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Tate. Coleson. The best friend that I ever had. Who then became the worst friend that I ever had.
The other one has his head ducked towards the door, eyes alight and molten, with a grin tugging at his lips. My heart shivers with pleasure as I rush towards the library. Tate Coleson just smiled at me.
“What are the little tabs for?” His eyes are back on the book stacks, much to my horror. “I tab the useful bits of information. Vivid and grotesque murder scenes, for example.”
“Tate cannot see you like this,” Mitch says. “In fact, Tate cannot see other people seeing you like this. He’s going to go insane.”
“River,” he says, in a low and deadly voice. “Look me in the eyes, right now.”
wrapped up with a little ribbon, there is a tiny perfect wooden bookcase.
“Can I touch your stomach, River?”
“I only want to listen if I’m with you,” he says quietly, hands gripping his knees. Then he looks up my body until his eyes finally meet mine. “Only with you.”
“Are you going to let me spoil you, River?”
“Such a gentleman,” I grumble dryly and I sink back against the comforter. I look at my college brochures and I want to hurl them out of the window. He shakes his head and walks out of the room. “Only with you.”
“I had to come and check on my favourite girl,”
“They’re not allowed to make fun of you. No one’s going to say anything to you about this because, if they do, they’ll have to deal with me.” He flashes me a cocky boyish smile. “You’re mine.”
“You are my prey. But you’re also-” He fishes out the chain from under his shirt and holds the cross pendant up to me. “-the answer to all of my prayers.”
“It’s your fault, you know,” I whisper quietly, rocking when we hit a speed bump because, feeling que cera cera, I didn’t strap myself in. “I thought you were my best friend, and you ruined it. And now I have to sleep in your bed and I can’t get this itch off of me. I want this feeling to stop, but there’s only one thing I can think of to solve it, and we… we can’t do that.”
“Why can’t we do that?” he pleads, eyes imploring, veins cording.
“Because priests are celibate,” I conclude. Suddenly he throws open the driver’s door, slams it shut, and then I’m being yanked into the storm outside. His hands grip my waist and his eyes are aflame. His voice is nothing more than a growl when he finally says, “Then it’s a good thing I’m not a priest.” He tosses me over his shoulder and thunders into the house.
“Can I kiss you, please?”
“I need you to say yes or no, River,” he urges, eyes trained on my lips.
“Okay,” I say. “Yes Tate, you can.” He smiles against my lips. “Thank you,” he says. And then he kisses me.
He breathes out a laugh and buries his face into my neck. “‘Okay’,” he repeats, his voice tormented. “I have to do better than that.” He lifts back up and looks down into my eyes. “Have you ever been kissed before? In fact, don’t answer that.” He threads his fingers through my hair and gives me a devious smile. “I am your first kiss.”
“What tattoo are you going to get?” I ask, my voice trembling only a little. “Your name, across my knuckles,” he replies immediately.
“Why do you keep saying that I ruined everything for us? How can you say that? I would have done anything for you.”
“College or no college, I can make it work. I can do long distance.”
“I knew that my girl would be the sweetest little thing in here tonight.”
“As soon as they’re gone, I’m yours,”
“Hey quarterback,” I tease and he gives me a cocky flash of perfect white teeth. “Hey wife,” he says, and he presses a firm kiss into my neck.
I shove the note back into my bag and take the exit to the right, not knowing how wrong I was about to be.
And I know more than anything that his deepest fantasy involves getting a nice girl to say I do by a church altar and then pumping her pregnant for the rest of her life.
“I’ll make it fit,” he whispers darkly.
“That’s my girl.”
I should never have believed him, I think to myself. I knew that this was too good to be true. My trust. My faith. My fault.
My eyes flash in shock to Hudson’s fist, which only two seconds ago was meeting Tate’s jaw. Unflinching, Tate hasn’t moved a millimetre. His eyebrow arches as his hand goes up to stroke his cheek and a bemused look crosses his face as his eyes finally flick back down to Hudson. And then he smiles.
“It’s not goodbye sex. I’m keeping her.”
Tate laces his fingers through my hair as he whispers, “I just got her back.”
“Stop thinking about everyone else, River - no one else matters. I want it to be you and me. If you move in with me after you graduate he’ll never know where you are. I’ll never let him near you again.”
“I’ve wanted you for my entire life. I’ve been in love with you for my entire life. Can’t you see this? Can’t you see what we have? We won’t ever find this with another person – I know that I won’t. It’s only going to ever be like this with you, River.” I bite down hard on my lip as he presses his forehead to mine, and a lone tear runs down his cheek. “Only with you.”
“Because you turned eighteen yesterday, baby,” he says softly, “so I had to come and get my girl.”
My eyes instantly move to his hand and my mouth drops open. I read the letters freshly inked into his knuckles in neatly scripted capitals. RIVER. Just like he always said he would.
“I’ve loved you forever baby, and I have no intentions of stopping. You made me a better man than I ever thought I could be, and I want to live the rest of my life with you. Only with you. So please will you do me the honour of being my lawfully wedded wife?”
