Atlas
I make a quick stop at the hospital to check on Mitchell and see what he remembers. He gave the cops a description of the attacker, but he has no recollection of us dragging him outside or anything that happened afterward, which works in our favor.
As I pass the warehouse, still wrapped in police tape, the memory of last night hits hard, but I swallow it down, knowing there’s nothing more I can do.
Now, all that’s left is to grab everything we might need from the supermarket and head for our hideout—a two-story property with a river view I bought five months ago—to unload everything.
It’s about thirty minutes from the university, roughly the same distance as the one we’re currently renting, but in the opposite direction, and with no neighbors for miles.
But more importantly—my father doesn’t know about it.
I take my phone out to text Summer.
Ready or not, here I come.
Summer
Hope that’s not a line you use in bed.
You’ll find out soon enough.
The next time I text is when I’ve parked in front of her place.
I think there’s a storm coming, judging by the howling wind outside.
The moment she steps out of the building, a gust of wind plays with her red mane, wayward strands dancing like wildfire.
Rushing out of the car, I open the passenger door for her. My gesture makes her pause and stare before she scurries inside, and I’m quick to follow.
“Who knew you were such a gentleman?”
“You didn’t?” I feign hurt, and the corners of her lips curl.
“The potato sack insult and being carried like one must’ve fooled me.”
Grabbing those fiery strands, I pull her closer, plastering my lips on hers.
Fuckin’ fire in my veins. This thing between us . . . it’s not ephemeral. She must feel it too.
“Is the shitstorm taken care of?” she asks when she pulls back.
“All’s taken care of.”
“I don’t think Jacob is a bad person. I’m sure he didn’t want anyone getting hurt.”
A rogue wave of anger surges through me.
“He fuckin’ attacked you, and now you defend him?”
“After what you told me about him . . .” She trails off, stealing a glance through the side window.
“He carries a lot of pain and doesn’t know how to vent it or ask for help.
Keeping it bottled inside can change a man.
One compromise leads to another, until a casualty or two starts to feel acceptable.
He would’ve kept going down the slope without knowing how to stop, but I think this tragedy was his wake-up call. ”
She isn’t talking about Jacob anymore, is she? What has her pain made her do?
I get her hand into mine, pressing a soft kiss on the back of it, and her rigid posture melts into the seat.
Half an hour later, I park outside the safe house, and she gets out without waiting for me to play gentleman.
“Isolated estate in the middle of nowhere . . . I see what you’re doing here. You brought me here to bury me,” she quips and playfully elbows me.
In mere seconds, she’s over my shoulder, being carried to the front door, while she laughs and struggles in my hold.
“I’m gonna haunt you if you kill me.”
“You already do, love,” I say once inside the house, letting her feet touch the ground while she takes in the surroundings.
“This place is amazing!” Her gaze fixes on the chandelier cascading from the second floor.
“Like it?” I ask while leading her into the huge white kitchen, with an island, spacious enough to cook and entertain.
“I love it!” Her words are breathless. “Why did you bring me here?” She pauses and turns to face me. “Dumb question. You wanna fuck me.”
“I bought this place as a sort of hideout. Now it’s our place. You’ll move in here. With me.”
She blinks once. Twice. Then she doubles over laughing.
I take a seat at the kitchen island, tapping my fingers on the marble countertop, watching, waiting, enjoying that sound until it fades and she chokes on my deadpan expression.
“Oh, God! You are serious!” she shrieks, eyes wide enough to pop out of their sockets. “Are you asking me to move in with you?”
I stride toward her and pull her into my arms, her body pressed against mine.
“I told you already, I have a problem with the word ask. I’m not asking. I’m telling you.”
“You’re never going to learn that I hate being told what to do.”
“But you don’t feel that way anymore when I’m the one doing it.”
“Oh, really?!”
“Really. Deep down, you know I’ll never again tell you to do anything you don’t want to. You said it yourself—you hate the confines of your room. Your dorm is not your home. This will be. Not because of the place. Because it’s with me.”
“I must have a magic pussy if you want us to move in together this fast.”
“Mouth too.”
Her hands grip my shirt, pulling me closer, lips hovering over mine, letting her warm breath tease me.
“I’m hungry,” Summer whispers.
“For my dick?”
She chuckles.
“I can’t agree to anything when I’m hungry.”
“Still talking about my dick, right?”
“Tell me you have food in this house.”
I huff a sigh of defeat.
“I stuffed the kitchen with everything so we wouldn’t have to leave the house for at least a week.”
“A week, huh?” She smirks and pulls away, refusing me the taste of her lips. “You’re cooking for me.”
I choke on a cough.
“Come again?”
“Oh, I plan to. Many times. I’ll ride your annoyingly handsome face like a pony.”
She smiles and grabs my hand, dragging me to the kitchen.
“But you owe me a date, so you’ll cook for me.”
A couple of steps are all she’s allowed, before I yank her back, the wall and me making a sandwich out of her.
It takes me nanoseconds to force her legs around my waist, my cock already grinding against her.
I’m unwilling to accept doing anything but burying myself deep inside her right this second.
Her tongue darts, licking my lips.
“Do this for me, and I promise to repay you in full.” Summer opens her crossbody bag to show me its contents, and amongst them is the pink remote vibrator. “You have to make good on your promises.” She winks.
Then she lowers her legs and ducks under my arm. Taking my hand from where it rests on the wall, she leads me toward the kitchen.
“Cooking first, screwing next.” Her tone—impervious to objections.
“You’re a fuckin’ demon, honey. You always find new ways to torture me,” I mumble after her.
“You just asked that demon to move in with you.” She glances at me over her shoulder.
“No regrets.”
Summer takes off her jacket, leaves her bag on the counter, and gets comfortable on a seat by the kitchen island. She expects me to cook? For real?
“Honey, worst-case scenario if I cook—I lose a couple of those fingers you love so much. Best case—I give us food poisoning. We don’t want either, do we?”
She gives me a dramatic eyeroll and moves to get behind the counter, while I take her place.
“My mom used to give us food poisoning every time she tried to cook.”
“Is that the reason you learned how to do that instead?”
“That . . .” Summer glances at me with a playful glint in her eyes. “And I’m half Italian, you know. It’s in my blood.”
“Sooo only half of you is a demon?”
I get a kitchen towel in my face.
Summer takes parsley from the fridge and rinses it off.
Then she grabs a big ass knife, balancing it on one finger between the blade and the handle, before flipping it a couple of times so skillfully, I’m tempted to try that myself.
She moves with such dexterity and precision, fast-chopping the parsley, that she could put a chef to shame.
“That’s why you’re so skilled with the knife,” I say under my breath, because, truth be told, I had other ideas in mind for that particular skill of hers.
“Well, yeah, what did you think? That I’m good with a knife because I go around carving people up?”
“I wouldn’t put it past you,” I retort, only to receive a second kitchen towel in my face.
Then Summer’s back to business, warmth and joy radiating from every move, leaving no doubt that cooking is her happy place.
My heartbeat stutters as her words from the party replay in my mind, and it hits me. She said she only cooked for the people she loved. Does that mean . . . ?
“Summer—” She doesn’t spare me a glance, an absentminded hum being the single indicator she heard me. “You’re cooking.”
“Mhm.” She tilts her head, glancing at me from under thick lashes. “What an astute observation, Sherlock!” Then her attention shifts back to the task at hand.
“For me.”
Her whole body goes rigid, not a single muscle daring to move, leaving the space around us void of any sound whatsoever.
Even her breathing halts until a sharp, shaky inhale breaks the silence.
She doesn’t let go of the knife, she doesn’t look at me, she does nothing to give me a preview of all those emotions battling inside her, fighting for control.
Good. Let it hit her.
I’ll force her to face what she feels for me, leaving her no routes to escape.