The Divide (The Divide Series Book 1) (19 page)

He shrugged his shoulders. “That way we won’t get in each other’s space.”

“Got it,” I mumbled as my eyes closed.

“Go to sleep,” Gregory murmured somewhere next to me.

I ignored him as the dream world slipped me away from reality.

Tingles of warm air caressed the back of my neck, so I leaned in closer toward the body heat behind me, the arm around my waist tightening. When I moved, my shirt raised a little bit, exposing my midriff, and I felt a calloused finger making tiny circles on my stomach, causing goose bumps to attack my body. I felt the muscled chest behind me breathe in and out, our breathing mirroring each other’s. At one point, I swear I felt a pair of lips press against my neck. I was comfortable; too comfortable. 

I didn’t want to wake up from this cozy dream and go back to my reality. I wanted to stay in this person’s arms and wanted to forget my life and forget the people who were after me. The fingers stopped playing circles on my stomach, and the large palm dragged across my stomach until it reached the other side, pulling me in even closer until my body mashed with his. My eyes popped open. The room was still dark, but some light shined through the cracks of the curtains. I peeked down at my waist—
yup, it was definitely not a dream
—a large arm was wrapped around my waist, and my body was plastered to a very muscular one behind me. A very muscular body I shouldn’t have been up against. I tried to swallow, but there seemed to be something stuck in my throat. I was positive we’d fallen asleep with both duffel bags in between us. What had happened to them?

The vital question remained: how would I get myself out of his arms?
But do I really want to
? I’d slept much better last night than I had my whole life. It had to have been because I was over exhausted—nothing to do with the large Neanderthal behind me. I shouldn’t have been cuddled up with some guy because I was technically “engaged” to Tyler. That was if he was still alive. My heart panged at the thought of Tyler; I hadn’t thought of him since the library. I wondered if he was okay and hoped he’d made it out. There was no need to be mad at him about what had happened; he'd apologized. Instead of running away to make sure I lived, I should have been planning a future with him. Thinking of Tyler made me wonder if there would ever be a time when I could go back home, to pick up where I had left off. My father had made an excellent choice by choosing Tyler to be my husband; he was a natural-born leader, and I’d had a crush on him for a long time. We could be happy.
Yet I’d have to be okay with becoming friends with Mandy and Sarah.
The upside though was if Tyler was to become the Leader, I would be able to do what I wanted, and I wanted to teach, to help others. 

Fingers gripped into my flesh, erasing all thoughts of Tyler out of my mind. My heart raced and my skin tingled as Gregory started slowly moving his hand back and forth—caressing my stomach—his fingers slowly moving up and down. A gasp escaped before I could stop it and Gregory’s hand stopped at once, I could feel his body stiffen behind me. He moved his hand up and away from me, and I felt the bed dip as he rolled over and off of it. I watched his silhouette as he strode to the bathroom, and had to squint at the blinding light Gregory turned on until he closed the bathroom door behind him. A few seconds later, the shower turned on. I already missed the warmth of his body.
No, no I don’t.
 

Shaking my head, I heaved myself out of the bed. Scrounging on the floor, I found the missing duffel bags on Gregory's side; sometime in the night he must have moved them. I grabbed mine and took out the items I needed for the day. I was dressed and brushing my hair when he finally emerge out of the bathroom. His dark, chocolate-brown hair was dripping water onto his shirt.

“Good morning,” I said. “Why did you take another shower? You took one last night.”

He scratched the back of his neck and mumbled something about needing a cold shower. I raised a brow but didn’t comment. He went to the side of the bed, sat down, and started putting on his black boots. “We should get something to eat. And try to find anything useful while we’re at it.”

I nodded. “That sounds good. Listen, Gregory, I wan—”

“We should get going,” he said, cutting me off. Getting up from the bed, Gregory walked toward the door. I closed my eyes and counted to ten to calm the irritation rising within me. I opened them and glared at his back but quickly smoothed my features when he turned toward me.  

“Should we bring anything?”

“Leave the duffel bags, but bring your purse and backpack just in case we can’t come back to the room,” he said.

I grabbed my bags and followed Gregory out the door. We walked in silence on the way to breakfast. Few people were out, and each person we saw seemed to be in some type of hurry.

I followed Gregory into a small decaying building: tables and chairs took up most of the floor space. Toward the back, a door swung opened and closed after someone with a tray of food went through. Gregory asked one of the waitresses for a small private booth near the back, and we followed her to the back and sat down. After we looked through the small menu and ordered our food and drinks, the waitress took our menus away and walked to the back room. An awkward silence fell between Gregory and me. He was looking everywhere but at me.

“Gregory, is something wrong?” I asked. I snaked the loose hairs behind my ears.

He gave me a calculated look. “No. There aren’t many people here yet.”

“What time is it?” I looked around. There were only four other people in the place. I’d been too preoccupied by the smell of food to notice it as we walked in. The place was practically empty. 

“Around seven,” he said.

“Where is everyone?”

“I don’t know. Maybe work.”

“People work this early?” I hated going to school this early.

He gave me an annoyed look. “Yes,
princess
, people work this early. Sometimes even earlier than this.”

I glared at him. Back to the nicknames. “I didn’t know. I still have a lot to learn. I’m still new at this.”

“Hopefully not for long,” he said, once again looking everywhere but at me.

I looked down at the frayed yellow placemat. My finger scratched against the placemat, as I tried to ignore the way I wanted to stab him with the fork that lay in front of my hand. It felt wrong to constantly think of ways to hurt him, but then he’d open his mouth and that feeling would go away. As I propped my elbow on the table, I cradled my head in my hand and wondered what could be up Gregory's ass today; was it a stick? A metal pole? Maybe I could ask him and start a fight; I really wanted to start a fight with someone. 

Food entered my vision, and my stomach growled hungerily. Food was the only thing that made my happy—it would always make me happy. People talked about how they couldn’t wait to meet their soul mate, but I already had one: food. I truly believed food was my soul mate. We ate in silence, which was nice. I stopped thinking of ways I wanted to fork him and thought more about wanting to get to know him. My mind liked to flip-flop when it came to how I felt about him. But maybe if I had known him better, I wouldn’t have wanted to plot ways to hurt him when he opened his mouth. I barely knew anything about him and I wanted to know what his friends were like, what he thought of his job, if he had a girlfriend. Strictly for educational purposes. Not for any other reason. Also, I wanted to know what it was like to grow up in his family. What kind of future did he have? Would he ever get married? Was he a good leader? What would it be like to kiss him? My fork dropped to my plate as I choked on my food. Gregory cocked a brow but then returned to eating. I coughed a few times, tears pricking at the corners of my eyes, trying to unstick the food that was currently holding up residence in my throat. Gregory leaned over and thumped me hard on the back, which helped free the trapped food. Swallowing, I grabbed my water and chugged it down. After I was finished, I set the cup down and looked around; watching as a few more people filtered in the shop.

I glared at Gregory. “You didn’t have to smack me that hard.” He just shrugged his shoulders and continued eating. Conversations started to rise as more and more people trickled in. It appeared Gregory and I had come in at the right time, as the place started to fill up. An elderly couple sat down next to us, the wife smiling warmly at me. Returning the smile, I turned my attention back to a sullen-looking Gregory. “What is wro—” My voice died down as I listened to the couple’s conversation. My spine straightened and Gregory’s face turned serious.

“Supposedly the daughter is missing,” the older man said.

“Hopefully she got out before everything went down,” the woman said. “Or she’s already dead like her mother, so she won’t have to face those men.”

My heart stopped and then immediately picked back up at a run. My mother was dead. I could feel the blood drain from face and roar in my ears. I stared at the couple and ignored the burning holes Gregory's eyes were making; I couldn't turn my attention away from the older couple. 

“I heard after they captured Leader Cowan, he tried to offer her life so he could live,” the man said, shaking his head. “That whole place is gone. It’s been taken over by—what did they call them? Oh, that’s right. Rebels. They’re trying to command the other regions, but, of course, the Ambassadors are fighting against them. I wonder what will happen now.”

My hands shook. My chin trembled. I blinked back tears as they started to rush in; I didn’t want to make a scene.
My own father offered me up?
I looked down at my placemat.
Why would he offer me up?
A tear broke loose and slowly slid down my face like a funeral march. A large hand grabbed mine and pulled me out of the chair. Gregory threw money on the table and pulled me out of the restaurant. We were halfway down the road toward the inn when I had to stop. I couldn’t breathe. I tried gulping down air, but my lungs wouldn’t work. The world tilted and my stomach churned. It felt like a hand had shoved through my chest and was twisting my heart. I couldn’t breathe. I put my hands on my knees and tried to suck in some air. Nothing. Gregory squeezed my hand and pulled me into an empty alley.

“Breathe,” he said. He put his hands on my shoulders.

“I…I can’t.” I gulped at the air. My heart was pounding like a freight train. The world tilted even further as the dizziness swooped in.

Gregory lifted my head and cradled my face. “Mia, breathe in.”

“I…I can’t,” I said. Tears formed in my eyes, blurring my vision.

“Yes you can,” he said. “Breathe in.”

I shook my head, a tear breaking loose and marching solemnly down my cheek. Something flitted across Gregory’s face before he drew my face to him, and our lips touched. His lips were soft and smooth as they moved against mine. Closing my eyes, my lips started moving along with his. He’d kissed me. He’d really kissed me. And it was nothing like the kiss I’d had with Tyler. This was so much better. This was a firework kiss. Lightness exploded in my body and overpowered the darkness. In that moment, I forgot about the conversation and my father, I forgot about my mother, I forgot I was running for my life. In that moment, I could only think of Gregory and what he tasted like: chocolate tangled with maple syrup. I grabbed hold of the collar of his jacket and hauled him closer, and kissed him back. Harder. Right now he was my air, and I needed it all. He pushed me up against the wall in the alley. We were body-to-body, lips-to-lips, yet I still felt we weren’t close enough. A yell broke out and we tore apart. Slowly, I opened my eyes. Gregory and I sucked in air, trying to catch our breaths. He lay his forehead against mine, his eyes still closed. I wanted more. I wanted to drown in him.

“Umm…” He had to clear his throat a few times before he lifted his head off mine. “We should get back to the inn. Figure out what to do next.”

I just nodded my head, because I couldn’t find my voice to say anything. I shouldn’t have kissed him. He shouldn’t have kissed me. I definitely shouldn’t have felt the way I had. Closing my eyes, I put our kiss in a box at the back of my mind with a lock and a key; I would go over that when I was alone and not running. Gregory started striding down the alley, but I just stood there. The conversation at breakfast came back to me. “How could he do that?” I asked.

Gregory stopped and turned toward me, confusion written on his face. “What?”

“How could my own father offer me up like some worthless animal, so he could live?” I started to get angry. “Parents are supposed to protect their children, not offer them up for slaughter.”

Gregory walked back toward me. “Mia, we should ge—”

“How could he be so cruel?” I asked. My hands shook, and my nostrils flared. My heart pounded painfully against my chest. “How could he let his wife drink so much to the point where she didn’t care about her children? How could he feel justified in beating his child until she’s limp on the ground? How could he cause so much grief for a child who is supposed to be having the time of her life? How could he ruin Lorburn?” I was so angry. Everything I went through, living in that house, hit me in full force. I should have never cowered to him—I should have given it back somehow. Escape should have been my only priority. And Gregory was right, my father might have actually killed my sister and instead of listening to Gregory, I got angry at him. He probably had killed my sister. My father was a monster. And there was no way in hell I would offer myself up for him.