eyes again. “You embarrassed?”
She crosses her arms over her chest, gritting her teeth. “I don’t want to get naked in front of—”
I turn around before she finishes her sentence, standing guard, keeping an eye out on the path a few feet from us, making sure no one comes this way. “Go ahead, you little brat.”
She laughs, relief in that sound.
It takes an effort not to turn around and look when I hear her changing, but I don’t, and finally she says, “All done,” her words kind of…sheepish, and I turn to look at her.
My breath catches in my throat, and the first thing I can think to say is, “You’re not fucking wearing that.”
Her face falls as I take in the swell of her perfect tits, barely hidden in that V of the black string bikini, the bottom straps high on her hips, but cut close to her thigh.
She crosses her arms over her belly, her face flushing pink as anger makes me clench my jaw.
“Why?” she falters, her feet bare, toes flexing in the grass. Her voice is soft. Weak. Not like the girl I know. “Does it look bad?”
I finally drag my gaze up to her eyes, my hands clenched into fists.
I see her looking down, like she doesn’t want to face me.
“What?” I counter, shaking my head, stepping closer to her. I open my mouth to speak again but she cuts me off, bending down and snatching up her shirt, the rest of her shit half in her backpack.
She goes to force the tank top over her head, saying, “Never mind, I don’t even want to go fucking swimming.”
I grab her wrists, pinning them together over her head, her shirt falling to the ground.
Her eyes are narrowed on me, that flush extending down over her neck, her chest. “Let go of me,” she snarls, and I see it. How she wants to cover herself. Her belly, round and growing.
I step closer, my fingers biting into her wrists as she tries to get away from me. “You feeling insecure, Sid Rain?” I ask, looking down into her eyes, her body elongated with the way I’m holding her hands over her head.
“Get off of me.” She tries to jerk her wrists from my grip, but I reach my free hand to her hip, shove her back against the tree behind her.
A startled little gasp leaves her lips.
“Tell me,” I demand, my body pressed against hers, my cock growing hard with her nearness, her wrists pressed against the tree over her head. “Tell me how you feel.”
She swallows, averting her eyes again. “Please let go, Jeremiah.”
I grab her chin, jerk her head up. “Tell me how you feel, sis.”
She glares at me a long moment, her eyes watery as she bites her lip. I see her chest heaving, and I want to dive down, bite her tits, leave a mark on her. Show her how beautiful she is.
Even when she’s pregnant with his fucking baby.
But I wait.
And finally, she says, “I feel…” She closes her eyes tight. “Ugly.”
My chest tightens.
“I feel gross. And he…” She falters, chewing the inside of her cheek. My fingers tighten around her wrists, thinking of what he’s done to her. That scar over her brow that I know she lied to me about. Where he is now. “He’s already fucking someone else. Maybe he thinks I’m disgusting, too.”
I tighten my hold on her chin. “Look at me.”
She squeezes her eyes tighter, but after a moment, she opens them, blinking back tears. “You’re fucking beautiful.” I lean down close to her, lick her tears from her lower lash line. She seems to relax against that tree. Stops fighting my hold on her wrists. “And if anyone looks at you for too long when we get in that water, baby,” I press a kiss to her brow, “I’ll drown them.”
It doesn’t take long for someone to do exactly that.
Sid is coming out from underneath the waterfall, at the edge just a light spray of water, slicking back her wet hair, her chin tilted up, face to the sun. She’s sexy as fuck, and I watch her from beside Nicolas and Ria, leaned against the grassy ledge adjacent it, the squish of the river beneath our feet.
People are crowded near her, waiting for their turns under the lighter part of the stream, but there’s a few fucking college kids—judging by the AU T-shirts they peeled off before they jumped in—causing a fucking scene. One of them knocks into