Page 23 of Walking in Darkness

His big body curled around mine as he began to move. He watched over me the entire time, our eyes locked, our souls hinged.

I swore that I could feel myself glow. Swore that I could see it reflected in his eyes. Flames that leaped and lapped. And when the orgasm tore through me, shooting me to the greatest heights, beyond the realms that we knew, there was only Pax and me.

Lost to a place that existed only for us.

Our match, something beyond my comprehension.

It didn’t matter, since what I understood was him.

Chest heaving for breath, he slumped down, though he immediately rolled us so he was on his back, and I was draped over him. A soft giggle got free. “So, I think you were totally wrong earlier. I thinkthatis the best way to wake up.”

Amusement vibrated through him, and he curled his arms around me as a smile spread across his mouth.

Joy.

Even in the middle of everything we were going through, I still felt it wrap us whole.

Then he bucked up, the playfulness resurfacing, jostling me against him. “Go get yourself a shower; then we’ll eat.”

“So bossy,” I told him as I rolled away, slanting him a teasing smile.

He sat up, so intimidatingly beautiful in the middle of the bed. “Just taking care of my princess.”

“Fine, just as long as you remember my favorite way of waking up.”

His chuckle was dark as he raked his fingers through the crop of white hair on his head. “You think you’re going to find me complaining?”

Heat flushing my skin and a tiny grin threatening my mouth, I slipped off the side of the bed, taking the top sheet with me, and dipped into the bathroom.

I showered quickly. It seemed ridiculous that I had a smile plastered to my face the entire time, but I wasn’t going to feel guilty for it. As far as I was concerned, we’d earned whatever scraps of happiness we could scrape together.

Once I’d finished, I stepped out and wrapped myself in a towel before I headed back into the main room.

Though I froze when I felt the anxiety gripping the room the second I stepped through the door.

Pax was propped up on the bed, and his head was downturned, all his attention trained on his phone.

“What is it?” I croaked around the tension, not even sure I wanted to know.

Foreboding filled his features when he looked up at me and said, “William is dead.”

Chapter Seven

Pax

“What? How do you know?” Aria begged from where she stood wrapped in a towel outside the bathroom.

In an instant, the bubble we’d been cloaked in earlier popped. Those threads of peace that’d been weaving around us stripped away.

Grief tugged at my insides, but it went so much deeper than that.

It was dread.

The heaviest kind of dread sank down to the pit of my stomach.

“Didn’t know him well,” I told her. “But I knew his last name and his hometown. Couldn’t shake this feeling, so I looked him up.”

I lifted my face so I could fully meet her gaze as I delivered the news. “He died of a drug overdose two nights ago.”