Page 131 of Last Shot

He picked her up, wrapping her legs around his waist, and stood, his teeth sinking into her neck as he growled, ‘You never listen.’

‘Your bed better be that fucking coffee table or I swear to—’

His mouth caged her flimsy protest, their tongues fighting against each other. Even kissing was an argument, but one she didn’t care about winning, as long as they could fight like this forever.

The bed was in the room she’d tried not to look in lest she humanise the evil beast who’d locked her in his cottage. And this time, she cared even less. There was a mattress, that much she knew as she fell against it, Grey pulling off her shorts and underwear before she could register she was no longer vertical. The earth could have started spinning in the other direction and she wouldn’t have noticed because he was kissing the inside of her thighs, marking her as his, even if he didn’t know it.

‘I love you,’ he said again. ‘It makes no fucking sense, but I love you.’

That was when she realised if his heart hadn’t been broken by Frankie and Giovanni’s secret, it might not have ever been in the right shape for her own jagged one to fit against. Their broken pieces fit together in a way they wouldn’t if they were whole.

‘I love you too,’ she said, her fingers in his hair, her heart fractured, splintered but beating stronger than it ever had.

He snapped the condom on, her body seething at the absence of his touch. She watched him – Greyson Hawke, untethered, uncontrolled, completely hers – drinking him in like expensive wine she’d been forbidden from tasting properly until now.

‘Don’t get me wrong,’ he said as he tilted his head, watching her wanting him. ‘I still want to fuck you over the kitchen bench. But I also want this.’ He kneeled between her legs like he was bowing before an altar. His hands splayed her thighs apart, rough thumbs rubbing circles over her hip bones. ‘Do you want this, Max?’

She caught the vulnerability in his question.

Do you want a life here with me?

‘When will you learn,’ she said, ‘to stop asking stupid questions you already know the answers to?’

The corner of his mouth twitched, a crack of sunlight through his dark, drawn shades. She knew that full sun was just for her; she conjured it, she wielded it.

This time, she guided him in, pulling him down so their hands intertwined above her head, crucifying their bodies together. He thrust in slow, long movements, filling her and breaking her apart at the same time.

The moment before she came she had one final, coherent thought before her mind was obliterated: there were no plans, no plots, no storylines other than the two of them – the main characters in each other’s lives. This moment was theirs only.

46

Grey

The drive down the dark, windy roads of Bindi Bindi Cove, through Bunbury and back to Perth, felt a million times shorter this time. Grey wished the entire world could stay like this, just him and Max in Bessy’s front seats.

But even though he was changing his ways, duty would always call. He just hoped that maybe the same duty might call them both.

Max’s phone had been dead most of the night; she’d been too distracted to charge it, which pleased him, but what wasn’t pleasing him were the monstrous sounds it was now making as it charged through the USB port – screaming with texts and voicemails like a newborn baby that had just woken up.

‘If that’s your boyfriend who keeps texting you, can you please give him a detailed itinerary of everything that happened in my bed last night?’

‘Sure.’ She unhooked the phone from the charging dock. ‘Is “faked orgasm” two separate words or hyphenated?’

‘I’m going to spend the rest of my life trying to work out if you’re lying or not.’

The phone continued to beep.

‘Seriously, does he—’

‘It’s Nella, and missed calls from a random number.’

‘What’s Nella saying?’ He gripped the wheel tighter. Even though he’d spoken to the Barbarani siblings virtually every day of his life, ever since the gala, Grey felt like he was talking about completely different people when he mentioned them now. He was sure it would change, and the new versions of Nella, Tom and Luca, his half siblings, would emerge from the murky sludge in his mind, the same shapes, with only a few edges shifted. A new version of normal would exist.

But right now, it was weird.

‘She literally sends a whole paragraph of text in separate mini sentences.’ Max sighed, squinting at the screen.

Grey cracked his neck. ‘Yeah, she does it so you’ll be compelled to reply out of sheer aggravation.’

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