Page 148 of Insatiable

Kade quickly slows down and pulls off to the side. “You should’ve said.” The helmet comes off, then he pulls off his hoodie and gives me it. “Here.”

“Won’t you get cold?”

He shakes his head as he puts the helmet back on.

Kade helps me get my helmet off and pulls the hoodie over me before putting the helmet back on. I sigh at the warmth. I feel him around me. My helmet rests against his back as he starts off, going at a steady pace before he speeds up, and my pulse spikes from the adrenaline.

I keep my eyes open this time, enjoying it, the view around us merging until it becomes a mass of lights and colours, and I find myself smiling.

I’m smiling so hard my face hurts.

He slows as we approach a stop sign and waits for cars to pass at the intersection. “I heard you giggle, Freckles. I think you secretly like it.”

“I did not,” I say through a grin, my arms still around him, even though we’re not moving. “I coughed.”

“That’s a lie.”

My leg tenses as he reaches back, circling his fingers around my thigh and sending flutters everywhere. Waiting. The lights are still red, and a huge part of me wants them to stay red.

“Your cough sounds like you have asthma.”

I swallow as his thumb moves against my leg. “Shut up.”

He chuckles deeply.

The lights turn green, and his touch vanishes as we set off once more.

We eventually stop near a beach, where the sun is nearly gone behind the sea. Orange, red and yellow hues dance together as people still surf, a group of underage teenagers drink around a fire, music playing on a speaker, and a couple sit in the sand, watching the sky like us.

We keep our helmets on, and when Kade’s hand finds my leg again, I keep my arms around him. A few minutes go by before I speak. “I don’t want to go home anytime soon.”

“You want to go somewhere else?” he asks, and when I nod, we sit for another ten minutes, comfortably, before he drives us to a quiet pier.

The bike moves over the wood until we come to a stop between loads of boats. He kicks the stand out. We’re invisible. No one can see us. Was that his plan? Is he going to try to fuck me here?

Is this all about sex?

“Get off,” he orders me, and I frown in confusion.

When I don’t move, he says, “Sit in front of me.”

Deftones is playing through the helmets, a band I’ve noticed Kade’s also been listening to a lot recently. He helps me off, and before I can ask what’s going on, he lifts me up and sits me in front of him, so we’re face to face. He shifts back, so it’s more comfortable, my legs draped over his.

He flips his visor open, then mine, his eyes as breath-taking as ever. “You want to sit here for a while?”

I bite my lip, the bike warm beneath me. “And do what?”

“I can think of a few things.”

I tilt my head as he reaches up and unclips my helmet, then pulls it off. It drops on the pier beneath us, the hoodie following. We can still hear the music.

The breeze hits my skin, but that’s not the reason for my hard nipples or the shivers running up my spine. His touch is electrifying.

“Are you going to let me kiss you yet?”

I shake my head, and Kade huffs.

My heart pounds in my chest as he traces his finger along my collarbone then hooks it under one of my dress straps and pulls it down my arm. The other follows. He unclips my bra and throws it aside.

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