Page 9 of Messy AF (At First #3)

nine

~ Tobias ~

S eated at the end of the fishing pier that overlooked Bliss Lake, my feet dangling over the edge, I leaned my head on Warren’s shoulder and sighed in satisfaction. It didn’t seem possible to feel this happy, and sometimes, the depths of my joy frightened me a little.

After all, having everything meant having a lot to lose.

We had returned to the Farmers Market as promised, and I had finally gotten my honey. It tasted a bit like watermelon. Weird, but I kind of loved it.

Peter had disappeared after that day in the alley, and a rental sign had gone up in front of his cottage barely a week later. Clearly, he had taken Warren’s threat seriously.

Smart.

Looking back on it now, I didn’t think I had ever been in any real danger. As my mate had predicted, Peter hadn’t wanted to hurt me. He had wanted to possess me. Like a toy or a piece of furniture.

The shifter had called it love.

I didn’t think he even knew what the word meant.

The confrontation hadn’t scared me, not exactly. It had left me unsettled, though. For a moment in that secluded alley, the ground beneath my feet had shifted, shaking my reality, the uncertainty of what he might do next more worrying than his actions.

But it had also made me stronger, and at the end of the day, I felt proud of how I had handled the situation. Granted, it was a lot easier to be brave with a two-hundred-pound vampire as backup, ready and willing to bodycheck anyone who so much as looked at me wrong.

Still, I had held it together. I hadn’t panicked, and I had been deliberate with my words. Most importantly, I hadn’t apologized. Not once. Not even a little one.

I’d take that win.

“What are you thinking about, angel?”

“How awesome I am.”

“And so humble too,” he teased, his gentle laughter carried away on the breeze.

“What?” I lifted my head and sat upright so I could look at him. “You don’t think I’m awesome?”

He stared back, the moonlight reflecting in his eyes. “I think you’re perfect.”

A bit of an oversell, but he would get no complaints from me. “Good answer.” Leaning back on the heels of my palms, I stared up at the ocean of stars that dotted the sky. “Are you ready to go?”

He answered with a question of his own. “Are you tired?”

“No, but it’s hot as hell out here.” Despite the darkness and the light wind that blew over the lake, the humidity was still sweltering. “If I have to sweat, I’d rather be naked,” I added, only partially joking.

“Who says we have to go home to get naked?”

I laughed, thinking he couldn’t be serious.

He was.

“What are you doing?” I hissed when he stood and began stripping out of his clothes. “You can’t do that.”

“Says who?”

“Public decency laws.”

“Who’s going to see?”

I jerked around, my eyes scanning the darkness as if I expected the Circle City PD or possibly the neighborhood watch to come storming out of the bushes.

“Warren, put your damn clothes back on.”

Instead of compliance, I received a cocksure smirk before he walked off the end of the pier and splashed into the water. He disappeared beneath the surface, reemerging only a heartbeat later like some Atlantean god.

“Are you going to join me?”

The lake looked endless as it stretched out behind him, its black surface swallowing the distant shoreline. Which somehow made him seem even more ethereal.

I hesitated, caught between the urge to scold and the ache to follow.

Warren drifted further out, his silhouette slicing through the reflected starlight, and his laughter echoing off the glassy surface. He moved through the water with an ease that felt almost taunting.

I hugged my knees to my chest, heart thundering in my ears, caught between the safety of the pier and the pull of Warren’s gaze. My toes curled against the rough planks as I warred with myself, trying and failing to resist the urge of being lured into his midnight dare.

“You’re impossible,” I muttered.

Warren grinned wider, obviously waiting for me to break.

“There is a sign.” I stabbed my finger toward the piece of metal posted in the sand next to the dock. “Right there. It clearly prohibits swimming.”

Warren jerked his head to the side, the motion somehow looking like a shrug. “Suit yourself.”

I glared at him, trying to summon the kind of conviction that could anchor me to the dock, but my resolve faded by the second. I liked rules—they existed for a reason—but I also couldn’t resist the need to follow wherever my mate led.

I glanced at him again, at the way he drifted lazily, arms outstretched, his confidence inviting and infuriating in equal measure.

“No one is going to care at this hour,” he called back, voice soft but sure in the hush of the night.

“Someone might,” I insisted, though my voice lacked any real conviction.

Shadows danced across his face, that impossible grin never faltering. The air felt thick with possibilities, the kind that made my heart race for reasons I couldn’t name.

For a long moment, I stayed frozen, torn between logic and longing. My pulse hammered against my ribs. Half daring, half desperate, I hurled a pebble out into the dark. It splashed far short of Warren but sent ripples skittering through the glassy calm.

His laughter echoed again, the sound reckless and wild.

I pressed my lips together, fighting a losing battle with myself.

“You coming or not?” he taunted, his silhouette haloed by moonlight.

“Ugh!” I groaned, huffing as I shoved to my feet.

Damn him. Did he really expect me to just sit there when I knew he was wet and naked not ten feet away? No one on the planet could resist such temptation.

I undressed quickly, constantly looking over my shoulder, my mind spinning all kinds of ridiculous scenarios. Betty from down the street could have been watching me through her window right that second with a pair of night-vision binoculars.

Shaking like a leaf, I carried our clothes to the other end of the pier and placed them in neat piles for a quick getaway, just in case. No one had ever regretted being overly prepared.

Then I stepped off the planks, my feet sinking into the warm sand, and made my way to the water’s edge. Every nerve ending in my body felt electrified as I waded into the lake, my body thrumming with nerves and anticipation.

Warren swam over to meet me, waiting in the shallows where the waves lapped around his hips. He watched me, his eyes aglow with a ring of crimson, his laughter low and indulgent.

“This is very, very against the rules,” I said when I finally reached him.

“Yeah, but it’s fun, though.”

“Debatable,” I muttered, still too worried about being caught.

Warren shook his head, moonlight catching in the droplets of water on his skin when his shoulders shook with laughter. “Come here, angel.”

Taking my hand, he pulled me into him until I felt every hard muscle pressed against me. I went easily, falling into his magnetism, the space between us charged with heat that had nothing to do with the night air.

“Relax,” he murmured, voice velvet soft against my ear. “You’ll scare off all the fish.”

“I’m not worried about the fish,” I shot back, trying for bravado but hearing the tremor in my own voice. “I’m worried that we’re going to get arrested.”

He laughed again, the sound dangerous, thrilling, and filled with wicked promise. “Don’t worry, angel. I’ll protect you.”

Then he hooked his arms around my waist and lifted me off the lake floor. My legs floated in the water, finding their way around his hips, seemingly of their own accord. A shiver rippled through me, drawing out a quiet moan when my swollen cock slid between the hard ridges of his abs.

“Promises, promises,” I murmured, leaning in to rub our lips together. “You got me in the water. What now?”

“That is the question, isn’t it?” he countered, pretending to consider his options. “What am I going to do with you?”

Winding my arms around his neck, I arched into him, a smirk playing over my mouth. “Anything you want.”

The invitation hung between us, the silence stretching, pulling taut with anticipation. The night itself seemed to hold its breath as it closed in around us, watching…waiting.

And like me, eager to see what would happen next.