by Jordan Marie
“I figure, I know. Figure I knew before I came here today, Mr. Marshall,” I tell him looking him in the eye at last.
“And yet you’re still here.”
“Yep. I’m still here.”
“I guess we know where one another stands,” he states coolly.
“I guess we do.”
“Dinner is ready!” Luna calls excitedly from the other room. I walk into the dining room behind her father, wishing today was over.
“Everything okay?” Luna asks me quietly as she walks over to me and grabs my hand.
“Yeah, it’s good,” I lie.
“You don’t look like it is,” she mumbles, and I force myself to relax and smile at her.
“Quit worrying, Moonbeam.”
She studies me for a minute, but slowly the tension leaves her.
“I’ll make this up to you, Gavin.”
I look at the beautiful girl who is holding my hand proudly, despite how her father clearly feels about me. If anyone is worth this crap, it’s Luna. I lean down to kiss her cheek and I get rewarded with her blush—and her father clearing his throat.
It’s going to be a long day…
CHAPTER TWENTY SIX
LUNA
Two Months Later
* * *
“I CAN’T BELIEVE you’ve been dating my brother and didn’t tell me.”
“Attie, we didn’t want anyone to know. Not after the mess that happened when we first met.”
“That’s another thing. How can you date a guy that spread shit about you like that, Luna?”
“He says he didn’t do it.”
“And you believed him,” Atticus mocks.
“I do. Gavin wouldn’t lie to me. He cares about me.”
“You’re being naïve. Of the two of us, I know my brother better than you do, and trust me when I tell you, Luna, Gavin will always do whatever he wants, and he doesn’t care who it hurts.”
“That’s not being fair, Attie. I know you and Gavin have issues, but he’s your brother and I just think you—”
“It’s because he’s my brother that I know what kind of person he is. You’ll regret this, Luna.”
“Attie—”
“Is my brother warning you off of me again?” Gavin asks, coming up behind us, and wrapping his arms around me.
He pulls me back into him and kisses my neck. I smile despite the tenseness of the moment. His fingers slide against the chain of the locket he gave me for Christmas. It’s heart shaped and inside is a picture of the two of us that Jules took one evening at her house. Jules has gone above and beyond covering for Gavin and me until we made our relationship public.
We’ve spent more time at her house than anywhere else, but since her parents are out of town almost every weekend, that meant Gavin and I were alone most of the time. Occasionally, the three of us would watch a movie, but that’s it. Jules never invited anyone over because she knew Gavin didn’t want people to know we were dating.
* * *
“I’M NOT WARNING HER, Gav, just telling her the truth,” Atticus says, bringing my attention back to the present. I frown, because fighting with Attie is the last thing I want, even though Gavin warned me it would happen.
“What truth would that be?” Gavin asks, his voice sounding angry.
I hate that this is the atmosphere that Gavin lives in. I hate it for Atticus too. I wish they could see that they’re both really great guys. I don’t have a brother or a sister, but I’ve always wanted one, especially now with things so tense between my parents. I wish I could fix whatever is wrong between these two, but I have the feeling no one can.
“That you don’t care about anyone but yourself.”
“I think Luna knows better than that,” Gavin insists, his voice low. I move my hand back and forth on his arm in silent support. “She trusts me, don’t you, Luna?”
“I do,” I answer without hesitation. If he needs me to tell him that, I will.
“Then, she’s crazy.”
“Maybe I should tell her why she should trust me over you, Atticus,” Gavin warns, and I frown, wondering what he means.
“You might have her fooled right now, Gav, but we both know sooner or later you’re going to lie to her again.”
“I think you better go, Atticus,” I tell him, not liking all of the animosity between them. I get enough of this kind of stress at home right now.
“Sooner or later, Luna, he’s going to hurt you again.”
“Attie—”
“And when he does, I won’t be here to pick up the pieces again,” Atticus threatens.
“I don’t want you to,” I tell him softly, needing to make it clear. “I’ve never asked you to be more than my friend, Attie. I don’t think of you…. I don’t care for you the way you want me to. I never have. I never will,” I add softly, hoping to ease the blow. I keep my voice quiet, hating that it’s all come to this, but not knowing any other way to achieve it. I need to make this clear to Atticus, so he doesn’t think Gavin is what is between us. I don’t want to become a war between brothers.
“Fine,” he says after staring at me for a few minutes. Then, he turns and stomps off.
Jules lets out a long whistle.
“Damn, there’s never a dull minute around you, is there Gavin Lodge?” she asks. Gavin doesn’t answer her. I turn to face him and he’s just staring in the direction his brother left.
“You okay?” I ask Gavin.
“Yeah,” he says, but he sounds anything but.
“I’d say he’s better than Attie. You kind of de-balled him right in front of most of our friends in the lunchroom, Luna.”
“I tried to be gentle.” I sigh, wishing this could have gone differently. I feel guilty.
“Trust me, he doesn’t deserve your guilt, Moonbeam. Besides, if he knew he had it, he’d use it against you. That’s how Atticus works.”
“Gavin, your brother’s not like that, at least not around us,” I tell him, hating everything about this situation.
“Damn I’m suddenly glad I’m an only child,” Jules responds, staring at Gavin.
“You should be,” he answers in a gruff tone.
Yikes.
“I better go check on Attie. He’s a bit of a whining puppy at times, but that was kind of brutal,” Jules says surprising me.
“We still hanging after school tonight?” I ask her, anxious to change the subject.
“Yeah. Mom’s picking us up after seventh period.”
“Sounds good. Love you.”
“Ditto. Later, Gavin.”
“Later,” he says as Jules walks away in the direction that Atticus disappeared to.
“Well, that wasn’t much fun.”
“It sure wasn’t,” Gavin agrees.
“How about we sneak into the gymnasium and make out under the bleachers?” I suggest, needing desperately to erase the dark cloud that seems to have settled over both of us.
“What about our next class?”
“I say we skip it.” I grin up at him feeling brave.
“Luna Marshall, are you trying to be a bad girl?”
“You have no idea how bad,” I respond. “Are you game?” I tease, backing away from him and holding out my hand.
“Lead the way,” he says, threading his fingers through mine, with a grin. The smile doesn’t reach his eyes, but eventually I think I can make that happen.
It’ll be fun to try either way…
CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN
JULES
“What are you doing here?” Atticus barks the minute I walk into the weight room.
Like he didn’t know I’d follow him. Hell, if he wants to be honest with himself, this is why he went to the weight room to begin with. Boys are so stupid. They think with their dicks and it takes forever for their brains to finally catch up.
“I came to check on you, dickhead. Not sure why I bothered.”
“I don’t either, I don’t want you here.”
“Just because Luna shot
you down in front of the whole school, doesn’t mean you have to be a bastard to me, you know.”
“She didn’t shoot me down,” he argues, and I don’t even bother to hide the look on my face. He can’t be that stupid and he can’t expect me to be.
“Dude, she blasted you with a nuclear bomb.”
“She’s just confused.”
“Bullshit. It’s time to man up, Attie. Luna doesn’t want you. She likes what your brother is giving her much more.”
Perhaps I should have watched what I said a little better. I see the anger that comes over Atticus’s face. It shouldn’t excite me—a wiser woman would be scared, but, I like it. He reaches out and grabs me roughly. My arm will have a large bruise on it later and that thrills me too. His hand snakes out and wraps around my throat and he pushes me back against the wall hard.
“Why do you always have to be such a bitch?” he growls.
“It’s a gift,” I tell him, gasping to get the words out and still barely able to because his hold is so tight. I can barely breathe.
“You shouldn’t tease a man, Jules. You may live to regret it.”
“I don’t see a man here,” I mock, knowing I’m pushing him over the edge, but unable to stop myself. I want to see what he does when he loses control. At first, I thought Atticus was fun to tease. Now, I think we may be more alike than I realized.
“Such a damn bitch. Someone should have done something about your smart mouth before now.” His voice rumbles and it feels like it echoes inside of me.
His lips come down hard, crushing against mine, as his tongue thrusts into my mouth. The entire time, his hand is still tight on my throat, holding me into place. I try to fight him, not because I don’t want what he’s doing, but because fighting him excites both of us. My fingers claw into his sides, and I know that I’m drawing blood. He bites my lip in retaliation and pain spreads through my body, making me feel alive. We kiss until we are forced to break apart, our lungs too deprived of air. He steps away from me, wiping my kiss away with the back of his hand. Attie also wipes away the smear of blood there from the wound he made on my lips.
“You’re twisted,” he says, staring at me, his chest heaving as he takes in oxygen.
“Takes one to know one, lover.” I grin at him, licking the blood from his bite.
I walk to him, my body on fire in ways it never has been before. I don’t fully understand it, but I’ve never been the kind of girl that hides from what she wants.
“What are you doing?” he asks, his eyes narrowing as I drop to my knees in front of him.
I reach up and undo the buttons on his jeans and hold his gaze in mine, feeling powerful.
“Showing you what else I can do with my mouth,” I tell him as I work the zipper down and do just that…
CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT
LUNA
“J esus,” Gavin huffs and I feel a little guilty.
I kiss the side of his face and hold him as his breathing slows down.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper lamely. I watch as he closes his eyes. Slowly, he begins to calm and his breathing returns to normal—at least semi-normal.
“You’re going to be the death of me, Luna,” he mutters, but he softens his words with a brief kiss against my forehead. His arm snakes around me, his hand pressing against my arm, and he holds me to him. I can hear his heart beating rapidly against my ear.
“I know it’s lame,” I start, wondering how to explain things to Gavin.
“It’s not lame, Luna.”
“All my friends have had sex. I don’t know why I keep backing out. It’s not you, Gavin, you have to know that. I just…”
“Babe, stop.” He moves us, so that he’s leaning against the bleacher and I’m more on him now instead of the gym floor.
We’re under the bleachers, having skipped class to spend some time together. Things went from innocent kissing and laughing to heavy petting and Gavin stopped things before they went too far. Of course, he stopped them because he could feel me tensing up and withdrawing from his touch.
Because I’m a moron.
“But—”
“But nothing. You’re not ready. I’m not pressuring you, Luna. It will happen when you’re ready.”
“You’re willing to wait for me?”
“I’d wait forever if it meant you were the reward.” His words touch me. Not only because they’re sweet, which they truly are—but, because Gavin means them and that makes my heart swell up with emotion.
“Well, if you wait forever, then there wouldn’t be any time left to claim me,” I point out, trying to lighten the moment as emotion clogs my throat.
“You’re such a freak,” Gavin laughs.
“You like me though,” I murmur looking up at him, secure in that knowledge.
“Definitely,” he returns, bending down to kiss me gently on the lips.
The moment feels so perfect, so special that I can’t hold back any longer.
“Gavin?”
“Luna,” he says with a smile that causes his eyes to crinkle with happiness. He looks so beautiful, so heart-achingly perfect that the words come easier than I ever thought they would.
“Gavin, I think I’m falling in love with you.”
The smile disappears from his face, his eyes heat with a hunger in them that makes me flush. His hand moves against the side of my neck, his fingers caressing my skin.
“I know the feeling, Moonbeam. I love you. I think I always have,” he confesses.
His words wash over me, and my heart rate jumps so quickly that I think I might pass out. I don’t even think, I’m not sure it’s possible. Instead I move so that I slam my lips against his and I kiss him with all of the happiness surging through me right now.
Gavin loves me.
He loves me.
Nothing could be better than this.
Nothing.
CHAPTER TWENTY NINE
GAVIN
“I love you, too,” Luna says when we finally break apart.
“Luna you don’t have to—”
“It’s the truth, Gavin. I love you,” she vows, and I kiss her again. When I feel her hand move down between my legs, rubbing against the denim of my pants, I pull away and suck oxygen back into my lungs—and hopefully my brain.
“Babe, we have to stop. You can’t miss your next class. You said you had a test,” I remind her as her hand presses hard against my erection.
“I could, I mean, well… I could use my hand,” she says blushing.
I pull her hand away, bring it to my lips to kiss her palm.
“Quit worrying about me. It will happen between us when it’s meant to be, Luna. I’m not going anywhere. I promise you. You are more than worth the wait.”
I hear the bell go off for the next class and Luna and I look at each other and frown.
“Shit,” we say in unison, with a dry laugh. We’re definitely going to be late.
I go first, bending down to go through the opening under the bleachers. Our gym has bleachers that fold down and there’s an opening to crawl underneath them and release the levers so they will unfold. They can then slide up straight and latch against the wall of the gym. It’s supposed to be state of art, I think it’s kind of weird. It doesn’t matter, they do have the advantage of hiding you away from others and since that private time includes Luna—I love the damn bleachers. Once I’m standing, I reach down through the opening and grab Luna’s hand, to help pull her out.
“Well look what we have here,” Larry Richards says from behind my back. I look around and the asshole is standing with the rest of his jock friends. There are four of them in total and there’s not a one of these idiots that I like. I think they’re all a waste of air.
“Shit,” Luna mutters under her breath, immediately buttoning up her shirt. I had the first three buttons undone. I turn to face them, blocking her from view, but I know that they’ve already seen the crisp white material of her bra.
“I’d watch what you say from h
ere out,” I warn him.
I don’t want to get in another fight with him, but I’m not about to walk away from another one either. They just suspended me for two days last time. Another fight will mean a longer suspension and also mean my father will have to come in. Since he’s always drunk that won’t go well either.
“I’m not going to say anything.” He moves his shoulders up. “Don’t think I need to. My boys here see the same thing I do.”
“What exactly is it you think they see?”
“Whatever, man,” Larry says with a slick smile that has me curling my hand into a fist. I want to knock it off of his face so much that it hurts.
“If I hear any of you fuckwads are saying one thing about Luna in this school I’ll end you,” I warn them.
“Gavin, let it go,” Luna says quietly, putting her hand on my chest. “They aren’t worth it.”
“Yeah, Lodge, listen to your whore and run away.”
“What did you say?” I growl, my body tense.
“Don’t worry about it. We’re not going to tell anyone. Hell, the whole school is already talking about it anyway.”
“They are not,” Luna argues.
“But they are,” he says. “They can’t understand why you want to keep whoring yourself out to such a loser after all of the shit he said about you. What was it, Gavin? Oh yeah, I remember now. She was dying for it. Begged you to let her suck—”
I don’t let the bastard finish. I launch myself at him, slamming him against the concrete floor and connect my fist with his fucking mouth.
I’ll kill him this time.
CHAPTER THIRTY
LUNA
I scream as Gavin slams on the ground, Larry under him. He grabs Larry’s collar and holds him in place like that, as his fist connects with the jerk’s face. Larry is pushing on him, trying to kick him—hoping to get free. Gavin doesn’t give him an opening. At least until two of Larry’s friends, drag Gavin off him.