Death's Dilemma (DHAD #2) (17 page)

“Cendall,” Trevor said again in a husky, silky smooth tone. I could feel my tongue now dancing behind my lips, wanting to taste what was placed before my eyes. And with one last deep breath, I again took in his scent and lunged myself forward, making sure my hands slid along his deep V before they made it to his hips. I felt his towel touch my toes, and my eyes followed suit. Holy shit. What was I supposed to do with that?

“Uhh… I… um,” I said, finally being able to get something to come out of my mouth. I was rambling. Shit! How was I going to make what I did okay? I started to take a step back when he suddenly grabbed my hips and reeled me back in.

“Cendall,” Trevor said once more, pulling my eyes back up to look up at his face. He was breathing heavily. I tried replying but was awestruck by his eyes that seemed to be struggling to hold it together. I just stood there, frozen, trying not to talk or even blink. Being this close to him, and just staring, my eyes wanted to wander back down, but his gaze locked me in place. Since I couldn’t seem to formulate the words to thank him, I let go and let my body do the talking. My cheeks flushed red as my hand found what had been hidden under the towel. He let out a harsh breath as I put my hand around it. I couldn’t help but wonder back to how good he tasted the last time I kissed him. I wonder if that tasted the same. There was no way this thing could possibly fit inside me or my mouth for that matter, but I’d never backed down from a challenge.

My toes were beginning to numb again.
Concentrate, Cendall!
I yelled at myself.
You don’t want to do what you just
— I exhaled a deep breath, and the second the breath left my mouth, my thoughts were halted as I was lifted from the floor, thrown onto the bed, and straddled by him.

He paused for a moment, probably taking in the look of shock on my face because I didn’t know it was possible to be flipped onto a bed that fast. He smiled like a kid walking into Chuck E. Cheese for the first time. I threw my head to the side, feeling embarrassed for some reason, because of the way he was looking at me. He leaned his mouth down to my neck while taking in cool, deep breaths. I could feel him taking the air around us in. He gently licked just under my cheek bone and gave me soft, tiny kisses in the center of my neck. He was driving me insane, making me want to burst and explode. Every single kiss he placed sent a new wave of sensations threw my body.

My mind argued as my heart raced. Was this really happening with Trevor? The Guardian who threatened my life the first day I met him, but saved my life yesterday? I shut my mind off and let my instincts that wanted to taste him take over. My center was craving this. I grabbed the bottom of my shirt and slowly pulled it up over my head. As I revealed inch by inch of my body, he never took his eyes off of me. Once I had it off, his fingertips breezed over my skin, barely touching, but skimming just enough to make my shoulders give way to a shiver. He traced up to my bra straps and took his time sliding them over my shoulders. He then reached behind me, and in a mere second, had the back strap undone. He pulled it away, and I felt heat, again, reach my cheeks. His eyes went wide, and I watched his pupils dilate as he stared down at my exposed chest.

“Are you sure? Just yesterday you were…I almost lost you. I—”

“Yes,” I said, cutting him off. I didn’t want to think about yesterday.

“Once I start, there is no way I’m stopping,” he said as his fingers began to tease my belt line.

“Yes,” I said before my mind even had the chance to process it. I was too wrapped up. The smell, the craving, the yearning, and me finally surrendering, admitting I wanted it—it was all too much. The feeling I was getting right now from his teasing with gentle grinds up and down my body made all the darkness and the emptiness of past feelings flee, for brief seconds, to as they were being replaced by everything that was Trevor.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” he asked one more time with a vulnerability in his tone that said he would keel over and die if I hesitated or changed my mind. I had no idea how, or why, but in this moment, I was absolutely ready for this to happen.

“I’m ready,” I said, finally accepting what I have been waiting to feel for so long now.

We both took a deep breath. He unbuttoned my pants with his right hand, as he made sure to trace his fingertips with his free hand up and down my thighs. He gently tugged at my jeans, taking my panties with them, and slid them down the length of legs. They fell to the floor in a disheveled pile. I lay, for the first time, completely vulnerable, stripped of all defenses beyond what lived inside me. Looking deep into my eyes, he entered me cautiously, letting me take a breath and allowing my body to adjust to him. A shiver racked my entire body, not from being cold but from the utter pleasure of our bodies molding into one, fully connected. I looked at him and felt as if he was staring straight into my soul, binding our minds together as our bodies remained as one. I’d never felt closer to anyone.

***

I nuzzled my face into his chest as I wrapped my arm and leg around his body. Neither of us said a word, just enjoyed the after wave of what had just transpired.

“Trevor, I—” said Catherine as she opened the door that I hadn’t locked behind me. Shit, but I didn’t know. She froze in place at the sight of us. We tried to pull apart, but that was difficult due to me not wanting to show her my goodies. Her face shot red, and if looks could kill, I’d be a goner for sure.

“I KNEW IT,” she screamed before leaving. I let out a nervous laugh, and he followed, surprising me.

“So does that mean you guys are breaking up?” I joked

“You know we haven’t been dating.”

“I know. Trevor I… I’m sorry. I just came in to talk about what… uhhh… happened and….”

“Just stop before you say something that spoils the moment.”

“Ok.” I listened for once in my life to his advice, knowing he was right. Tomorrow, I would come up with great excuses as to why it happened, and why I would never let it happen again. Tonight, however, I was going to stay here, lying until I fell asleep in the arms of the Guardian who’d saved my life.

I awoke alone in the middle of the night. I glanced around the room to look for Trevor, but he wasn’t in sight. I put on my clothes and saw a note tapped to the door.

Didn’t want to wake you.

Got news about a new location.

Went to find out.

See you when I get back.

I took the note off the door and went to my room. I flopped on my bed and stared up at the ceiling. What the hell had that been about? I’d went to say thank you and couldn’t find the words. Instead, I let my body do the talking.

“Shit,” I said out loud. There really wasn’t any fixing this now. I’d taken things to a whole new level of complicated, hadn’t I? But I didn’t do it alone. He wanted it too. How could we make it work from here? I’d have to fix this in the morning. Could we go back to what we were before?

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Lifesaver

“Thank you for saving my life,” I said, and he opened his eyes to look at me. I grabbed a cup of coffee and sat down next to him. His eyebrow rose as a puzzled look spread across his face. “I wanted to tell you that yesterday, but I…got distracted. I don’t know. Just—thank you,” fumbled out of my mouth, but he didn’t flinch. “What?” I asked, not being able to take the glare any longer

“I’m waiting.”

“For what.”

“Your excuse.”

“Excuse for what.”

“What happened last night,” he said as he grabbed my hand, but I pulled mine away. He gave an irritated smirk.

“It’s like that movie we watched. What was it called? Friends with Benefits. We were both very emotional, and things went a little far. Humans do it all the time, I hear, and…” I had no idea what else to say. This was the best lie I’d come up with last night. In truth, I knew things would never be the same again. I knew it would change everything. I would never be able to shake the comfort I’d found in his arms or the look on his face as we became one. The feeling of ease that rolled over my entire being when I finally just let go and let my instincts take over, lose control like they’d wanted to for so long now. But me saying that just would make it all the more complicated. What if he didn’t feel the same? Surely I wasn’t his first, maybe that’s how it always felt, no matter who you were with. Who was I to know?

“So you’re going to fall in love with me, then?”

“WHAT?”I squeaked.

“In the end of that movie, they fall in love. They start off as friends, then they uh...do what we did last night, and in the end, they end up together.” They had, hadn’t they Shit.

“I—”

“What’s wrong with you two?” Lacie said thankfully, saving me from uttering anything else.

“Nothing. Why?”

“I don’t know. You just look weird. Did something happen last night?”

“No,” we said in unison.

“Oh shit! What happened? Was there a Demon attack? Did someone die?”

“No, nothing. Really. We did get our new location, though. We leave tomorrow.”

“That sucks, but I get it. Can I at least say goodbye to Myah today?” Lacie asked me.

“Yeah. I’ll have to come with you though. We’ll drop off Cameron on the way too.”

“What is going to happen? How will we explain it all?” Lacie asked.

“Cameron’s mom was killed during a burglary attack last night, and he walked in on it. The burglars knocked him out but killed his mom. When he wakes up, he’ll call the police.”

“That’s so messed up,” she said.

“Not as much as the real story is.”

“That’s true. Well, I’ll go get changed, and we’ll go?” she asked.

“Yes.” She went back upstairs. I was about to get up when Trevor grabbed my hand again. My breath caught as I looked back and became trapped in his glare. I blinked as my mind gave me a mental picture of what those eyes had looked like over top of me yesterday.

“Listen, we need to talk about what happened last night. Like really talk about it.”

“Fine, but after all of this.”

“Fine.” He let go of my hand and, I went upstairs to wait for Lacie.

“Be careful while you’re out and about. I doubt another Reaper will try and attack once they find the one’s remains, but the quick one got away. Something I plan on changing really soon.” So John was dead, and Eddie had lived. It didn’t worry me a bit. John was the aggressor; Eddie never had the balls to do anything without direction, and without Drake being around, he’d started to take John’s direction, a mistake that would be fatal if I had any decision in the matter. The way he just stared at me as John hit me over and over again, doing nothing, like we hadn’t grown up together. I’d always known John hated me, but I’d once called Eddie a friend.

It was hard to wipe and place memories into Cameron’s mind. Something like this troubled a person for a long time, and most usually never got over it. But the truth wasn’t an option. Myah had been easy. Drake had already cleared her mind after he took her home. We just went over to her house, and Lacie told her we went over to Cameron’s, concerned he wasn’t answering the phone, and found him beaten and passed out. We told her we then called the hospital, and he was there now, resting. All of which was true, for the most part. For our story to work, we did have to take Cameron back to his house. Then, we called the police and the ambulance took him away.

Myah started to cry, and the tears got even worse when Lacie told her that we had to move too. We explained that we just found out today from her parents that they had both been offered and accepted new jobs in California, and we had to leave tomorrow.

“You can’t leave,” she begged.

“We’ll keep in touch. I promise,” Lacie vowed and lied in the same, but it seemed to comfort her. She then made Myah promise to take care of Cameron.

I let out a sigh of relief when we ported back home. It had been an exhausting, draining day. As much as I hated too admit it, Cameron and Myah had grown on me, too. That had been obvious by me saving each of them. The tallies on my Reaper strikes list just kept adding up. Hopefully, in the end, whatever it had in store for me would be worth it. In reality, I just wanted to get moving and get some rest. The past few weeks had been insane, and I needed a break to think. I still hadn’t really found out anything about my mom, just assumptions that she was obviously from the side I’d learned to fight against as a child. We also had no idea why Mobrolantis wanted Lacie so badly, just that he thought she was a part of some prophecy that was suppose to help him finally tip the scale of good and evil. He thought that she would be his ticket back into invading Heaven, since he was the only Demon to date to have accomplished this once already. No matter what happened, I knew I had to keep her from him.

“Ready?” Trevor asked when I opened up my bedroom door and saw him sitting on the bed.

“Sure,” I said as I sat down beside him, and the corner of his mouth tipped up. Heat rose in my face, and I forced myself to look down, not wanting to make eye contact. He caressed the bottom of my chin with his palm, and on instinct, I leaned into the touch. He lifted my head, and my hair fell in front of my face. He tucked it behind my ears, and took a deep breath.

“I’m so glad you can heal yourself.”

“About that, thanks for tricking me.” I meant it.

“I had to, otherwise, Cendall, you were almost gone. Your face was black and blue.” His fingertips traced from my temple and down my cheek. “Your left eye was swollen shut, and you were bleeding everywhere. I could see your abdomen through the cut he placed in your side. I don’t ever want to see you like that again. It was unbearable. And then you couldn’t heal yourself.” He looked away as his hand left my face.

“I know, but I had to, and you didn’t. I’m thankful, but this is why this is a problem. What if Lacie would have been attacked while you were saving me?” Did I really just say that out loud?
Shut up. Shut up. Shut up,
I tried to tell myself, but the words of duty kept flowing. “That’s why, whatever happened last night, can’t happen again. We can’t forget why we’re here, why we were brought together in the first, place.” He ignored my words and put his hands on the side of my head, pulling it into his chest. His heartbeat was racing.