Wake Me Up (Love Knows No Boundaries) (10 page)

He lifts himself up
onto his arm and hovers over me, but he doesn’t kiss me. His lips lightly grazes my jaw, sending delicious tingles down my spine. When the tingles reach my abdomen they feel like full blown electric pulses, bringing every nerve in my body to life. I unclench my hands over my stomach and close my eyes again, and the world diminishes until there’s only him.

He lifts his hand of
f my chest. He’s barely touching me now, only his breath fanning my skin. With his body so close to mine the warmth of his breath skims over my cheek to the corner of my mouth, dipping down my chin into the curve of my neck. The same pulling sensation starts in my abdomen, the one I now know leads to all good things.

I let out a shaky
breath at the thought, and struggle even more to keep still. He leaves a trail of heat, working his way down. I want to squirm and grab him. Never in my life has it been this hard to keep still. I want to forget what happened in the past twenty-four hours. I want to pretend we’re strangers, and start again.

He continues placing feather-
light kisses over my collarbone and down to the curve of my cleavage, just visible with the t-shirt I’m wearing. And right about there, my hands grow a brain of their own. They shoot up, into his chest, grabbing at his shirt.

He gets some message from that
, because he comes back up and hovers over my mouth. I open my eyes and look right into his.

I bring my hands
up to his face and let my fingers trail over his skin, really taking him in for the first time. I can’t exactly explain how it feels to touch him. To feel, not sick, but ecstatic instead. I press my palms flat against his face so I can feel more of him.

And the soft l
ook he gets, I’ve always wanted to see that. All I’ve ever wanted was to feel safe. Parents should make their children feel safe. If nothing else, I hope I can make a friend out of Aiden, like I’ve done with Chloe. But … if I can experience more with him, why not?

I let my eyes trail over his face, t
here’s a faint cut disappearing into his hairline, and I wonder if he got it in a fight. Looking up at him, I hear the enrapturing sound of the eagle.

I mean
to say his name as my eyes jump to the sky, but all that comes out is a rush of air. I don’t know who moves first, or if I push him off. But I’m up, and dizzy with emotions I can’t begin to describe as the eagle soars over the lake. My chest expands and shrinks all at once. My heart stutters and I hold my breath. There is an aching pain spreading through my chest, but it’s different this time, it’s sweet, as if something is finally being released. Something I have been holding inside me for far too long.

The eagle cries out to
the sky and beyond, staking its claim on its territory and a piece of my soul, the piece that hurts. It swoops down lower on the other side, gliding gracefully, flapping once, twice and then it’s gone.

I’ve come and I’ve seen. I’ve e
xperienced the one miracle I wanted to. I look out over the still water, and it strikes me like a bolt of lightning, I feel like a fish stuck in a confined space, swimming around aimlessly, coming from nowhere and going nowhere.

I’m twenty-
two. I have no plans for my future. What will my next step be?

~*~

Chapter Eight

Aiden~

There are so
me things I think you file away deep inside of you so that one day, when you’re old, you can call them up and smile at them. Emma’s face when she sees the eagle will be one of them.

It’s up there in my top f
ive, with Laurie and Zac’s story. I had a happy childhood, one of those perfect ones. My parents love me. I had a twin sister whom I adored. I have a younger brother I can teach stuff to. I was good at sports, good at everything I did. I joined the army and I was good at that. Our family was perfect until we lost Laurie.

Not that we’re not happy
any more. We got each other through it, sort of. But there’s that hole when you wake up the next day and your partner is gone, your other half for so long. Zac lost his wife, I lost my sister, and since that day we’ve been brothers and partners.

But
… but.

It’s been two years
. I haven’t wanted to touch anyone in two years. Kiss anyone. I didn’t know I was feeling like this until Emma. I didn’t know I was staying single so Zac wouldn’t be alone. It’s been us for two years, just working, but now I want more.

Monday
morning when I come back from my run, there is soft music coming from Emma’s room. She didn’t have a nightmare, and I left her to sleep. I stand and listen to the music, and I’m surprised when it sounds like Country, then it changes, and I have to smile as it picks up the beat. The song is all Emma. I google the lyrics, and find that it’s by Avicii. Definitely not Country, but Swedish.

Wake me up
. It reminds me of what Zac said.

We fa
ll into the week, and the times I see Emma at the university, I try to make it clear with a hug or kiss that she is sort of taken. I know what men think and which part of their bodies they think with, so if you don’t stake your claim, they descend, like a pack of wolves.

I h
ave my eye on one of those wolves right now, and he’s doing the leaning thing – into Emma’s personal space.

Seven days. I’ve known her seven day
s, and it’s taking a lot of willpower not to walk over right now and take the guy out. But, I’m not her boyfriend, yet. We haven’t had that discussion. Things kind of happened backwards for us, and I’m not sure how to approach the subject. I’ll have a heart attack if she brings someone home. Limbs will fly. There will be blood. God help the guy that tries something with her.

I wipe
my face and breathe in slowly. I need to calm down. I’ve grown way too protective, but it’s the damn thing with Katia and Colton that has me on edge, and the thing with her mother didn’t help at all.

Her hand is soft on my arm
, and I drop mine to look at her. It’s endearing, she actually looks concerned.

“Are you all
right?” she asks.

I don’t care about being in public
any more, or how she might feel about it. I slip my hands into her hair, pull her face to mine and I kiss her, not like I’ve been kissing her the past few days. No quick brushes of hot air. I crush her lips until she opens them for me, and then I fall.

Dammit, it feels heavenly to fall into her.
I drop my hand to her back, drawing her body tightly against mine, and I let her sweetness fill my mouth. Her hands move from my sides to my arms, then they finally slip around my neck and she holds me. If we were alone now, I’d forget what I said about her first time being special and take her, but we’re not, and that’s a good thing for us both.

I break the kiss
, and smile when she inches up to follow me, but I don’t buckle under the temptation.

“If we don’t stop
, I’m going to undress you right here,” I say. Her face flushes at my directness, and she drops her forehead to my chest. “With that said,” I continue, “I don’t think it’s a good idea if we go home right now. So, a public place it has to be. Any ideas?”

She hasn’t left the apartment
except when she comes here. I have offered to drop her somewhere when I have to meet with Zac, but she’s just too happy to stay there. Not tonight though, it’s Friday.

~*~

“Anything,” she answers me.

“What would you nor
mally do on a Friday?” I try to make it easier.

She adjusts her bag and I reach for it, throwing it over my s
houlder. She turns half away, looking at the students passing us by. “Really, we can do anything you want to do, Aiden.”

I tilt my head so I can see her face
, and I try to keep mine neutral. It was easier in the beginning, but now that I’m starting to really feel something for her, it’s getting harder not to get angry. I better not meet her mother.

“
Okay, it’s a date then,” I say, as cheerfully as I can manage. She looks up at me, surprised. “I hope you’re ready to be charmed, Emma Walker.” I reach for her, slipping my hand around the back of her neck. Her skin is silky soft. I can spend hours touching her.

She smiles
, and stands on her tiptoes so she can reach my ear. “Give it your best shot, Detective.”

Heat flushes through my body an
d I tighten my hold on her neck, keeping her close to me.

“Is that a dare?” I breathe the words down her jaw to her neck
, and she grabs at my shirt. I can’t keep from smiling, I love how responsive she is.

She nods before she pulls away. Her cheeks are that
cute rosy pink again. It’s times like this, when she reacts this way, that I have to remember she’s inexperienced. I have to make it special, somehow.

My mind is racing like a wild horse when I drive away from the university. I need to come up with something really differe
nt. Movies and boring stuff like that are out. I glance at the time, and as insane as the idea is, I stop for gas to fill up, and then head to the apartment.

“Can you wait
here for one sec? Just one.”

She smiles
, none the wiser, and I run up to pack fresh clothes for tomorrow. She must be the easiest person to pack for. Shorts, shirt, pyjamas, and underwear. I grin like a dumbass when I throw that in. Toothbrush and brush, and I almost miss the little box of contraceptive pills. I open the cabinet in the bathroom to make sure I’m not missing anything.

There are bottles. I reach for them, inspecting each one.
Three are still sealed, the fourth is half full. I take out my phone and call Zac, before I even think it through.

“Speak to me,” he answers
quickly.

“Can you check out somethin
g for me? I can’t right now. What is Toplep taken for?”

“Sure,” he says.

I cut the call and stare at the four bottles. Then I close the cabinet on them. If they were prescription, they’d be labeled that way. I push it to the back of my mind for now and head down. I’ll deal with it when Zac calls back, whatever the ‘it’ is.

When I steer us in the direction of Ocean Isle
, I switch on the radio. I’ve noticed Emma loves music.

“W
e have a lot of time to kill, so twenty questions,” I say. I can try and get my answers that way.

“Twenty
questions,” she repeats. “You certainly are a brave bloke.”

“Why would that be?” I glance at her.

“Normally the male species shies away from answering questions.”

“It’s in my nature to ask them,” I remind her. “I like to solve puzzles.”

“You do?” she asks, looking uncomfortable.

“Human ones
,” I rectify.

“Oh.” She glances
out the window and then back at me. “Twenty questions.” Her face brightens up with that stunning smile she has. “Your favorite color?”

“Charcoal
, yours?” I counter. She looks around the car as if she’s thinking about it.

“
It’s not blue … eh … almost the color of the sea but darker.” I take my phone out and hand it to her.

“Why don’t you look it
up? Bring up a color chart.”

Her eyes jump from the phone
, to me, then back to the phone before she takes it. I steal glances as she goes to work, and seconds later she holds up the screen to me.

“This one,” she says
, looking very pleased to have found it.

“That’s teal, isn’t it?”

She nods. “That’s the one.”

“Favorite thing to do?” I watch her closely.
She couldn’t decide on something to do for tonight and it has me thinking what the world is like where she comes from if she couldn’t make a simple decision like that.

“Read
, and you?” She surprises me with a quick answer, but one word is not good enough.

“
What do you read? You need to explain it more.”

She looks at the surrounding
s passing us by. “Fantasy is escapist, and that is its glory. If a soldier is imprisoned by the enemy, don't we consider it his duty to escape? If we value the freedom of mind and soul, if we're partisans of liberty, then it's our plain duty to escape, and to take as many people with us as we can.” She takes a breath as I let one out. “It’s a quote by J.R.R. Tolkien. I read anything.”

I just got another puzzle piece of her - s
he reads to escape.

~*~

She smiles suddenly. “What’s the most daring thing you’ve ever done?”

I don’t know if she means cr
azy daring or just plain daring.

“That’s a tough one,” I say
. “It all depends. Do you mean crazy, or plain ole’ daring?”

“You have different slots?” She acts shocked
, and then leans her head back against the seat, looking at me with those big green eyes. “Both.”

“Crazy first.” I smile at the memory. “
Laurie and I went through the academy together. We got partnered together, too. We got labeled the ‘Terrible Twins’ after we drew the short straw out of all the rookies on who would prank the Captain our first week in. When he wasn’t there, we turned the whole place upside down.” I sigh, remembering how we took turns to keep watch. “Laurie even turned the certificates on the wall upside down. What could not be turned was glued. We got in so much trouble.” I laugh, and then the old pang of sadness comes, tightening its hold on my heart.

“She sounds n
ice. So you’re twins?”

“The most daring
thing I’ve ever done was two years back.” I grip the wheel harder. “Going to Laurie’s funeral took about all the courage I had.”

“I’m-
” My eyes snap to Emma and she stops in the middle of saying the words. She places her hand on my thigh and smiles gently. “I just want to say I feel for your loss. I shouldn’t have asked.”

She still manages
to find a way to apologize. I loosen my hold on the wheel and force a smile to my lips. We need to move on.

“What is t
he craziest thing you’ve done?” I ask.

I catch the
smile on her face before she looks out of the window. “I went to a pub, and out of all the blokes there, I picked a policeman to make my daft proposal to of saving me from being the last virgin on this bloody planet.” Her cheeks flush a deep pink, telling me just how hard this is for her to admit to me. “I got rat-arsed, and then in my smashed stupor I tried to seduce the said policeman.” She looks at me and pulls the cutest face. “Turns out he’s my flatmate too, and well, Bob’s your uncle.”

“And,” I smile gently,
“how’s it all workin’ out for you so far?”

“
Better than any book I’ve read.” The honesty shows on her face. If I wasn’t driving right now, I’d kiss her breathless.

So I settle for second bes
t and bring her hand to my lips, pressing a kiss to her fingers. I weave my fingers through hers and rest our hands on my leg.

She finally starts to
ask where we’re going at the halfway mark. I don’t budge. I keep her in the dark until the end. We’re almost there, and it should come into view any minute. We made good time.

“
Now it’s not teal, but close enough,” I say. 

I know the view. I’ve seen it every summer my whole life long. This is where we spend o
ur family vacations. Ocean Isle. Just like clockwork, the strip of blue appears, and Emma’s fingers dig into my hand.

“You didn’t!” She straightens up in the chair. “Aiden
.”

I’ve never felt so empowered to hear my name on someon
e else’s lips. Her face lights up, and then she rewards me with a smile.

“You dared me,” I say. “You
told me to do my best, so here we go.”

She doesn’t stop smiling until I park the car at our family’s cottage.
Then, her face freezes.

~*~