Page 45 of Riot

“Fine. It was incredible. You broke me. Happy?”

“Very.” He pressed a kiss to my jaw then pulled out carefully. The emptiness made me wince slightly, but he was already moving, heading into the bathroom then returning with something in his hand.

A warm, damp cloth wiped gently across my stomach, cleaning me up with a tenderness that made my eyes sting. He wiped himself down, tossed the cloth toward the general direction of the bathroom, and gathered me against his chest.

Rolling onto his side, he arranged us so my head rested on his shoulder and his arm wrapped around my waist. The bite mark on my shoulder throbbed, but it was a good ache. The kind that would remind me of this moment every time I moved.

“What happens now?” My hand found his, lacing our fingers together.

“Now we sleep.” His thumb traced patterns on my hip. “Tomorrow, we figure out everything else.”

“That’s very vague.”

“That’s very me.”

I laughed against his skin. Outside, somewhere in the clubhouse, a door closed. Voices murmured. The puppy barked once before falling silent. Normal sounds. Pack sounds. A world I’d stumbled into without meaning to and found myself wanting to stay.

“Riot?”

“Hmm?”

“I’m glad you showed up at the laundromat.”

His arm tightened around me. “Me too, unicorn. Me too.”

Chapter Eleven

Calvin

“You got laid,” Niles said in a singsong voice. “I have transcended.”

“What?” I laughed off his statement, heading into my bedroom with a towel around my waist. Riot had dropped me off an hour ago so I could get ready for work.

My reflection in the mirror showed the bite mark on my shoulder. It was already healing, two holes that looked as if I’d been bitten a week ago instead of last night.

“I know a freshly laid voice when I hear one, baby bird,” Niles said on the other end of the phone. “Your biker boyfriend knocked the crooked out of your back.”

I felt myself blush. “You’re delusional.”

Niles snorted. “Honey, I’ve been delusional since childhood. Doesn’t make me wrong.”

A noise came from somewhere in the house. Faint. A creak of floorboards settling or a door shifting in its frame. Pulling the phone away from my ear, I listened. Nothing followed. The house settled back into its usual quiet, the kind that came when everyone was either gone or still asleep.

“Calvin? You there?”

“Yeah.” I shook off the unease and crossed to my dresser. “Just heard something. Probably Ramos being a creeper.”

“Your brother home?”

“Stop thirsting.” Pulling open a drawer, I grabbed a pair of jeans, underwear, and a T-shirt. The phone stayed wedged between my ear and shoulder while I dressed. “You are not coming over.”

“Not when he has Miguel with him.”

My skin crawled just hearing his name. I thought about the way he always looked at me, the way he seemed to circle me like he was trapping prey, and my stomach turned.

Niles made a sympathetic noise. “You should move out.”

“With what money?” Socks came next then my sneakers. The familiar weight of them grounded me. “Unless you’re offering me a room in that fancy apartment of yours. I’ll hide in a cupboard if your father stops by.”