Chapter Ten
The embrace caught her off guard, but it felt so deliciously good, Hannah couldn’t find it in herself to pull back.
The pressure of his strong hands around her waist, pulling her in close; the feel of his breath on her neck…
All those touches that she had craved for so long but denied herself for fear that it would just drive a deeper wedge between her and her brother.
But now, here, in the quiet of the vehicle, there was no way either of them could deny it, this sweetness between them, this need. She pressed her head into his shoulder, inhaling the scent of him, and wondering how she had lasted so long without this.
When she pulled back slightly and looked into his eyes, she had no idea how he would react. Would he push her off, tell her they couldn’t do this? Or would he give her what she had needed for so long?
Her heart slammed up against her ribs as he slowly lifted his hand to her face and cupped her cheek. His thumb rubbed against her skin in slow, soft motions.
And then, at last, he dipped in close and kissed her.
It wasn’t a peck—it was a real kiss, a kiss that tingled from the top of her scalp to the very bottom of her toes.
She smiled against his mouth and pressed herself into him, arching her back so she could show him just how much she wanted him.
Nothing else made sense to her right now but the feeling of his mouth against hers, his tongue caressing the inside of her lip, a soft, delicious tease that made her whole body light up.
When he drew away from the kiss, he was breathing hard, but there was a smile on his face.
She gazed at him, a little more nervous than she would care to admit.
But God, that smile—it was everything to her.
When she saw him smile, she knew there was no denying it.
She was in love with him. She had been for years now, for so long she had lost track of it, but that didn’t matter.
The way he kissed her, she knew he loved her, too.
“We should get back to the sanctuary,” she murmured reluctantly. “Someone’ll notice we’re both gone.”
“Yeah, someone like your brother.” He sighed.
She pulled a face. “Oh don’t bring him up. Let me pretend we can get away with this a little longer, huh?”
He chuckled and lifted his hand to her cheek again, gazing at her as though he could hardly believe she was right there in front of him.
She tilted her face into his palm, enjoying the feel of his calloused hands against her skin. She wasn’t sure she would ever get tired of it—there was something addictive about the way he touched her, even when her good sense told her she should be holding back.
She leaned in and kissed him softly once more before pulling away and resituating herself on her own side of the SUV. She immediately missed his warmth.
“You think he’s going to be angry again if he finds out?” Xavier asked as he took the wheel once more.
She shrugged. “Maybe,” she admitted. “But we’ve done a lot of talking since that first kiss all those months ago, you know.
By now, Lawson’s got to see that he was acting like an idiot.
Big brother or not, he has no right to tell me, or you, how to live our lives.
If we like each other…” She trailed off.
Like was far too weak of a word for everything she felt for Xavier right now, but she didn’t want to jinx what had just happened by overstating it.
“He’ll just have to get used to it,” he finished up for her.
“My thoughts exactly. But we should still get back to the sanctuary—catch everyone up on what happened with the sheriff.”
“Agreed,” he replied, and he turned the key in the ignition and pulled away from the café.
She couldn’t stop staring at him, now that she knew he felt at least some of what she did for him.
For so long, she had denied herself this—this closeness, these sweet moments where they could just be together.
She hoped this would be the start of him opening himself up a little, too.
Maybe to her, maybe to Sarah; it didn’t matter as long as he got some of the weight off his mind.
As they drove, heading up the mountain road that led through the dense forest and back to Warrior Peak, he glanced out the window at the passing scenery.
“Remind you of growing up here?” she asked.
He nodded. “Yeah, my brother and I used to play in these woods a lot when we were young,” he remarked, smiling slightly.
“I think it drove my mom insane. Max was always getting into trouble, falling out of trees, stuff like that. I can’t count the number of times I would get yelled at when we came home and he had another scrape on his elbow. ”
“So he was kind of a daredevil then?” she prompted.
She liked hearing these stories about his youth.
It felt as though she was seeing some hidden side of him, something he did his best to keep from everyone else.
It might do him good to reflect on some of the happier memories he had of his childhood.
No matter how dark things had gotten, it didn’t mean he had to leave behind everything good that had ever happened.
“I think he liked everyone to think he was,” he replied, amused. “But you should have seen him when he was younger. He would come to my room at least twice a week, asking me to check under his bed for monsters. Or to sleep on the floor to keep him safe.”
“And did you?”
“Of course I did.” He laughed. “I couldn’t turn him down, and he knew it. Anything he wanted from me, he got.”
“Damn, I didn’t realize you could have that kind of power over your big brother,” she joked. “I should have tried to get more out of Lawson growing up.”
“He didn’t do all of that for you?”
“He did some of it,” she replied. “But grudgingly. Don’t know why he’s got such a stick up his butt about protecting me now.”
“Maybe because he’s seen a bit more of the world,” Xavier suggested. “He knows what can be out there if you’re not careful. He just doesn’t want you to have to deal with any of that.”
“Yeah, I guess,” she agreed.
She tried not to get upset with her brother, knowing that he was just looking out for her. But she didn’t understand how he could feel like her being with Xavier was anything other than a good thing. If there was anyone in the world he trusted, it should be his best friend, right?
Well, they would figure that out when it came up again. For now, what mattered was the relaxed smile on Xavier’s face as they drove. He reached out to give her leg a squeeze, his touch casual and easy, just as she had always wanted it to be.
“I love spending this time with you,” she blurted out before she could stop herself. “I know I tried to keep my distance after what happened with my brother, but…” She trailed off with a shrug.
“Me, too,” Xavier assured her, grinning.
She wished she could take a snapshot of his face like that and commit it to memory. She never wanted to forget the way he looked at her, the way it made her feel like she could take on the world and win.
“So you guys played a lot out here in the winter, too?” she asked, turning her attention back to the forest outside. “You must have been freezing.”
“Yeah, but we always had a warm home to go back to,” he replied. “We never wandered too far. Mom was always waiting, ready with a hot drink and a bandage for any bruises Max got along the way.”
“Oh don’t act like you didn’t get a few, too,” she teased.
He chuckled. “Yeah, okay, maybe I did sometimes, too,” he admitted. “I wasn’t always the sensible older brother.”
She could hardly imagine him like that, relaxed and fooling around.
All the time she had known him, he had seemed to be this solid, strong guy who took everything seriously—well, everything outside of her, of course.
She always tried to bring out a lighter side of him, never wanting him to feel like he had to put up that front when he was with her.
She wanted to see the man underneath, the man who had grown up from that little boy who had played in the snow with his baby brother.
“But in my defense, I…” Xavier began, but then, he sharply cut himself off, his words faltering as he looked in the rearview mirror.
Hannah craned her head around to see what he was looking at, and her stomach lurched. A big truck was racing up on them from behind.
The two-lane road was winding with a ravine on one side and a fast-flowing river on the other; the entire length of it was a no-pass zone.
If another driver happened to be coming down the mountain, it would be bad for them all.
As the truck sped toward them faster than anyone needed to on an icy road, she couldn’t help but feel a familiar terror curling inside her stomach.
“Who the hell is that?” he muttered. “And why are they coming at us so fast? It’s icy as hell out there.”
“Maybe they’re just trying to pass?” she offered optimistically, but she knew that wasn’t the case. Nobody would dare speed around these mountain roads in this weather unless they were stupid. Or trying to intimidate someone.
Or drive them off the road.
“No, that’s not it,” he replied, his voice dropping to a growl. “You’re buckled in, right?”
“Yeah,” she squeaked, hoping he couldn’t hear the fear in her voice.
She could hear the other vehicle’s engine on the road now, drawing ever closer, and it took everything she had not to let the panic get the better of her.
Her eyes slid to the sides of the road—noting how close their SUV was to the edge.
She shivered at the thought of how frigid that water must be.
“It’s okay,” Xavier murmured to her, sensing her tension.
She clasped her trembling hands in her lap. She wanted to believe him, God, she wanted to believe him, but she was struggling to contain her panic. After the fire, she hadn’t been able to assume anything was innocent. Any danger in her vicinity, she was hyperaware of it.
Then the big truck was beside them on a curve. With the vehicles almost pressed up against each other, Hannah tried to look around Xavier to see the driver of the truck, but in her panicked state, she couldn’t get a good look through the darkened windows.
Suddenly, the driver twisted the wheel and slammed their truck into Xavier’s SUV.
“Hold on!” Xavier yelled, but his voice sounded far away.
Hannah’s head spun, and everything slowed as the vehicle flipped off the road. The sickening crunch of metal and the sound of tearing filled the air, and she felt her scream stick in her throat. She wanted to yell out for help, but she knew it was no use.
But as their SUV spun through the air and down toward the water below, she finally let it out. A scream that bounced around the interior of the vehicle, her hands scrambling for purchase on something, anything.
But it wasn’t enough to brace for the final impact as the SUV landed with a crash in the cold, murky river.