Page 17 of I Was Born Ruined (Death by Daybreak MC 1)
Only part of that statement's a joke.
“Are you … are you fucking serious?” Amiya asks as I roll my eyes and toss the bag back at her.
“Um, no. I'm about to start my period, and if I am pregnant, it's the second coming of Jesus.”
I stand up as Amiya blinks stupidly at me, grabbing a spare ring off the shore and setting off into the water.
The sun is high and the air is warm, even if I can smell the faintest tinge of smoke in the air from all the fucking forest fires nearby. Sometimes I think about doing something reckless and random, like running off and becoming a volunteer firefighter. If I thought they'd take me at age seventeen, I'd go.
Floating off into the middle of the group, I join some stupid game that's like magical chairs only with loads more drinking. Basically, Johnny R. plays some music from shore and we all float around trying to get close to each other, when he turns it off, we all shove each other into the water. Once everyone's been dethroned, we all try to snag a new ring. Last person in has to paddle their way back to shore and watch.
After a few rounds, it's down to me and Trevone.
We knock each other into the lake at the same time and then both scramble for the nearest black ring so quickly that we end up sitting side by side and laughing our asses off.
It's all fun and goddamn games, until I hear the echo of a bike, bouncing off the water and chilling me to the core.
“One more round?” Trevone asks, raising his eyebrows at me.
“Next time,” I say, pushing off into the water and booking it for shore with long, graceful butterfly strokes. I used to be on the swim team. Before Queenie and Posey were dead and I stopped giving a crap about anything at all. I mean, I hadn't given a lot of crap before that, but after they were gone … life was a void.
I emerge from the water, stumbling and scrambling up the bank before he can get down here.
I just want a normal senior year; I do not need this shit.
“Grainger,” I start when I get into the dry grasses behind the trees, wet and dripping and wearing Dena's stupid suit.
The way he swings himself off his bike and storms toward me, I know I'm in deep shit.
“Don't make a scene,” I growl when he gets close to me, breathing hard, his inked hands curled into fists. His body's so warm, I can feel the heat radiating off of him and into me, twice as scalding as the rays of the sun from above. “Not here. Let me grab my stuff and we'll go.”
“Gave you that chance before, Gidge. Sorry. I'm not falling for it again. Where are your clothes?”
His blue eyes slide down to mine and catch me. Breath hitches, pulse thunders, heart pounds. I'm standing here wanting him at the same moment I'm wishing I could take a blade and plunge it through his chest. And I know—I just know—that all of my classmates are staring at me, watching this bullshit unfold. I’ll be the talk of the school come Monday: I always am.
Swallowing hard, I turn and point at the crumpled pile near the base of a tree. Grainge grabs my wrist, burning us both so badly that he curses and I jump. There’s too much heat for us to touch casually like this, just a stick of dynamite bobbing in a sea of flames. Something’s got to give, and energy like this only leads to one of two things: violence or passion.
With Grainger, it’s usually a little bit of both.
He yanks me over to the pile, bends down and grabs my stuff, shoving it against my chest. My silky red panties fall to the ground near our feet, and I see the man’s jaw clench. There’s a muscle in his tattooed neck that’s ticking with rage. I slip my clothes on as fast as I can, but before I can pick the underwear up, he’s already done it and shoved them into his pocket.
Grainger lifts his umber eyes and meets my red-brown ones.
“Get on the bike, Gidget. That is, if you don't want me to make a scene.”
I stare at him, tall and wide, with moons and stars and suns tattooed down both arms, trailing across his hands and fingers, climbing up his neck. He's thirty-two and about as fucking mature as a ten year old.
“Do you think Cat would make a scene if he knew you'd finger-fucked his seventeen year old daughter in a church today?”
“Bike. Now,” Grainger snarls, nostrils flaring, the smell of warm leather perfuming the air around us. His vest is hot to the touch when I put my fingers on it.
