Paint It All Red (Page 28)

He doesn’t come, and I frown. Usually he’s all over us after we’ve been gone for a minute.

Deciding to chase him down later, I go to the fridge and grab a bottle of water, but my hand hovers over a bottle as I stare and tilt my head.

It’s a habit to count things and take in my surroundings, always aware of any change. And I’m positive there were three beers beside my water this morning. Now there’s only one beer.

Slowly, I grab my water as a chill slides down my spine. It’s possible Jake has already started drinking, but doubtful, considering there were no beer cans near him.

It feels like someone else is here, but I don’t make it obvious by looking around. The living room is just beyond me, and I grab a knife and an apple, acting as though I’m about to peel it.

Abandoning the water bottle, I stab a new nail into my wax apple to represent the man I wanted dead the second most, but I pause, noticing it’s been turned. I look at this apple every single day. I know it’s not facing the right angle.

I move through the house, seeing nothing obviously out of place, but there is more sand in the dining room than normal. Bennett should be all over my feet right now, but he’s not.

Slowly, I start peeling the apple as I move into the living room, and the chill in my spine has it stiffening. There’s no doubt that I feel eyes on me right now.

“If you’ve hurt my cat, you have no idea what that will cost you.”

I spin around, the knife in hand as I drop the apple, but my entire body turns to stone when I see someone smirking at me from the corner.

Logan pushes off from the wall, and I’m tempted to pinch myself just to be sure I’m not hallucinating or dreaming.

“Your cat’s name is Bennett?” he asks, his lips twitching as the knife tumbles from my hand. “I’m not sure how I feel about that,” he goes on, stalking closer.

My bad leg tries to give out, and I stumble, but Logan’s arms are immediately around me, his scent engulfing me as those hands grip my waist.

I tilt my head back as unshed tears start clouding my eyes, and he stares expectantly.

“You’re here,” I rasp, which is a ridiculous thing to say after three months.

“You let me think you were dead,” he says, his voice strained.

“I didn’t want to risk contacting you and getting you in trouble,” I quickly explain. “They were monitoring your calls because you were stirring up trouble even on leave and—”

He puts a finger over my mouth, silencing my babble.

“They still don’t know it was you. Did you kill Jason as a sign to me that you’re still alive, or was he just unfinished business? The torture was mild in comparison to the others, almost as though you were in a hurry.”

He pulls his finger down from my lips, dragging it, and I shudder against him while staring into those too-familiar blues.

“It was the safest way to tell you. I didn’t think it’d take them so long to find him. And I couldn’t do it sooner because I couldn’t even walk without crutches until—”

He silences me when his lips come down on mine, and I melt against him, reveling in the feel of his kiss. Tears spring from my eyes as I kiss him harder, clinging to him like I can’t let go.

I’m breathless and dizzy when he finally breaks the kiss, but I manage to blink the tears away and speak.

“How’d you find me?”

“You said if you could be anywhere, you’d be in Greece with me. I hoped that meant you came to wait,” he says softly, thumbing my chin.

“But your job—”

“I left it,” he says, studying my eyes.

“And your life—”

“Is wherever you are. Guess you shouldn’t have been so perfect if you didn’t want me to love you this much.”

I blow out a frustrated breath over that word. Perfect. He knows the truth is so far from that now.

“I didn’t want you to sacrifice everything for—”

He kisses me again, most likely to shut me up, but I don’t care. Any reason for his lips to be on mine is a perfect reason.

Finally, he breaks the kiss.

“I signed up to ensure justice,” he says, brushing his lips over mine. “I didn’t sign up to play politics. I’d rather be in Greece with you than sitting in someone’s pocket back home. And before you get the clever idea to leave me behind because you think you’re ruining anything for me, you should know I can’t ever go back.”

My brow furrows. “Why?”

“Because I made sure there was no way to leave you with any doubt.”

My eyes search his, and it finally dawns on me. “It was you who shot Christopher,” I whisper in shock.

“That was my message to you,” he goes on. “Didn’t realize it’d take them so long to find the body.”

I shiver in his arms, realizing how fucked up this token of love would be to the rest of the world. But to me, roses and poems can’t compare.

“So you’re here to stay?” I ask, still reeling.

“You can’t ever leave me again. I’m assuming there aren’t any other secrets?”

“No other debts to collect,” I assure him.

He stares at my lips like they’re fascinating, still cupping my chin as he starts backing me toward my room. I guess he’s been getting familiar with the home.

“Where’s my cat?” I ask, which sounds stupid.

“I was surprised you had a pet,” he says, amused as he dodges my question.

“Did he run out?”

“No,” he says, smiling broader. “He’s probably purring away with—”

“Oh, good. You’re here.” Hadley’s voice has me snapping my head around as she walks out of my room, holding a purring Bennett in her arms. “Your cat has bald spots that are confusing me.”

“What are you doing here?” I ask, shocked.

She shrugs, inspecting Bennett’s ugly coat that is gradually getting better.

“Where else would I be? Now about your cat… What’s wrong with him?”

“He was a stray and had something stuck in his fur. Jake shaved off the glue-like stuff about two weeks ago when we found him.”

She rolls her eyes. “Speaking of Jake, where is he?”

“He’s the bum with his arm over his face who is sleeping on the beach.”

Hadley grins at us and puts Bennett down as she skips toward the door. I hope Jake is prepared to be surprised. I also hope she wasn’t just a fling to him, since she’s sort of in Greece right now.

“Back to where we were,” Logan says, turning my face back to meet his. “I had Hadley do a search of a list of surnames. I knew you wouldn’t change your first name. Lana Vorhees was pretty obvious, considering I watched Friday the Thirteenth all the time when I was a kid.”

I smile like an idiot for no reason at all.

“Me too.”

He brushes his lips over mine again, still backing us toward my room.

“Then it was even more obvious when I saw Jake Vlad listed under this address as well. Not sure that Vlad is the best name for him.”

“He used to dress up as Vlad the Impaler every Halloween when we were kids,” I explain, still smiling.

We’re so morbid.

“I picked a little less obvious name,” he says with a shrug.

“Oh?”

“White,” he says, shrugging while smirking.

“As in Carrie White?”

He nods slowly, still backing me toward the room until my legs finally hit the bed. In one motion, he bends and tosses me to the bed, and I squeal like a little girl.

He comes down on top of me, and I giggle like an idiot, smiling up at him as he kisses the tip of my nose.

“So this is real. You and me. We’re actually going to get to be together?”

“Not possible for you to get rid of me,” he says, kissing my lips.

“I can’t believe you’re actually here,” I moan as his lips start trailing down my neck.

He leans up on his elbows as I start stripping. He watches me, but finally he decides to shed his clothes too. As soon as we’re both bare, he settles between my legs, but he stares into my eyes while pushing a piece of hair away from my face.

“I decided if I could choose anywhere in the world to be, it’d be wherever you were,” he says before he kisses me, silencing whatever girly, swoony thing that would have come out of my mouth.

And I kiss him back with everything in me as he thrusts inside me, filling me so completely that every nerve in my body feels electrified.

“I love you,” I whisper across his lips.

“I love you, Lana Vorhees,” he says, grinning.

It’s our own twisted version of perfection.

EPILOGUE

Three years later…

LOGAN

Lana is laughing with Hadley as they read Laurel’s latest letter. Lindy May sends all of Laurel’s letters to Olivia. And Olivia sends them to a home in Greece that Lana owns, but we don’t ever stay there.

Laurel has turned into a fun, witty girl who has managed to put her past behind her and move forward. Lindy has given her all the tools to do that, and she’s finally moved on herself in her quest to save Laurel.

Her ex-husband killed himself a little over two years ago. Lana and Jake broke out the champagne to celebrate, since they’d apparently driven him to that.