Renegade (27 page)

He pulled back too quickly and glanced at the door. “Gran’s making you breakfast,” he explained.

I pushed back the covers to immediately have them flipped back over me. I felt my eyebrows travel up my forehead. “Didn’t you just tell me to get up?”

“No, I said we didn’t have much time.” He lowered himself onto the side of the bed and I scooted over to make more room. “But I think we have time for presents.”

“Presents!” I exclaimed.

He grinned.

“But I already have this,” I said, picking up the rose again and holding it against me.

“Give me your hand,”

“Which one?”

He looked confused so I took pity on him and thrust my right one out. He took my hand with his left one and then with his right he slid something over my middle finger. I smiled and pulled my hand back. It was a super slim silver ring, a thin band with a silver U in the center. I looked at him, puzzled, not really sure what the U meant.

He chuckled and pulled my hand back, sliding something else onto the same finger. Then I pulled my hand back. It was another ring identical to the first but instead of a U there was a silver heart.

I looked up at Sam and smiled.

“One more,” he said, and I gave him my hand as he slid yet another ring on top of the other two.

This one was the letter I.

I pulled it back and stared down at my hands. I “heart” U.

I love you.

Three perfect silver stacking rings that spelled out the words I would never hear enough from him.

“It’s too much,” I protested even though I had no earthly intention of giving back any of them.

He smiled. “You like it?”

“Are you serious?” I asked, looking down at them. “They’re beautiful.”

“I thought you could use something from me that probably wasn’t some key to some ancient thing we were going to go through hell for.”

“I love that bracelet too.”

“It was nice. Until every demon within a thousand-mile radius started chasing us around for the key.”

I grinned. “Did you buy this from some woman on the street?” I teased, thinking of the way he met Gemma.

He made a cross sign over his heart with his finger. “Cross my heart, it came from the mall.”

I laughed. “You went to the
mall
for me?” Sam hated the mall.

He grimaced and then nodded.

I reached out and pulled him to me, leaning back against the pillows and flexing my fingers against his head, kissing him, and nipping at his bottom lip with my teeth. He groaned and I kissed him deeper, letting our tongues tangle and our lips mingle. I had only been awake for five minutes and this was already the best birthday of my life.

It’s going to get better.
He answered my thought as he kissed me, and I playfully bit at him for hearing it when I wasn’t directing it at him.

Gran began calling for us, saying something about breakfast, but I could hardly make out what she was saying because I heard all the thoughts running through Sam’s head. I felt my cheeks heat as a particularly seductive thought traveled through is brain and made its way into mine.

Sam!

His chest rose and fell with a silent laugh, but his lips never left mine, and his hands… his hands began to travel to places that only his hands had been.

He groaned and I knew he heard that thought as well.

I’m the only,
he told me as he ran his hand higher, beneath my tank, until his rough skin brushed against my smooth, secret skin.

I made a sound of agreement and then he pulled back, pressing a kiss to my nose and taking a deep breath.
Sometimes I miss my apartment.

It is hard to get alone time here.

As if to prove the point Gran yelled up the stairs again.

I giggled.

Sam rolled off me and I admired my ring again before bouncing out of bed and pulling on some sweats over my tank and shorts. “I’ll shower after we eat.”

Sam nodded and I followed him from the room, taking my rose with me, smiling. On my way out the door, I caught a glimpse at the calendar on the desk. This year we were celebrating on the actual day I was born.

A day that wasn’t just my birthday.

It was also Halloween.

Chapter Fourteen

Riley

Something warm and heavy settled over my face. It seemed to jerk me out of the void that swallowed me whole. There was a presence very near, hovering over me, and whatever was on my face made it so I couldn’t see.

My arms shot out, gripping the demon that thought it had me, and I rolled, putting myself on top—putting myself at the advantage.

But my movements came to easy. Pushing through that thick sludge should be much harder. When I moved whatever was shielding my vision fell away and I blinked against my clearing sight. I’d expected to see nothing but darkness. I expected to see a demon licking its chops, thinking I was a meal.

I hadn’t expected Ana.

Her face was skewed with fear as her fingernails bit into my shoulders as my weight pinned her to the mattress.

“What the hell?” I muttered, looking around.

I was in a bed. A very large bed draped in white. It had white curtain things hanging around it and the very large, open window on the other side of the room let in a breeze that teased the curtains.

Ana made a small sound beneath me and my attention went back to her. She was completely beneath me. I wasn’t wearing a shirt and the sheets were tangled around my waist.

I might be able to get used to this.

“Riley,” Ana said, her voice breathless. “I can’t breathe.”

“Breathing is overrated,” I said and brushed a blond strand of hair from her face.

What the hell was I doing? Acting like Cole, that’s what.

I rolled off her, back over onto the pillow that bore the indent of my head. Ana slid out of the bed and returned to a chair that was pulled up as close to the mattress as she could get it. Something cold had me shifting, and I reached under me and pulled out a wet washcloth and stared at it. Ana reached out and took it from me, returning it to a large white bowl filled with water sitting on the table beside the bed.

Had she been washing my face? Is that what I felt?

Something in my chest tightened.

“Do you remember what happened, Riley?”

I thought back to the last memory I had.
Pain so great I couldn’t feel my limbs and being swallowed by the dark, ominous sludge in hell. Wondering if anyone would even care to find me.

I glanced at Ana. She was watching me intently. “How did I get here?”

“The Devourer brought you.” She explained. “He flew up to the house and dropped you in the grass.”

The Devourer?

“You were covered in that black oily stuff and so was he. For a minute…” she said and her voice dropped to a hoarse whisper. “For a minute I thought you were dead.”

She glanced away and I swear I caught the shimmer of unshed tears and my heart slowed to a lethargic beat. Thump… thump… thump.
Would she care if I died? Would she have wondered where I was if the dragon hadn’t found me?

“Ana?”

Her eyes lifted and she smiled. “Sorry. It was hard to see you that way.” She busied herself wringing out the towel in the bowl and gripping it in both hands.

“I couldn’t get you inside so I brewed some of the tea and poured it down your throat outside. It seemed to heal you enough that you were able to help get yourself in here, but once you hit the bed you passed out again.”

I glanced down at myself—not a mark on me and no trace of the black sludge anywhere.

“I gave you some more tea and you’ve been sleeping ever since.”

I leaned back on the pillows to think. Leviathan’s demons must have done more damage to me than the first time he broke my back. Or maybe I did the damage trying to get here. I hadn’t thought I was going to make it. I was shocked the Devourer pulled me out of the water like that. I was shocked he would do anything to help me.

I guess I wouldn’t be referring to him as an overgrown bird anymore.

“Riley?” Ana’s soft voice cut into my thoughts. I turned my head to look at her. In that moment I wondered how many ugly people God had to create because he used up all his beauty creating her.

“Hmmm?”

“What happened to you?” She reached up cautiously with the cloth in her hand, watching me, trying to gauge my reaction. When I didn’t move—in fact, I barely breathed—she continued slowly pushing the wet hair off my forehead and using the cloth to wipe my brow.

I closed my eyes for a minute, enjoying the way her hands felt moving over my skin and brushing through my hair. And then I opened them so I could watch her more.

“Me and a certain Prince of Hell don’t really get along,” I said by way of explanation.

“He did this to you? He… beat you and then threw you into that stuff?” Her hand had come down to rest in that place between my collarbone and my shoulder, slightly gripping the skin there.

Her hands were warm.

Without thought, I reached my hand up and covered hers.

“I was trying to get here. That’s why I was in the water.”

With the hand I wasn’t holding, she tossed the cloth back into the bowl and then laid her free hand on the bed between us. “I’m glad you made it.”

“Yeah. Thanks for taking care of me.”

We sat there not speaking, listening to nothing but the sounds of the crashing waves outside and staring at each other through the fading light of day.

“How long have I been here?” I asked, finally breaking the silence.