Christopher’s gaze snaps up from my mouth. He shakes his head quickly and whispers, “No. You’ll stay right here. I’ll go.”
A twig snaps. We both go quiet and glance toward its sound. The jerks from the other team are poking around the catapult, which they can’t seem to figure out how to maneuver. I wonder if Jamie somehow found a way to compromise it. I hope so. Because now’s my moment.
I try to turn in Christopher’s arms, and he loosens his grip so I’m able to. His touch softens, his hands settle on my shoulders, as I spin and face him.
Reaching up on tiptoe, I press a kiss just below his ear, then whisper, “Go for the jugular.”
Christopher pulls back, eyes narrowed. “Katerina, what—shit!”
I lurch out of his reach and spin, bending to scoop up two paintballs. Adjusting them in my grip like the good old softball days, I rush out into the clearing, sprinting across it and letting out a shrill whoop that makes the bros in black startle and fumble in their bags for their paintballs.
The first ball snaps from my hand and smacks Chad the ringleader right in the—irony of glorious ironies—balls. On a pained groan, he drops to his knees and falls sideways.
The last man on their team stares at me with pure rage, winding up and whipping a ball at me. I dodge it as I sprint farther across the clearing, so he’ll turn as he tracks me and not be able to see Christopher coming up on him.
“Sucker!” I yell, hopping a rock in my path. My ankle wobbles, and I stumble forward, but I wrench myself upright back into a sprint.
He’s tracking me, winding up again as I run, before he snaps a ball that I try to dodge but which nails me on my chest, right over my heart. I groan and throw my head back in frustration. When a ball strikes me again, my groan morphs to a shocked gasp, though I shouldn’t be surprised. The rules say you stop when your opponent’s hit, but of course he’s thrown another ball, aiming for my face.
The jerk reaches into his satchel and grips a new ball as he growls, prowling toward me, winding up, “You fucking cu—”
A paintball splats right into his windpipe, making him go wide-eyed and gape like a fish as he stumbles back, the ball falling from his hand.
Slowly, I turn my head.
Christopher stands at the edge of the trees, and our gazes lock. The world dims around me, a peripheral blur of the bros in black stalking off, until all I see is Christopher. Jaw tight, chest heaving, standing with me in a little forest of bare paint-splattered branches and dwindling leaves, the last slice of ripe persimmon sun dissolving on the horizon.
As I stare at him, the surge that’s built inside me, flipping breaker after breaker, shutting down reason after reason for why I should pull back from this longing that’s unfurled inside me and protect myself like I always have, for why I shouldn’t crush my mouth to that high-handed, infuriating, sweet-talking, shamelessly flirtatious, hot-as-hell-in-skintight-green-coveralls pain in my ass, blows my resolve into a shower of white-hot sparks that rocket through my limbs, urging me to move.
I take one step toward him.
And then another.
And then I run.
? TWENTY-FOUR ?
Christopher
I watch Kate run toward me, her feet pounding into the dirt as fast as my heart pounds in my chest. For so long, I’ve denied myself this—the pleasure of watching her, the thrill of admiring her, the ache of longing for her.
But not anymore.
Surrendered, free from the last of my resistance, I drink her in as she barrels toward me, beautiful and wild, splattered in paint, ribbons of chestnut hair flying out of their messy knot in the whipping wind.
I take a step toward her. Then another. Long, fast, then faster strides eating up the earth, and fuck, my heart, it feels like for the first time it’s stretched its arms, drawn in starved-for air, and roared out joy.
We’re three paces away from each other.
Two.
One.
She leaps onto me, scaling me like a tree, and our mouths crash, knocking teeth, rough exhales as I clasp her face in one hand and slide the other around her thigh, over her ass, wrenching her close.
“Christopher,” she gasps, threading her hands through my hair, arching against me.
It’s frantic and fevered, not so much a kiss as a consuming, mouths hot and hungry.
“Kate,” I groan, unleashing myself on her, no finesse, nothing I’ve practiced and perfected guiding my mouth or my hands. As I tip my head and take our kiss deeper, her legs tighten around my waist. Her heels dig into my ass, and her fingers claw through my hair. I’m so hard, every brush of her body against mine is sweet, terrible torture. I need her so badly, nails raking down my back, teeth grazing my skin, hoarse, sharp cries as I lose myself in her.
Air rushes out of me as Kate rocks her hips with mine. I crush her closer, moving her tighter over me.
“Yeah.” She nods, grabbing a fistful of my coveralls and pulling me in for another bruising kiss. “More.”
My hand leaves her face, drifts down her chest, molding over her breast, palming it. I find her tight, hard nipple and rub it as she pants into my mouth. When I try to tug at the buttons of her coveralls, rip them open, my grip slips on paint, reminding me what she did—how recklessly she ran into danger.
I don’t care that it was just paintball, a few splatters of biodegradable material striking her skin. Those fuckers had it in for her and she knew it. She put herself right in their line of fire anyway. My anger rushes back, as red as the paint smearing my hand—rage and frustration and fear braided in my blood. I walk us back to the nearest tree and pin her against it. “Don’t run off on me like that, straight into harm, Katerina. Don’t ever do that again.”
“That wasn’t harm,” she pants, working herself against me, head thrown back against the tree, eyes shut.
“It was,” I growl, nipping her neck, dragging my tongue up her throat, tasting her, breathing her in as I punish her with my hips, rutting against her, then pulling back, holding myself away, my hands hard at her waist, denying her what she wants. “Kate, when you’re in danger, listen to me. Let me protect you.”
She plants her feet against the tree, leans into the trunk, and shoves, making me stumble back, hurtling us backward until I land against another tree. Tightening her thighs around my waist again, she straightens her spine, until she’s half a head above me, her hands cupping my face.
I stare up at her, helpless, hopeless, lost in those stormy eyes peering down at me, flashing like lightning as she drifts her fingertips down my cheekbones, dancing them along my jaw. “I was fine,” she murmurs. “I’m fine right now.”
“Dammit,” I growl, craning up, kissing her, squeezing the sweet curve of her ass, dragging my hands up her back. “Tell me what it’ll take. I’ll beg, Kate. Anything. Just don’t scare me like that, stop running headlong into danger.”
“I’m safe,” she whispers. “You don’t need to worry.” Setting her teeth on my bottom lip, she gently bites. “I got hit by two biodegradable paintballs. That’s it.”
I swear against her mouth, lightheaded with need as I drag her closer, crushing my mouth to hers. “It’s still unacceptable.”
She laughs as we break our kiss. “You’re ridiculous.”
“You’re impossible,” I groan, cupping her neck, slipping my fingers into her sweat-soaked hair, tangling with those wild locks knotted high on her head. “God, I can’t stop. I can’t stop and—”
And I’ve tried, I almost tell her. I’ve tried for so long.
She searches my eyes, perplexed, serious. Her thumb sweeps along my temple to my cheekbone, gentle and reflective. “What is it?” Leaning close, lowering her mouth to a breath away from mine, she whispers, “Tell me.”
My hands travel gently up her back, tucking her closer. I draw in a breath, my heart pounding, searching for the bravery to unburden myself. “I—”
“We WON!” Bea’s voice pierces the air.
More voices whoop and yell. Feet pound toward us.