Page 67

I take an equine grunt as a yes—I figure I’m right to, considering that when I dig my heels into Ruin’s side and click my tongue, he moves forward without protest.

And he moves some more. And he moves, and he moves, and he moves in slow, steady circles around a field with no fences, no limits, so many places to escape to, but he chooses to stay here, with me.

Unlike last time, I don’t push my luck. Considering Carmen’s point proven, I carefully dismount my wonderful, angelic stallion, and I resist the urge to kiss him on the fucking mouth.

So proud I practically glow, I look to my audience, and I find them proud too. Even Finn reeks of it, though I can tell I’m in for a verbal spanking later.

Maybe a real one, if I’m lucky.

“Ruin is not a conventional horse,” Carmen calls out gently, satisfaction surrounding her like a tangible aura. “Conventional training won’t work on him. I’m not sure any training will work on him. I think he’s meant to be a little wild.”

All three of my sisters exchange a look.

“Yeah, yeah,” I grumble. “He’s wild, I’m wild. Chaos and Ruin. Like calls to fucking like.”

Grace sighs, all fake despondence. “You stole my joke.”

“I will trample you.”

“Did no one consider the ramifications of giving Lottie the equine equivalent of a loaded gun?”

Ha fucking ha.

Finn waits until after work to corner me.

I’m frowning at a pot of steamed broccoli that’s all but disintegrating in its state of over-cooked-ness when my stomach suddenly digs into the lip of the sink, pushed against it by the hard chest warming my back.

Briefly, teeth close around my earlobe. “Are you trying to get yourself killed?”

Dropping the pot in the sink, I wriggle around, batting my lashes at that uncharacteristically sour face. “Today? No.”

Finn’s scowl—his scowl , he’s scowling , have I ever seen him scowl? Has he ever scowled?—hardens. “You’re not funny.”

I trace the furrows in his brow before pressing my thumbs to the downturned corners of his mouth and forcing them upwards. “I’m soooo pretty though, right?”

He rolls his eyes, but as he shifts to kiss the inside of my wrist, a smile burns the thin skin there. “You’re gorgeous. Even when you’re giving me a heart attack.”

“Heart attack?” I pout, flicking that clenched jaw. “Quite the downgrade from the hard-on I gave you last time.”

“No one said anything about a hard-on.”

“It was implied.”

“Hallucinated, maybe.” He leans in, eyes narrowed. “That's what you were trying to do, huh?”

“Not everything is about you, Finley.”

“Not my name, baby.”

“Finneas?”

He clucks his tongue.

“Finnegan?”

He covers my mouth with his palm before I can even get that last one fully out.

I sink my teeth into the heel of his hand and he hisses, he laughs, he pinches my chin lightly and uses the grip to pull me up onto my tiptoes, making me meet him halfway as he stoops for a kiss. “You’re in a good mood.”

I loop my fingers around his wrist, squeezing until I feel the thump of his pulse. “I had a good day.”

“You did good,” it looks like it pains him to admit, and I don’t entirely get why until he adds, “No ER visit needed this time, at least.”

Ah . That’s what the dark cloud hovering over his head is all about. “You were worried about me.”

He grunts. “Chronically.”

I croon and I coo and I tease as if I’m not a little wobbly in the knees, like the mere concept of his concern doesn’t make me all fucking gooey . My smile is soft, too soft, and I try to hide it in his palm, but there’s not exactly anything stone-cold about the way I plant a kiss there.

“Huh.” I pull back, eyeing the tattoo I keep forgetting to ask about. Tracing the outline of a faded horseshoe, I flex my other arm, brandishing my own u-shaped ink. “We match.”

“Hm.” Finn gently detaches himself from me so he can coast his hand down my arm until he cups the curve of my elbow, his tattoo covering mine. “Been thinking that for a while now.”

Fucking hell.

I turn around like that might stop the flush creeping up my neck, sighing when I catch sight of more than one ruined pot and remember what I was trying to do—what I was failing at doing—before I was interrupted.

Cupping my shoulders, Finn digs his thumbs into the nape of my neck and drops his chin to the top of my head. “Whatcha makin’?”

“Nothing edible.”

Laughing, he nudges me aside. “I’ll cook.”

“No.” I hip-check out of the way. “I’m cooking.”

“Baby, you can’t cook.”

I scowl, resenting the reminder. “But…”

“But?”

But . “I was trying to do something.”

“Do something?”

“Something nice,” I grind out. “For you.”

Finn blinks. He exhales slowly, nostrils flaring. I frown as he drops his head back. Frown some more when he groans at the ceiling. Keep frowning, but in an amused way when he groans into my mouth next, kissing me hard before peppering the same affection all over my face. “You’re so sweet .”

“Stop,” I grunt as half-heartedly as I bat him away, no real effort behind my attempts to evade.

Jesus, I’m practically pulling him closer by two fistfuls of his shirt, I’m giggling as his lips trace the slope of my neck, as teeth nibble my collarbone, and then I’m shrieking when he hoists me into the air. “ Finn .”

“Sweet,” he repeats, he insists. “My sweet fucking girl.”

Mentally smacking down the scoffed argument that instinctively rises up my throat, I choose to let him have his little delusion instead.

Indulge it a little. Act real fucking sweet as I wrap my dangling legs around his waist, my arms around his neck, and smile like butter wouldn’t melt. “Not mad at me anymore?”

“I’m never mad at you.” With a rueful smile of his own, the hand not cemented to one of my ass cheeks sweeps my hair behind my ear. “Believe me, I try. It’s impossible.”

He doesn’t look happy about that. I don’t know what he looks like—I don’t know what that look is. I would ask, if the mere potential of his answer didn’t scare the shit out of me.

I might’ve bit the bullet and asked anyway, if a pointedly clearing throat didn’t draw both of our attention to the woman leaning against the door I didn’t even hear open.

“Really hate to interrupt,” Grace drawls, and the urge to make like my failed dinner and disintegrate strikes me. “But I desperately need to know who the hell you are and what you’ve done to my sister.”

Letting my legs drop, I hang in limbo for a whole ten seconds before Finn sets me on my feet. “Ha ha.”

“Were you just giggling ?”

“Weren’t you leaving?”

Grace tosses over keys that I recognize as Lux’s by the beaded keychain her son made, and Finn deigns to take his hand off my ass long enough to catch them. “Lux got busy. I’m here to beg your man for a ride to the bus station.”

I don’t know what in the hell possesses me to sigh like the request is some huge inconvenience. I do, however, know that it’s the pouty, teasing simper my twin hits me with that has me stepping out of Finn’s grip, shrugging and muttering, “He’s all yours.”

“Uh-huh.” Grace hums, grinning like a little shit at the man behind me. “Did you call her sweet or was that an auditory hallucination?”

Out of nowhere, a Scrub Daddy sails over my head and hits my twin square on the forehead. “You wanna walk into town, Gracie?”

Grace meows like a fucking brawling alley cat.

And then she makes dramatic smooching noises like a dickhead as Finn dips to kiss me once more. “I’ll pick up some dinner on the way back.”

My eyes narrow, but I don’t exactly argue.

As he saunters out the front door, I only notice someone is watching me watch him go too late.

The look on Grace’s face makes me sigh. “What?”

“Nothing. Well,” she immediately amends, that smarmy grin back in place. “Lots of things, but you’re very flighty. Don’t wanna spook ya.”

I fake another laugh and flash her my middle finger.

“Permission to hug or does he have you all touched out?”

Just to prove a point, I let her yank me into her arms. “I still don’t get why you’re not just staying until Christmas. What’s the point in leaving when you’re coming back in, like, less than two weeks?”

“I have training. Games. A life outside of Serenity.”

“That exists?” I quip even though I know the answer all too well. And even though I can’t imagine wanting to get back out there, I don’t question Grace anymore. I just give her a squeeze and pull away, expecting one last quip before she saunters out the door.

What I don’t expect, however, is her unnervingly serious expression. I don’t expect firm hands on my cheeks either. Nor the solemn, random proclamation that leaves my twin’s lips. “You deserve good things, Charlotte. Let them happen.”