Page 40 of Equilibrium
The way he caressed my skin in the shower, careful not to touch me anywhere I might not have wanted him to, even though I wouldn’t mind, it told me everything I needed to know. Only people who knew what it felt like to be touched without their permission knew how to help when the masks fell off.
And it seemed like he knew. I didn’t know how. I maybe didn’t even want to know, because the pain he must have gone through was more than I could handle right now. There were only so many people I could help in this lifetime, and unlike before, my sister was my priority now.
I knew what a heavy burden it was, even though Maya was older than me. Although it broke my heart, Storm had to come second right now.
I couldn’t handle another broken heart, and saving Maya was a safer option than letting myself fall for him.
I shivered under his hold as the night slowly cascaded upon us, decorating the sky with the bright stars I used to love looking at. The chilly breeze from the ocean tickled the bare skin on my arms, and an involuntary shiver ran through my body, leaving an uncomfortable feeling at the bottom of my spine. For somebody that was technically Russian, I sure hated the cold. I would probably take boiling heat any day over the freezing cold that seeped into your bones until it started hurting.
“Are you cold?” the mountain behind me asked, and even though I stopped shaking and mumbling to myself, he didn’t move away. When he pulled me back into his body, I felt protected, as if nothing and nobody could take me away from here. I just knew it was wrong.
It was just another lie my brain was trying to create. Another unattainable dream I would never reach.
“A little bit,” I whispered. I hated feeling weak, and right now, after everything I went through, right now I was falling apart. My body refused to cooperate with me, my mind even less. Great, Ophelia Aster succumbed to the humane side of herself. I guess I wasn’t a little Satan after all.
“Do you wanna get out of here?”
I almost wanted to laugh because the conversation between the two of us felt strained, and considering I had his dick inside of me today, it shouldn’t have. He kept shielding me from the rest of the people, but I could see Atlas lurking on the right side of us, keeping an eye on both the members that were gathered around the bonfire as well as the two of us.
Indigo, the dark-haired menace Zoe pointed to before—I had no idea how the two of them were even related—slowly walked to Atlas, and would you fucking look at that. He was checking him out.
His eyes lingered on Atlas’s ass for a second too long, before he finally moved toward his shoulders and lastly his face. As if sensing my stare at him, his eyes flickered to me, narrowed and angry, as if I caught him doing something he shouldn’t have. I personally didn’t give a flying fuck who screwed who and who loved who. The Syndicate was very vocal about same-sex relationships and getting caught in one meant expulsion or death.
I just never got it. It wasn’t as if somebody’s sexual preference was going to rub off on you.
However, Indigo looked like he wanted to strangle me and throw my body over the bridge. It was obvious that whatever was going on there, he tried to hide it.
“What are you looking at?”
As soon as he asked, I looked toward the ocean, ignoring the burning stare Indigo was throwing my way. I wasn’t sure if their club was okay with the LGBTQ community, and I wasn’t going to throw anybody under the bus, even though it seemed as if Indigo didn’t want me here.
Hell, I didn’t want me here, but Storm couldn’t take a hint.
“Nothing,” I murmured, burying my face in his neck.
Even though I wanted to run, my body worked against me and all it wanted was to be enveloped in Storm’s heat. These fleeting moments were the ones I was going to cherish forever, because once he figured out the hidden truths and poisonous lies underneath my skin, he was never going to hold me like this again.
I felt like a stage-five clinger, but I didn’t give a shit right now. Blood and war could wait for one day.
The feathery touch of his hand against my cheek and the curious stare on his face, it was as if he was seeing me for the first time. A shiver ran through his body as my lips connected with the soft skin at the bottom of his neck. My tongue darted out, licking the spot from the little indent to his Adam’s apple. My taste buds exploded with the salty flavor of his skin, mixed with spicy remnants of his cologne.
“Sunsh—”
“Let’s get out of here.” I lifted my head, looking into his eyes. I brushed my thumb over the scar running through his eyebrow, remembering what he told me about his father. I guess we both had fucked-up stories to tell.
The intensity of his stare on my face sent a heat pooling between my thighs, but whatever happened between us today couldn’t happen again. I saw the hurt written all over his face when I all but ran away from him once I’d realized what I’d done.
Sex was a powerful weapon, but it wasn’t one I wanted to wield against him.
If I started making a list of pros and cons for Storm, the list of pros would be much bigger than the latter, and that bothered me. I think that a part of me knew I could get lost in the thunderous green eyes if I wanted to, and that scared the living shit out of me.
He’s been back in my life for less than a week and he was already causing havoc that I didn’t want right now. The time was wrong, the life we lived was wrong, and I didn’t even want to go into the list of reasons why we shouldn’t be together.
No, why we couldn’t be together.
“Ophelia,” he murmured as his head lowered down to mine, pressing a soft kiss on my forehead. I fucking hated this kind of affection because I didn’t know what to do with it. I understood that he had monsters of his own; the monsters he probably fought daily just like I did, but the way he behaved with me, it made me feel cherished.
Precious.
