Chapter 22 Weston
WESTON
She goes still, and I hurry with the rest when I realize she’s probably imagining the worst. “I’ve been watching over you and T.J. for months, long before any of this.” I wave my hand vaguely to indicate the burned shed and admin building.
Her brows pull together. Not alarmed as much as confused. “What?”
“Not like this.” I force out a breath. “Not surveillance. Protection. Before the fire. Before you knew who I was.”
“Because of Tyler.”
“Because of Tyler,” I echo. “Because he was mine to bring home, and I couldn’t. I found out you were here, and I couldn’t bear the thought of anything happening to his family while I stood by and did nothing.”
She’s gone completely still, and I should leave it there, but I don’t. “And somewhere along the line,” I add quietly, “it stopped being only about Tyler.”
The look she gives me tightens every muscle in my chest. She doesn’t seem shocked or even hesitant. In fact, something in her eyes says I’m not the only one who’s been trying to hold back.
“Weston,” she whispers.
I lift a hand to touch the side of her face with the backs of my fingers, tentatively, to give her time to pull away. Her skin is cool from the air, but warm underneath, and so damn soft it loosens something rough in me.
She doesn’t step back. If anything, she leans into it.
I brush a thumb under her eye to catch the tear she doesn’t let fall. “You’re not alone, Elena.”
Her eyes close for a moment, then blink open. “I’m involved with Buck.”
“I know.”
“He told you?” She bites her bottom lip, distracting me from the question for a few seconds.
“We talked. No details.”
This raises a faint color to her cheeks, and the air between us heats.
Elena’s eyes drop to the floor, then meet mine. “I don’t know what I’m doing.”
I let my hand settle against her jaw. “You don’t need to have all the answers.”
She searches my face, then takes one small step forward, putting us firmly in each other’s personal space. “I should probably be worried about how good that sounds,” she murmurs.
“You should probably be worried about a lot of things.” Though her hair is pulled back from her face, it’s not in a braid tonight. I find a loose strand and tangle it around my fingers.
“Including you?” Her mouth softens into a playful smile.
“Especially me.”
When I lower my forehead to hers, she reaches for the front of my jacket and tightens a handful in her grip. I’m raising a hand to her chin when the outer door rattles, and my attention flies there on instinct. It’s only the wind, but it reminds me we’re too exposed.
I force myself to step back from her before I start something I won’t stop.
Her fingers loosen from my jacket, and disappointment flashes across her face so fast I nearly miss it.
I tip my head toward the door. “C’mon.”
“What?”
I hook a finger around her keys. “I’m walking you to your car.”
“Weston—”
“Humor me.”
She swallows and nods as she buttons her coat.
I push open the outer door, and the cold air floods in as the snow swirls around us.
After I engage the lock, I guide Elena down the front walk with one hand at the small of her back.
Instead of angling straight toward her car, I steer us along the side of the building, beyond the brightest of the lights, to where the brick wall is shadowed, and the main entry cameras won’t catch much more than shapes.
“You think of everything,” she murmurs.
“Not everything.”
“Enough.”
We stop in the shelter of the wall, where snow catches in her hair and on the shoulders of her coat. The cold reddens her cheeks, making her look painfully real.
I set her bag down next to the building and reach for her again as her breath feathers white between us. I slide my hand along her jaw, and she leans into the touch again, like she’s been wanting it as much as I have.
“I should probably be worried about how good this feels,” she says.
I step in until the front of my coat brushes hers. “You should definitely be worried.”
When I lower my head, she rises to meet me, and when my mouth covers hers, she makes a small sound that goes straight through me.
She kisses me back with no hesitation. No testing of the waters. There’s heat and need and something so raw, it punches the air from my lungs.
I back her gently against the brick, one hand braced behind her head, the other sliding to her waist to hold her there.
The night is cold against the side of my face, but Elena’s warm where I touch her, and even warmer where our mouths meet, and the contrast is enough to make me feel half out of my mind.
I slow down and kiss her deeper, because this has been a long damn time coming, and I want to savor it. But then she slides her fingers into my hair, and I run short on self-control.
I angle her head and kiss her again, rougher this time, and she rises on her toes to meet me, giving as good as she’s getting, gasping when my hand tightens at her waist.
Mine, some dark part of me growls on instinct, even though she’s Buck’s, too. Mine in the only way that matters right now.
When I finally pull my mouth from hers, it’s only far enough to breathe. Her eyes are dark and wide, her lips are parted, and her face is flushed in a way that has nothing to do with the weather.
Blood courses through my veins, and my pulse thuds. “Elena.”
Her hand stills at the back of my neck. “Yes?”
“If I keep kissing you, I’m going to forget we’re standing outside your school.”
The shaky laugh that escapes her is warm against my mouth. “That would be inconvenient.”
“The town would never stop talking about it.” I brush my thumb once across her lip, unable to keep from touching her, and barely able to keep myself from kissing her again. “For the record, I’ve wanted to do that for a while.”
She rests her hand on my chest and swallows. “Me too.”
A grin pulls at my mouth before I can stop it. I’m too damn pleased for a man standing in the middle of an active threat.
I look out across the parking lot automatically, checking shadows and making sure we’re still alone, even while my entire body is still attuned to the woman in front of me. That instinct doesn’t shut off, and if anything, kissing her seems to have hardwired it tighter.
The threat is still out there. The surveillance, the fires, the man with patience and a camera, and just enough skill to be dangerous.
“I’m walking you to your car,” I tell her.
“That sounds even less optional than it used to.”
I take her laptop bag and guide her to the parking lot with one hand at her back.
When we reach her SUV, she turns before I can open her door. “Weston.”
I look down at her. The fear is still there, and the fatigue, but under both, there’s something new and bright that makes me want to drag this whole town tighter around her until nothing bad can reach her.
“Be careful,” she says.
I touch her jaw once, briefly this time. “Always.”
It’s a lie, maybe. Men like me don’t always know how to be careful—not in the way she’d want me to be. But for her, I’ll learn.