Chapter 18 #2
“I feckin’ love it, babe.” His voice comes out a bit hoarse.
“I’m. Not.” I arch my back, sliding against his lips as I cut him off. He makes a muffled noise that doesn’t sound like a protest. “Your. Babe.”
Aidan breaks contact with a wet sound. “You are while I’m inside you.”
His breath is hot against me.
“While I’m kissing you, while I’m touching you, while I’m licking you…While I’m inside you, you’re mine.”
I can’t argue with that, so I put my own mouth to better use around him.
Aidan makes up for lost time, pulsing his tongue until I squirm and sigh.
He moans as I grind against his jaw, trying to maintain my composure enough to pleasure him at the same time.
I don’t want this to be one-sided, but I can barely focus when his face is buried between my thighs.
Soon, Aidan is gently thrusting in time with my movements. Dragging a hand through my hair, pulling his mouth away only to whimper, “Lo, please…I’m so close.”
He squeezes my thighs and the taste of his release hits my tongue. I swallow it down until he’s writhing with sensitivity.
You’re mine .
I turn around, needing to be face-to-face with him again. He brushes my bangs off my forehead, and we let the weight of the moment settle between us: I just sixty-nined my ex in a hearse.
On-again, off-again relationships sound startlingly close to that famous quote about the definition of insanity.
I’ve never been able to understand why someone would let themselves get wrapped up in a relationship when it’s already been proven not to work.
But with Aidan and the phantomlike aftershocks still coursing between my legs, I get it now.
Doing the same thing over and over isn’t a bad thing when this is the result.
Lips pressed to my shoulder, Aidan wraps a dewy arm around me. His heartbeat thumps against my back. I’ve enjoyed hookups since our breakup—if not quite this intensely—but cuddling has been strictly off-limits. I let myself luxuriate now in the tenderness.
“I’ve gotta say, a hearse is the most creative place we’ve done this,” he says. “I can honestly say I’d never considered it.”
“You’re a horrible influence.”
Aidan kisses me deeply once more. Reluctantly, I shimmy back into my shorts and find my bra while he stuffs himself back into his pants. All I want is to stay here in the afterglow, but we’ve already been reckless with our time.
Pulling aside the curtain, I peek out the fogged window. Only a few sheep linger nearby. “The herd is gone.”
Aidan’s shoulders drop in mock disappointment. “Are you sure? I swore there was a stampede.”
“We’ve really gotta get back to Teachan. We have breakfast, hair, makeup. Saoirse might need help with a last-minute floral installation…”
His hands hold mine. “Trust the professionals. Everything is going to be grand.”
Aidan must have the charisma of a cult leader because I believe him.
His optimism threatens my cynical tarnish, gently buffing away layers of resentment until he reveals a soft glow.
I feel exposed, a raw nerve. I worry the pain is going to sneak up on me like a cavity, but I try to savor his sweetness, anyway.
I lean in for one more slow kiss and reach for the door handle.
But nothing happens. It’s not connected to a mechanism, simply a handhold to close the back hatch.
“Oh. Oh crap. This…isn’t a handle.”
“What do mean it’s not a—” Aidan reaches for it, waiting for the telltale click of a latch that doesn’t come.
My eyes dart back to the glass partition between the cargo area and the cab, but there is no hole or gap to snake my hand through.
And no obvious button on the dash to release the back door.
Aidan’s phone is sitting in the cupholder, so close but out of reach.
“We’ll just call Callum. Sure, it would ruin the surprise, but he’ll tell us how to open it.” I reach for my phone, only to realize it’s still on the front seat of my car. “Okay. So that’s not an option.”
“We’re trapped!” Panic rises in his voice. Suddenly, the humidity of our bodies is too much. “It only opens from the outside. Oh my god. We have to break a window.”
After going out of our way to deliver the hearse to the castle for their photos, we were going to damage it. Fantastic. And I don’t even want to know the cost of replacing one of these wide, etched windows. Maybe we can kick through the barrier instead.
Aidan’s breath comes in shallow pants.
I steady his shoulders. “You’re okay. We’re gonna be okay, like you just said.”
“We aren’t. I’m full of shite.”
I get it: Being trapped in a hearse is one step removed from being buried alive. At least this option has windows. He shuffles along the floor and peers through one. I follow, shoulder to shoulder next to him. A few straggling sheep are on the move. And there’s a shepherd. An older man.
“Hey!” Aidan cries, beating a fist against the etched glass. “In here!”
“What are you doing?”
His eyes widen. “Calling for help.”
“We can handle it,” I assure him. We don’t need this guy asking questions. “There’s got to be a way to pop a window out or something.”
Poor Aidan is sweating again. “Over here! We’re locked in!”
The hearse gently rocks as Aidan knocks on the window to get the shepherd’s attention. I run my hand along the door’s seams, searching blindly for an emergency lever.
“Hey, he sees me.” Aidan looks over his shoulder, eyes full of hope, then bangs on the window again. “Come on, help us. Open the door!”
I poke my head through the curtain and find the elderly man making the sign of the cross. Laughter bursts out of me. He’s in no hurry to investigate a moaning, rocking hearse with frantic hands beating on the windows to escape.
“We’re not dead!” I shout, even though it’s doubtful he can hear us. He takes a step closer, removing his cap as he squints at the vehicle. “And we’re not undead!”
Aidan cocks his head. “That’s not suspicious at all. You might as well be shouting, ‘Braaaains.’?”
“You were the one moaning.”
My fingertip grazes something cool when I go back to searching for an emergency handle, and I pause. The little nub of metal is the size of a door lock, and I yank up on it.
“Do me a favor and push—”
With a squeak the back door of the hearse swings open. Aidan grabs me by the waist before I go toppling out straight onto my face.
It’s only then that I remember my hair is wild from Aidan’s hands. We’d gotten so preoccupied with the prospect of being trapped that I hadn’t really cleaned myself up, just slipped my bra back on and patted down the worst of my frizz. What we were doing back there is painfully obvious.
I climb out and give the bewildered man a jaunty salute. I’ve never done that in my entire life, but my body is on humiliation autopilot.
Aidan climbs out of the back door. His ginger waves could be considered “artfully tousled.” The sexy disheveled look works for him, whereas I will certainly need the help of the hair and makeup artists Lark hired.
I crook a finger at him. “You’d better not write a song about this.”
He bites back a grin, probably already mentally writing his next summer hit. “But I have the perfect name: ‘Last Ride.’?”