Page 53 of Breaking Point (IceHawks #1)
Grayson
KIERAN ASHFORD
please
GRAYSON
dude
did you not just drive her home?
KIERAN ASHFORD
your point?
GRAYSON
and she still didn’t give you her number…
have you ever thought maybe she doesn’t want you to have it?
KIERAN ASHFORD
nah I don’t think it’s that
why wouldn’t she want me to have it?
I send excellent personalized memes
I literally won an award for it
GRAYSON
are you talking about the award we made up at the bar?
Kieran that award was written on a beer stained napkin
KIERAN ASHFORD
doesn’t mean I don’t hold the best meme sender title
“ L ayla just texted me. Kieran dropped her off,” Bella announces as she rounds her car, parked next to mine.
“I guess they didn’t kill each other after all,” I say as I lift Bambi from the car, letting her off the lead. There’s nowhere on the property she can get out and she needs to sniff her new environment.
“Yet.”
As I unlock the front door, my eyes on Bambi, I ask, “How do you feel about Layla leaving for so long?”
Bambi shoots off inside my house, her tail wagging as her little sniffles fill the halls in her exploration. Thank God for my hardwood floors—I can stomp my foot and she’ll hopefully feel the vibrations if I need to catch her attention.
Bella’s heavy sigh trails behind me to the back door as I follow Bambi to the deck. Zoomies overtake her once she steps out into the yard.
“No judgment?” Bella asks softly.
“I’d never judge you.”
“Easy to say,” she mumbles. “I…I’m terrified of her leaving.
She’s my best friend, and more than that, she’s my safety net.
It’s hard enough as it is with my mom, and I can’t imagine not having her here to lean on, but when I think that it’s always followed by guilt because Layla deserves a chance to be healthy. ”
“You’re allowed to have complicated feelings, Bella. It doesn’t make you a horrible person to feel scared. You’re going through something that’s unimaginable.”
She steps onto the deck beside me, her gaze latched on Bambi rolling in the grass. “Then why do my feelings make me feel so horrible?”
“Because you’re a good friend.”
Her head drops back with a groan and I can’t help but laugh.
“What’s in Berlin anyways?”
“A treatment center doing experimental trials on patients with lupus. ”
My brows rise in shock. “Fuck, that’s hardcore. Is she going alone?”
“Yes, which only makes me more selfish for wanting her to stay. Here I am talking about my fears of her going but I can’t even imagine how petrified she is to do it alone.”
“One doesn’t cancel out the other. You can be afraid of the change to come along while also being hopeful for her. In some ways you’re both tackling heavy things head-on by yourselves.”
Bella looks at me out of the corner of her eye. “When did you get so wise?”
Turning to face her, I mock being wounded. “You never thought I was wise?”
“Must have been because of that first impression.”
I wince. “Don’t remind me. I’m just glad they haven’t tried to come back.”
“You and me both,” she mutters. “I like my hair and eyes exactly where they are.”
Me too.
“She’s so happy,” she suddenly breathes.
My smile mirrors Bella’s as Bambi runs in between all the trees, her nose to the ground, tail wagging. “I haven’t seen her this happy…ever.”
“You can’t take her back,” Bella whispers.
“I know.”
“I’ll figure out a way—wait, what?” She turns to me, eyes large and round. “What do you mean, you know?"
I shrug. “I knew the moment I agreed for her to come here that I could never give her back.”
“Then why take her? You said with your work?—”
“I’ll figure it out,” I say simply, my eyes still locked on Bambi. “She deserves a home, Bella, and I’m not going to be the one to give her that only to take it away when she’s just beginning to feel comfortable. That would be cruel.”
At the weighted silence, I finally turn to face her. The sun is setting over the mountains, the sky a pastel shade of pink, making her look angelic as her long brown hair flutters in the soft breeze, pushing the scent that is distinctly her toward me .
The way shock parts her lips has me licking my own and my hands twitching at my sides.
I’ve never had the desire to kiss someone as much as I do her.
“You really are a good guy, aren’t you?” she whispers softly.
I wasn’t expecting that. “And you don’t think I was before?” I can’t keep the hurt from my voice. I know I’ve made mistakes; I know Bella came into my life when I was at rock bottom.
But I turned my life around.
She doesn’t even know about Drew yet…
At the reminder of my brother, something goes cold in my heart. Maybe I’m not the good guy you think I am.
“No, it’s just…” She shakes her head before squaring her shoulders, and I know that gleam in her eye.
It makes me forget everything. It makes thoughts of myself fall away. Bella is gearing up, that stubborn streak in her flaring.
“It was you, wasn’t it?”
Bambi comes barreling up the deck stairs with a stick in her mouth. When she drops it, I pick it up and throw it with a frown pulling down my brows. “Was me what?”
“You paid my mother’s medical bills.”
I’m halfway to putting my hands in my pockets, the crisp mountain air chilling my bones, my mouth opening to refute, but she simply holds up her hand.
“Don’t lie to me. Did you or did you not pay for her medical bills?”
Her eyes are completely unreadable. I steel myself for a fight, for her to be mad and angry for overstepping, but as I confess, “Yes,” Bella surprises me.
She throws herself at me.
Her chest collides with mine, making the breath in my lungs leave me in a rush. She wraps her arms around my neck and buries her head in my chest. “Thank you.”
Her shaky voice matches my hands as I quickly return the hug, savoring her warmth and scent as it envelopes me. “You aren’t mad?” I ask, dumbfounded.
“Mad? About yanking me out of medical debt? No. I am shocked and feel like I’m undeserving of it, though. ”
“How are you undeserving of it?”
“I’ve done nothing to deserve such generosity. There are families that deserve it more?—”
My hands are on her hips and I push her away from me slightly so I can peer into her eyes.
“I’m going to stop you right there.” My voice is hard, stern enough that she pays attention.
“You, more than anyone, deserve to be taken care of. Everyone does, Bella. No one deserves to have cancer or a family member with it, let alone the pile of medical debt, but you have been taking care of her by yourself for nearly a year. You deserve it.”
“It would feel wrong to take it?—”
“Don’t make me take it back. I won’t.”
“But why?” she murmurs. “Why would you do this?”
Because I think I’m falling in love with you would probably make her run, so instead I whisper, “Because your mom means everything to you, so in turn, me.”
Her breath hitches as silver lines her eyes. “You didn’t have to do that, though.”
“No, I didn’t.” I drop my head, hoping she can still see me through her tears as I say, “But I wanted to.”
Suddenly, I realize that neither one of us has let go of the other. Both of us still have our arms wrapped around each other from the hug. I tighten my hold, knowing that I’m dancing along a fine line, and yet I can’t seem to care.
Not when Bella tilts her chin up a fraction.
I shouldn’t do this, my brain is screaming at me not to do this, but I find my head lowering to meet hers anyways.
“Tell me to stop,” I breathe. “Because I can’t do it by my own willpower.”
Bella swallows thickly before tilting her head up more, a thousand thoughts floating behind those honey-brown eyes. “Just for practice, right?”
Something crumbles in my chest but I don’t let her see it, not when I’ll take the scraps she gives me. I’ll take anything over nothing.
“If that’s what you have to tell yourself,” I murmur, our lips a hair’s breadth away .
“Is that not what you tell yourself?”
“No.”
I don’t give her a chance to respond because in the next breath, I’m upon her. Sliding my hands from her waist up to her cheeks as I place my lips against hers.
As they unite, a zap of electricity, an addictive feeling, hums throughout my body, urging me to continue. I realize I’m cradling her like she is the most precious thing in this world. She is—to me.
A moan falls from her lips, her fingers gripping my shirt, pulling me closer.
Not needing to be asked twice, I spin her, placing my hands under her thighs and lifting her into the air, taking the moment she gasps to plunge my tongue into her mouth and devour her. I walk us back to my table and sit, keeping her straddling my lap.
If Bella has to lie to herself and say this is practice, I don’t care so long as we can practice all day, every day.
I can never have anyone else. She’s ruined me for life.
Bella is perfect.
The way she fits against my lap is perfect.
The sound she makes as her hips start to rock is perfect.
The feel of her hair between my fingers is perfect.
Her soft lips are perfect.
Everything about this moment is perfect—until a wet slobbery stick lands on our thighs, accompanied by a loud bark and the stomping of excited toes. Reluctantly, I pull away to face Bambi, who’s peering up at the both of us with such happiness in her gaze I can’t even feel disappointed.
However, I do feel it the moment Bella suddenly removes herself from my lap.
Taking the stick, I throw it, my fingers that didn’t touch the slobbery stick brushing my lips that are still tingling. Bella rushes inside, calling over her shoulder, “Thank you for everything. I have to get back home to check on my mom. Send me photos of Bambi!”
Before I can so much as blink, she is gone. Rushed from the house by the time Bambi comes bouncing back up on the deck. Her little fluffy golden head twists this way and that as she whines.
“Looks like Bella didn’t just steal one heart.” Sighing, I make my way over to Bambi, hoping my presence alone can get the sad, confused look out of her eyes. “I know, girl, me too. Me too…”
ICEHAWKS
GRAYSON
is that my head…on Edward’s body?
THEO IRVING
yeah
you’re Bella’s spider monkey
LOGAN JOHNSON
HAHAHAHA
KIERAN ASHFORD
haha this is fucking gold
I’ll get it printed and hung in the locker room
GRAYSON
don’t you dare
KIERAN ASHFORD
already ordered
JACK LEWIS
everyone bow down to our new captain
spider monkey Grayson
HUDSON MITCHEL
pure gold
GRAYSON
who the hell leaked this on social media?
ASHER O’CONNOR
my bet is on Irving
THEO IRVING
guilty as charged