Page 81 of Make Them Cry
Because some part of her still looks at me like I’m more than just a man with a keyboard and a mask.
When we finish, she turns to me and says, “What do we do now?”
I take her empty cup, toss it in the bin, and meet her gaze.
“Now we fight back.”
I should leave.
I should head home. File reports. Sync with Arrow. Anything but stand here in the low light of Riverside, watching River run a hand through that waterfall of blue hair.
But I don’t move.
Because I can’t.
Not when she turns toward me, eyes soft but stormy, like she’s trying to be strong even when everything inside her is spinning out.
I inch closer before either of us says a word. She looks up, chest rising, her bottom lip caught between her teeth.
“I hate that you saw it,” she whispers.
“Saw what?” I ask her, even though I know she’s talking about the video.
“That video. It looked so real, but so… not. I don’t know. It’s like we were together but not. Does that make sense?”
My heart pounds in my chest. “I know what you mean.” The video didn’t look like two people making love, it didn’t even resemble two people who liked each other. It was the worst version of AI one could get away with. “I hate that it exists,”I growl. “That someone thought they could use you like that. Violate you like that.”
Her lashes flutter. “But you still came back.”
I cup her jaw with one hand, my thumb brushing her cheek. “Of course I did.”
She tilts her head. “Why?”
The word lodges somewhere between her vulnerability and my undoing. I let out a breath, brushing my lips just beneath her ear.
“Because I’m already yours, River. I’ve been yours longer than you know.”
Her fingers fist the front of my shirt, and then she’s pulling me in, closing the space. Our mouths crash together, needy, open, hot. She tastes like heat and hurt and hope. I kiss her like I’m making up for every day I couldn’t, every night I watched her through a screen, every second I held back when all I wanted was to touch.
She moans into my mouth, and I swear it rips me open.
I lift her, hands gripping the backs of her thighs as she wraps around me. Her lips don’t stop. My back hits the wall and her hips roll against mine and it’s too much and not enough all at once.
“You feel everything, don’t you?” I murmur against her mouth.
“Only with you.”
God. That right there. That’s going to wreck me.
I carry her to the couch, our lips never breaking. I kiss every inch of her skin I can reach, reverent and greedy all at once. She’s fire under my palms, and when I slide my hand up her spine and she arches into me, it’s like watching the sun rise after years in shadow.
“You’re so fucking beautiful,” I breathe. “You don’t even know.”
She reaches for my belt, fingers trembling. “I want?—”
I stop her with a kiss.
“I’m not going anywhere,” I whisper, forehead to hers. “We don’t have to rush. I want every piece of you. But I want you to feel safe even more.”
