Page 66 of Ravage
“Kell, wait. Let me stay to do some more digging. I can’t leave here empty-handed.”
He shakes his head. “Sorry, beautiful. I’d love to trust you, but this isn’t the time to test that.” He swoops forward and grabs me before I can bolt, scooping me in his arms and holding me tightly against him. Even my attempted wiggles to escape are no match for his strength.
Kellan runs me out of the door in the kitchen, going a direction I don’t recognize and through some woods I didn’t even know was in the area. The side of my face is pressed against his chest, so I’m breathing mostly him while we’re moving. All I can breathe, hear, and smell is Kellan.
I keep trying to push, shove, or wriggle against him to find a weak spot in his hold, but we just keep getting further and further from the congressman’s home. “Kell!” I scream to get his attention, muffled as it may be.
He keeps going like he has some destination in mind, and then finally slows when we are deep in the woods. Kellan releases me back to my feet and thankfully catches my wrist before I fall on my ass.
He pulls me in and pushes his finger beneath my chin. It’s apparently become nighttime while I was unconscious, so his eyes are dark as he studies me with more serious intensity than I’m used to.
“Are you sure he didn’t do anything to you?”
I jerk my chin away and step back in an instant before he can read whatever reaction my body might give him. “I told you. I’m fine. You should be more worried with how pissed I am that you guys ruined my plans to get information on him. Are you at least going to share what you find out with me?”
Kellan runs his fingers through his hair. My eyes get caught on the muscle in his arm as it flexes in that movement. “You know we can’t do that. You still need to prove to us that we can trust you.” He catches me looking and smirks when I hurriedly pretend I wasn’t just drooling over his body. “I wish it was as simple as us just working together again, beautiful. Really. But you have some answers to give us still.”
Right.
I scuff my foot against the ground and, when I feel the grass and dirt underfoot, I realize one of my heels is missing. “Shit! Really? And you dropped my shoe?”
He raises one brow at me. “You some kind of fancy girl now?”
“No, you prick. I’m supposed to return them and this dress to get my money back. I only have—” I bite my tongue and look away.
Kell cocks his head and responds with a low rumble of his own. “Only have what? Are you running out of funds, beautiful?”
“You know what? It’s none of your business. Where did you take me anyway? How do you know I won’t just walk back to the estate and still ruin your plans to make it fair?”
He frowns at my refusal, but thankfully lets it go. Then it twists into a grin. “Your sense of direction is still terrible, so I made sure we’re far enough away that I’m not worried. You’re more likely to wander to other neighborhoods than find your way back.” He points to the left. “There’s a bus stop about a mile that way and it’s your closest chance of getting out of these woods. Here.” He pulls out the knife he’d stolen from the kitchen and cuts an arrow pointing up into the bark. It’s not a great job, and the knife is fucked, but I guess I can see it.
I’m not sure why I would need it though, unless it’s too late for buses. “Kell, what time is it?” I ask slowly as realization starts sinking in on what might happen.
“It’s late for this neighborhood.” Kellan stalks around me.
Shit.
“Wait—”
“Sweet dreams, beautiful.”
Knocked out again.
Chapter eighteen
Raegan
“And then I had to walk to the bus stop and take three buses to get back to the city. With one shoe.” I jab my chopsticks into the pork fried rice to break out a chunk that I can shovel into my mouth. “Mm, ma god,” I moan behind my hand and then swallow. “This is so good.”
Portia giggles and leans back in her fluffy purple butterfly chair, her legs crossed while she holds her own container of Chinese food. Her dark brown hair is tied back in a high ponytail, her eyes and cheekbones accentuated with bright orange makeup and glitter, while bubblegum pink tinted lip gloss is smeared over her lips.
She’s wearing only a strappy bralette—which her breasts are fit to burst out of—and shiny but spandex-fitting, orange mini-shorts.
“I told you to come over to eat any time. I can order you some food when I order out at night, too, if you want.”
I’m busy filling my face with the yummy goodness to answer right away and shrug instead. I’m not used to relying on anyone. Thinking of contacting her, or even Elias, is a conscious effort and definitely not my gut reaction. Which is usually what I go with.
Yet, here I am, gabbing away to Portia like we’ve been friends forever now that she’s moved in to Elias’s apartment and the one right next to mine. She’d had some of her friends in the bar pack up her things at her previous apartment so she could make Elias’s modern and monochromatic one feel more like home.
