeat, his breath, the feel of his strong arms around me, the scratch of his stubble as his cheek brushed against my face. I wondered what his face said, the set of his jaw, the twitch of his temple. If he had kind eyes and what color they were.

“Sophie, you’re going to be the fucking end of me, aren’t you?” I could feel his fists clench, hear his teeth grind. I practically felt his blood pressure rising. This man was a tortured soul and then…he softly kissed my dead eye.

I gasped in air. I struggled in his arms like a trapped bird.

“Don’t kiss me there!” I threw my words bitterly at him. “How dare you!” I stormed toward my bungalow. “What do you think I am? Some kind of saint you can make a pilgrimage to? Kiss my sacred wounds and gets some kind of fucking miracle? The miracle is that I’m alive. That I still go on despite all of this fucking bullshit.”

Not only had his bad mojo killed the vibe, it went and made me lose my damn mind.

The neighbor’s light went on. I struggled with my keys until I dropped them and they staccatoed to the pavement.

“I got them. Fuck me, Sophie, I’m sorry. I don’t know what the fuck is wrong with me. Let me get the door. I shouldn’t have kissed your eye. It was fucking stupid. I should have asked you first.”

I crossed my arms and hmpphed.

“Where did you want me to kiss you?” he asked. He placed the keys in my hand.

Maybe it was the moonlight. Maybe it was the hum of the bike that had hypnotized me into the trainwreck of a person I was becoming tonight. I turned to Maverick and stuck my face in his trying to intimidate him. He didn’t back down, he didn’t move away from me at all, but wrapped one hand delicately around my throat. He jerked me to his hard chest and then backed me up against my own door.