Chapter 15
ARIA
Birds chirp high in the trees above as the morning sunrise hits my overtired eyes, forcing me awake.
I cringe into the fresh brightness of the day, my body aching in a million different ways.
The ground is cold and unforgiving beneath my body, but there’s a strong, warm arm wrapped around my waist. It takes too long for me to realize that my cheek is pressed against Stone’s ginormous chest.
What the ever-loving fuck? I must have scooted my ass over here in my sleep while searching for a source of heat.
Either way, cuddling the oversized mass murderer?
Probably not my finest moment. Though there’s no denying how good it feels.
His whole arm circles my body, and right here, like this, I feel as though nothing could ever touch me.
Buuuut, on the other hand, he’s a mega asshole with an attitude problem, and considering the sun is now in the sky and we were only supposed to rest here for a few hours, I think it’s fair to say we’ve overstayed our welcome against these particular trees.
So I’m going to go ahead and cut this shit short.
Shoving my hand into his chest, I use his body as leverage to help scrape my ass off the dirty ground, sitting up as my face twists with a yawn.
“Wake up, asshole,” I grunt, wiping a hand down my face.
I feel as though I’ve been run over by a truck, and he has the nerve to look comfortable. “It’s morning. We overslept.”
Stone groans and reaches for me, attempting to pull me down against him, then his eyes spring open, suddenly remembering where the hell we are.
“Fuck,” he spits, flying up off the ground in one swift movement, making me wonder if it was even his intention to sleep.
Maybe he meant to just sit for a while but succumbed to yesterday’s exhaustion. “We’ve gotta get moving.”
“Geez, not even a good morning. How’d you sleep?”
“You slept like shit and used me as a human radiator. Now, get moving.”
I stare up at him, my lips twisting in annoyance. “You’ve never had girlfriends before, have you?”
He scoffs, reaches down, grips my arm, and pulls me to my feet.
His hand settles on my waist for just a moment, making sure I’m steady, and the second his fingers touch my body, a pulse of electricity fires through me.
Then just as quickly as it came, he releases his hold, leaving me colder than ever before.
“None that mattered enough for me to ask how they slept,” he mutters, turning away and starting for the woods.
“Can a girl not pee first thing in the morning?”
“Sure,” he says, turning back around and casually staring directly at me. “Go ahead.” He waves at the ground.
“You can fuck right off if you think I’m about to lose my pants and pee for your entertainment,” I snap, crossing my arms over my chest. “Now, I know it’s been a while since you’ve seen the wondrous phenomenon otherwise known as a vagina, but this isn’t the way you’re going to get reacquainted. It’s giving . . . pervert.”
Stone rolls his eyes and huffs. “Fine. Go. But I swear, if you’re not back by the time I count to ten, I’m coming for you, and I don’t give a shit what position you’re in or if that sweet little cunt is on display. Got it?”
“Jesus. Okay,” I mutter, taking my time as I turn on my heel and move into the thick bushes, hating all the little insect bites covering my skin. “Someone’s grouchy in the morning.”
“One,” he calls, his voice booming from behind me and making my heart start to race. He’s not kidding. He’s actually going to count to ten, and if I’m not done . . . Well, fuck.
I rush behind the biggest tree, grip the top of my pants, and start working the buttons, but my frantic fingers are taking far too long.
“Two.”
“Oh, fuck, fuck, fuck.”
“Three.”
Shimmying my pants and thong to my ankles, I start to squat down, only I don’t know which way to angle my hips that will ensure no squirtage lands on my pants, because shit.
There are a lot of things I can handle, but having Stone Blackthorne see a little wet patch on the back of my pants due to poor aiming isn’t going to be something I could ever live down.
“Four.”
“SHUT UP, ASSHOLE,” I call, bracing myself against the tree as my bladder threatens to explode. “LET A GIRL CONCENTRATE!”
“Don’t test my limits, Riley Maddox.”
“IT’S ARIA!”
“Six.”
“You skipped five.”
“I don’t hear you peeing,” he throws at me. “Which means I can only assume you’re trying to make a break for it.”
“You’re . . . wait. YOU’RE LISTENING TO ME PEE?
WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU? God, you’re such a creep.
Is this what happens to men in prison? You’ve been so starved of women that you sink to these lows?
Wow, Stone. Out of all the things you’ve managed to shock me with so far, this one takes the cake. ”
“I’m not listening to you pee, BECAUSE YOU’RE NOT FUCKING PEEING,” he yells back. “Seven.”
“Fucccck,” I groan, grabbing my pants and pushing them as far away from my body as humanly possible before trying my best to concentrate. “I have performance anxiety.”
Stone groans, the sound full of frustration, and I listen as he crunches through the foliage, making enough sound to ease something inside me, and with a satisfied breath, I finally let it go.
I pee for what feels like a century, and I’m grateful when Stone calls it quits on his countdown .
. . or count up, as it so happened to be.
I finish my business and feel fifty shades of wrong when I’m then faced with my next three options.
Drip dry, shake it like a Polaroid picture .
. . or wipe with a leaf. Now, I don’t know what that leaf ever did in a past life, but nothing could have prepared it for the fresh hell I put it through, but desperate times call for desperate measures.
Getting myself back together, I make sure everything is in place and am pleased to find that not a single stray drip managed to make it on my clothes.
It definitely wasn’t my finest moment, and I hope like hell that I won’t have to do it again any time soon, but a girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do.
The foliage crunching ceases, and I make my way back over to Stone before striding straight past him, my cheeks flaming with embarrassment. “Mention this ever again, and I will strangle you with your own fucking balls.”
“Ahhh, there’s my menace. Thought she might have been lost for good.”
Clenching my jaw, I lead us through the thickening woods with Stone heavy on my heels, refusing to rise to the bait. He knows exactly how to get under my skin, and he’s doing it flawlessly. But he won’t break me.
I’m no longer terrified of him. Sure, he’s one hell of a scary dude, and I wouldn’t ever want to cross him, but there’s no denying his energy has shifted since last night.
Sitting under those trees and just talking like that .
. . I don’t know, there was a strange sense of familiarity, and I was comfortable with him.
Apparently comfortable enough for my unconscious body to wriggle its way through the foliage and sleep in his arms.
Shit. What is wrong with me?
Moral of the story, he doesn’t look at me as though he’s plotting my death anymore.
There’s a rich curiosity there, and definitely a level of deep suspicion.
He’s not willing to completely trust me, but after showing him the scar on the back of my head and explaining how I managed to land myself in the hospital for almost a year, something seems to have settled within him.
I have no recollection of that time, and if I truly am who he says I am, then there’s a possibility that I didn’t betray him as he seems to think I did.
What I can’t wrap my head around is that I don’t have a family.
I sat in the hospital every day, waiting for someone to walk through the door and claim me, telling myself that they didn’t come because they couldn’t.
I pictured a mother who looked just like me, a father who’d rush in and wrap me up in his arms. I’d imagined it so vividly that I sometimes thought the hazy images were memories fighting their way through the fog.
Now I’m finding out the family I’d pictured in my mind didn’t exist. No one was ever coming for me.
All these years, I have wondered about the life I might have had.
I’ve strived to be the best version of myself, because surely I had great parents somewhere who raised me to be a strong, kind woman.
But to discover that my life was always a fight to survive .
. . shit. It broke my heart. The grand life I’d imagined for myself was reduced to ash, but on the bright side, look what I’ve managed to achieve by myself.
I got myself through college, working like a slave, graduated and found a job. Got myself a beautiful apartment to call home, even though cramped doesn’t even begin to explain it, and I’ve kept myself alive. I even joined a gym last year . . . not that I actually go.
I need to get back to that.
I don’t know what’s going to come from this fucked-up little adventure with Stone, but this isn’t my life anymore.
Sooner or later, he’s going to be caught and sent back to prison, and then I’ll focus on rebuilding, on trying to figure out who I really am, because right now, I have no idea who the real me even is anymore.
“You’re thinking too hard.” That low, mesmerizing tone rumbles from behind me.
I roll my eyes and ignore him, because honestly, why the hell not? It’s not as though he enjoys answering any of my questions. He can get a taste of his own medicine.
I keep walking, having no idea if I’m even leading us the right way, but I’m sure if I wasn’t, Captain Buzzkill behind me would mention it.
“Do you think the prison knows you’ve escaped yet?”