Binding 13 (Boys of Tommen, #1)

by Chloe Walsh

I was freezing my tits off beside her in nothing but a pair of training shorts, socks, and studded football boots. Oh, and the pink fucking schoolbag slung on my back. They could look all they wanted; my only concern was getting this girl’s head checked out.

It mattered that she was able to do this to me. It mattered that, hours later, I was still thinking about her, wondering about her, and inevitably worrying about her. It mattered that she mattered when no one ever mattered to me before.

I felt him shift beside me and then his fingers were on my chin, tipping my face up to his. “You’re safe,” he whispered, cupping my cheek in his hand, eyes boring holes straight through my soul. “I promise.” That word. God. That one word broke me. It was all too much. My life. Those girls. My father. And in the middle of it all, I could only see him. This boy.

My dinner, prick, I wanted to roar.

“Now,” I sneered, glaring down at their faces. “Who wants to call my girlfriend a whore to my face?”

“You sure as shit did something to her,” I snarled. “And when you fuck with her, you fuck with me.”

I didn’t care if it would hurt me. I didn’t care, period. Because I was vulnerable around this girl. Shannon Lynch utterly disarmed me.

Instead, I nestled my cheek against his side and closed my eyes, allowing myself to drift off to sleep without an ounce of fear in my heart because it couldn’t exist inside of me, not when this boy had his arm around me.

“Fine, lad, I’ll help you,” Gibsie replied with a sigh. “Even though it’ll never work, you’re doomed to fail, and I’ll more than likely end up giving the best man speech at your wedding at some ridiculously young age because you’ll have bulldozed the shit out of things, for now, I will absolutely help you bury your head in the sand.”