The air chilled and warmed her simultaneously, but she felt heat in his touch. The earth rejoiced that they were here, full of energy and talent and letting it ride out in streamers.
His tongue brushed her lips, teasing. Her lips parted, allowing him in, drawing at his mouth until she pulled a gasp from his throat and his hands snaked under the sweatshirt.
They’d done this before, but now was different. Somehow new and familiar at the same time. Her insides were melting away, and it was a good thing his hands were there to hold her up because she was falling against him. A hand cupped her breast, and she moaned into his mouth, arching her back when his thumb found the most sensitive bits.
Suddenly she wasn’t chilly at all.
In fact, she could do with a lot less clothing.
Her hands explored under the hem of his T-shirt, stroking along the planes of his stomach, tracing the muscles of his chest. One of his hands stroked down her back and found its way beneath the waistband of her jeans, just an inch, maybe two, but just feeling his fingers on more sensitive skin had her panting into his mouth.
He dragged the sweatshirt over her head before she even knew what he was doing. Then his mouth was on her neck, his hands grabbing her thighs and lifting her, carrying her back to the car in such a way that she wanted him to quit with the gentle stuff and push her up against the side of the car, just to feel the sheer power of it.
He did exactly that. It felt even better than she expected. The radio was still on, some announcer’s voice filling the afternoon air with football scores or weather reports or even the price of tea in China.
She so didn’t care, because Hunter’s shirt was gone and he was kissing inside the neckline of her top. He was pressed so tightly against her that she could feel everything, and it was amazing and terrifying and sensual and breathless and she couldn’t think.
Her hands groped for the button to his jeans. Hunter made a low sound, an encouraging sound.
But then he broke the kiss and caught her wrist. “Wait,” he said, his voice rough.
And worried. He reached past her and turned up the radio. “What did he just say?”
Kate could barely comprehend English, and she struggled to wrap her brain around this sudden shift. “What is it? What—”
“Shh.” He put a finger over her lips, his attention on the radio.
Then she picked up what the announcer was saying.
“. . . Mrs. Dean recently lost her niece Calla Dean in a school carnival fire a few days ago. She states that prior to his disappearance, Noah was a good student who had never given any indication of running away. He’d indicated problems with a student at the high school, and we’ll update this story as further information is available. For now, local police are treating the area as a crime scene. Anyone with information should call . . .”
Disappearance.
Noah Dean was missing.
CHAPTER 26
Hunter headed back toward Annapolis, sticking to the speed limit.
He couldn’t afford attention.
A big part of his brain was crying for him to make a run for it. It wasn’t like he’d gone after Noah Dean in secret. Vickers knew. Other students knew. What had that news report said? A crime scene? The cops could be looking for him.
And really, he shouldn’t give a crap about one kid who’d caused more than his share of misery.
Hunter just couldn’t shake the feeling he was somehow responsible .
He’d tried to find another report, but now the DJ didn’t want to do much more than churn out the same crap pop songs he played every hour.
Kate was searching on her phone.
Or she was trying to.
“We’re going to have to wait until we get out of the mountains,” she said. “The Internet is taking forever to load.”
“Should you text Silver?”
She didn’t say anything, and Hunter glanced over to see her studying the face of her phone, her mouth squinched up like she was deep in thought.
“Hey,” he said. “Can you text Silver and ask him what to do?”
“No.”
“No?”
She looked over at him. “Have you considered that Silver might be the reason Noah is missing?”
Those coils of tension wound their way around Hunter’s chest again. He felt like such an idiot—hadn’t he agreed to help them yesterday? And now one kid was missing, and he felt ready to go to pieces.