Page 32

DANTE

I wake up one Saturday morning to the hazy fall of snow outside my dark windows.

Instinctively, I reach over to Reid’s side of the bed only for my hand to land on cold sheets.

Ugh. Where is he? Squinting one eye, I look around the room, to find absolutely nothing.

The walk-in closet door is open halfway, the light still on, but no sounds come from the room. He’s not here.

Maybe he’s downstairs curled up by the fire with his sketchbook.

I roll out of bed, scratching at my bare stomach as I plod toward the bathroom.

Once business is taken care of, it really starts to irk me that Reid didn’t let me wake up with him in my arms, sassy and sleepy. My favorite kind of Reid.

After getting dressed, I descend the cold wood stairs in search of Reid.

Scrolling through my phone, I glance up expecting to find him curled up in the chair by the fire, but there’s no fire going, and notably no Reid.

Well. Okay. I click through the app on my phone that shows his location, but the ring just shows him up in the bedroom. Now I’m starting to get nervous.

“He left a few hours ago,” Hayden calls out from his perch at the dining table.

I jump a few inches in the air because I somehow didn’t notice him. Hayden has that way about him. If he wants to be seen, you’ll know it, otherwise he can easily blend into whatever room he’s inhabiting.

“Any idea where he went?” I ask.

Hayden quirks one eyebrow as if to say yes, but I’m not telling you .

I scowl his way which only earns me a laugh from Hayden.

Prick. I trudge back up the stairs, irritated and annoyed, because I had a particular vision for how this Saturday morning was going to go.

Wake up with sleepy, sassy Reid, roll him over and fuck him, then treat him like the little prince he is alllllllll day.

But no, now he’s gone and I’m left to my own devices.

Wiping at my eyes in frustration, I toss myself back on my bed, only to land on something crumbly and noisy. What. I reach under my back and pull out a now crumpled piece of paper with Reid’s neat scroll across it. Oh.

Find me, asshole.

I smile despite myself. When I tilt my head to the side that’s when I see the black ring on the nightstand.

Oh, he wants to be found. Suddenly the day feels a lot more exciting than it did just a few moments ago.

Jumping out of the bed, I race down the stairs, barely registering Hayden’s delighted laugh in the kitchen.

Tugging on my own thick jacket, I push out into the garage only to be greeted with an impatient-looking Parker.

“Jesus, that took you forever.” He promptly tosses the keys at me and I catch them against my chest. “Onetime- only favor to use my car. If you return it with one scratch, you’re a dead man.

Also, Reid said something about being where he likes to be watched.

” Parker passes by me in a flurry of his warm-scented cologne.

“You guys are weird. No fucking in the car.”

Little does he know that now the idea has been planted. I won’t be able to go on without fucking Reid at least once in the car. I climb into the car, start it, and sit for a minute to try to think up where he could be. The library? School’s closed for winter break but maybe he could still get in.

The roads are lightly lined with snow as I drive toward the school.

I love the hush that falls over the city with snowfall.

After growing up in New Mexico, snow was a new thing for me to get used to the past few years.

Yeah, it took acclimating, but now I’m partial to the aesthetics of it.

Although the reality is often infuriating, it’s still worth the way the snow softens everything it touches.

The school parking lot is empty like I imagined it would be.

Running through the snow is more dangerous than anything else, one bad step and my head gets cracked.

The library door is unlocked when I push against it, warmth washing over me as I shake the snow out of my hair and wipe down my jacket.

The usual front desk person is absent, some of the lights off, not even a security guard.

Hopefully Reid doesn’t get us expelled with this stunt.

I’m not sure where to start looking for him though.

I just start at the bottom and decide to work my way up.

Not wanting to turn lights on to draw attention to myself, I use my phone flashlight to skulk through the first floor. The first floor of the library is mostly technical texts, research books that I haven’t ever spent much time with.

Eerie silence greets me, despite the quiet slap of my feet against the carpeted floor.

Once I’ve swept the first floor, I take the staircase to the second floor.

I hope Reid doesn’t make me look through all five floors only to find out this is the wrong location and he’s actually waiting for me ass up somewhere else.

As I sweep the second floor, I think about the last few weeks with Reid.

He’s become such a good boy for me when he’s not hissing and spitting.

I kind of want to take him home to meet my parents…

and Ama. I want him to meet my family because he’s my family now too.

Reid’s the one. No one else will ever match my crazy beat for beat but him.

I think if I asked Reid to kill for me, he would, which is exactly the energy I’ll need for this fucked-up world.

Imagining Reid in my parents’ kitchen is easy, him helping my mom make dinner as my mom shares stories about me running naked through the neighborhood as a toddler. God, I want that so bad. I’m going to ask him the next time I see him. If I can fucking find him.

The emergency lights flicker on the third floor, making my breath hitch with the promise of finding Reid.

It’s still hush-quiet, but I can feel Reid close by, it’s hard to explain.

When he’s near me, my body knows. I make my footfalls quieter, make my big body less conspicuous as I dip between the rows of books to hunt him down.

The gentle flick of pages being turned reaches my ears as I edge toward the table he sat at all those weeks ago.

He’s so fucking beautiful. He hasn’t dyed his hair since we met, so there’s a hefty growth of dark auburn at his roots.

The hairs curl behind his ears, almost too overly long, falling into his face when he hunches down further to continue to search for whatever he wants to find in the book on the table.

His thin fingers pause on a page, eyes crinkled at the corners as the very hint of a smile tips up his lips.

He feels me too. We’re connected like magnets, close proximity will always bring us together.

Reid sighs in frustration at not finding what he’s seeking and stands abruptly, the chair scratching roughly against the carpet.

I watch, heart pounding, as he heads the opposite way to return the book.

He’s dressed in my favorite outfit. Dark skinny jeans with a maroon sweater that shows a peek of his shoulder when he lifts the book to clutch it against his chest.

I dip into another row to keep my eye on him as he moves through the rows to find another book.

Pausing halfway through the row, I watch as he lifts onto his tiptoes to return the current book, fingertips dancing across the books on a lower shelf as he drops back down to the soles of his feet.

Even that is fucking elegant. He has no idea how much he’s bewitched me.

I think if I told him, he’d snarl and tell me to suck his dick, which I happily would, just to make him feel wanted.

He moves toward another row, but I don’t think I can wait one more second to have him in my arms. Not to fuck him, not to suck his dick, but just to hold him and smell the warmth of his skin at the crook of his neck. Oh, I’m in so deep there’s no coming back.

I sneak up behind him as he pauses at a shelf to stare up at a book he can’t reach even on his tiptoes. Coming up behind him, I lean up and tap the offending book.

“This one?”

Reid tilts his head backwards to stare up at me, light blue eyes and pale skin, all sharp edges and desire. I don’t give a fuck about the book. I drop my hand to curl my fingers behind his ear, holding his head so that he can’t pull away.

“I wanted to wake up with you,” I murmur close to his lips.

Reid smirks as he melts back against me. “Isn’t this fun though?”

“I’m cold.”

“I’ll warm you up,” Reid promises.

And then he crashes his lips against mine. He tastes like those damn cherry candies he’s always sucking on, but no cigarettes because he hasn’t smoked since the blowup with the twins. My good boy. I own Reid’s mouth with my own, laying claim to him with my kiss.

“This is fun, but I really just want to take you home and fuck you in our bed,” I say, sounding like a beggar even to my own ears.

“You’ve turned into a romantic so fast,” Reid notes, not sounding remotely irritated though.

I nuzzle against the crook of his neck, my favorite spot on his body. Minus his ass. Kissing his pounding pulse, I curl my hands against his arms and hold him close to me where he belongs.

“I love you, Reid.”

“I love you too, Dante,” Reid says easily, like it costs him nothing.

“I wanna take you home over spring break to meet my family, to meet Ama.”

Reid turns around in my arms to blink up at me, confusion, fear, and a little love shine in his eyes. “Really?”

“Yeah, will you come?”

Reid looks down at his feet, his telltale show of vulnerability. “I can’t fly… we’d have to drive. ”

“I’ll buy a camper. I don’t give a fuck.”

Reid chuckles, deep and low, before tilting up onto his tiptoes to kiss me soft and slow. “Alright, Dante. You can take me home. Well, over spring break, and now, because it’s quite cold and I think I need you to warm me up.”

My chest overflows with love and desire for him all at once. Wrapping my arm around his shoulder, I guide him down the stairs and out to the car with a grin on my face that feels natural, and real.

The snow falls away after a few days, the air heating up enough to melt the slushy piles of snow scattered around campus.

We’re still in the throes of winter. When winter softens, maybe I’ll whisk Reid away for a romantic stay in a cabin, just the two of us.

Trudging out of the engineering building, I amble toward the math building to find Reid.

It’s easy for me to spot him in the distance, my eyes just naturally fall to him whenever they can.

He’s lying on his stomach in the quad, a blanket tossed over the still too-cold grass.

Nobody else is out there, only Reid as he waits for me.

Two hurt people in a broken world finding one another at the exact right time.

Maybe life is more than a string of happy accidents, maybe it’s purposeful.

Because I can’t imagine a world where I’m not meant to find Reid, to love him, to hold him down and fuck him until he cries.

The sun breaks through the clouds at the exact moment Reid lifts his head from his sketchbook to lock gazes with mine.

Reid promptly flips me off, happily returning his attention to his sketchbook.But the telltale smirk curving the edges of his lips tells me absolutely everything I need to know.

I think I’ll call it love.

THE END… for now .

Want more Dante and Reid? Catch a glimpse of Reid’s first official mission as part of the crew now.

You might be wondering who is next… well… I’m not much of a secret keeper so I’ll spoil you now… Mason and Parker are coming this fall! Pre-order them now.

If you enjoyed this book please consider leaving a review wherever you feel most comfortable.